Local businesses try to get aid

Local businesses try to get aid

All the new details.

Announcer says "watching newswan has been talking to banks and our state lawmakers throughout the week about this exact situation.

Alicia, what can you tell us?

It's not a surprise that the money ran out but it is horrible timing -- many banks were just getting to the point where they could start processing these ppp loan applications and now small businesses wondering what's going to happen next.

Small businesses have been urgently trying to get loans through the cares act and ppp loans.

Some of them have been successful.

Pat says: it made it so we can commit to our employees that you don't need to worry about your job for now because were looking really pretty well others have not.

Paul says: i woke up this morning hearing on cnn that the program has expired the funds are gone so i do not know at this point if i who actually moved expeditiously as possible to get this will get the loan just yesterday, i spoke with the ceo of people's bank about what would happen if ppp loan funding ran out.

Ken says: surprisingly, it's gone longer than i thought.

A lot of banks were a little slower getting involved with the process, but it won't last much longer.

What happens whenever that does run out?

Once it's done, then we can't get an authorization from sba, so there'll be no funds guaranteed.

Now, that's exactly what has happened and banks and businesses don't know where to turn.

Senator merkley has called the ppp loan plan "botched" -- last week i spoke with the senator who said they aren't seeing fair treatment for businesses from all banks.

Merkley says: we're seeing one bank saying it's capitalization is insufficient to do more applications that's wells fargo we have others that said they're just going to focus on folks they have relationships with so the door is closed and to others and in fact we called through the banks and credit unions that were eligible and found we only found four that said they would take applications from folks i don't have a relationship with some banks are doing all they can but are facing their own hurdles -- ken says: has the communication been challenging through this process for you being a bank?

It has.

They took a program that sba used for 50 years and added the ppp program to it and then modified some of the rules so what used to be in eligible is eligible under ppp some different changes and we've been trying to learn the rules i reached out to umpqua bank today who replied with this statement -- saying in part "though all initial sba funding has now been allocated, we are continuing to process applications so businesses still needing aid can get the relief they need if and when additional funding is made available by congress."

Many of the small businesses i talked to today say if they don't get financial help soon they will have to close down in the next few months.

Reporting from home, alicia rubin newswatch 12.