As shelter-in-place orders wreaked havoc on businesses in cities and towns across the United States this summer, local leaders and their teams like Dan Henderson and the Gilbert Office of Economic Development had to make some fast decisions.
As director of the Office of Economic Development in Gilbert, Arizona, a community of more than 260,000 people southeast of Phoenix, Henderson’s team had heard from local brick-and-mortar and online entrepreneurs about plummeting revenue and skyrocketing debt from unpaid rent and overdue supplier bills.
“We engaged with 1,000-plus businesses,” says Henderson. “We knew they needed money to pay rent, leases and mortgages, their employees and to pay their extended family of vendors.”
Fortunately, in late May, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey allocated $441 million in federal CARES Act funds to cities and towns around the state. That included $29.2 million for Gilbert to use toward public safety and public health personnel expenses.
After … Read more