State treasurer coming to Ruston pushing grants

State Treasurer John Schroder will be in Ruston on Tuesday pushing a program that offers $15,000 grants to small business owners to reimburse their COVID-19 expenses.

Schroder will be at City Hall at 2 p.m. to answer questions about the Louisiana Main Street Recovery Program. The meeting will be held in the former courtroom on the second floor. Seating is limited. Those wanting to attend should email hperot@ruston.org.

Businesses may be eligible for a grant if the business incurred interruption, disruption, unplanned expenses, or extraordinary costs associated with the COVID-19 pandemic or the public health measures put in place by state or local government officials, according to the website Louisiana-MainStreet.com.

If a business has already received assistance from other government programs, it may still be eligible for the grant program, the website said.

Louisiana allocated $275 million of the funds it received from the federal CARES Act to small business through the recovery program from economic support.

Schroder, whose office is administering the funds, had apparently anticipated the money would go quickly when the application period opened in late July. But it hasn’t.

There is approximately $256 million left for distribution, the website shows.

As of Thursday, there have been 2,468 applications awarded or paid through Aug. 26, with the average grant of $7,718, according to the website. The site says the program wants to award $40 million to minority, women and veteran-owned businesses by Sept. 25.

The deadline to submit an application for Louisiana Main Street Recovery money is Nov. 4.