Processing Your Payment

Please do not leave this page until complete. This can take a few moments.

April 30, 2020

SBA region chief: PPP rollout a ‘remarkable feat’

Connecticut lawyer Wendell G. Davis is the regional administrator for SBA Region 1, which covers Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.
By Matt Pilon

Sure, the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program has suffered from frustrating computer glitches and has disbursed some loans to companies decidedly not in need, but give the SBA a little credit, New England chief Wendell G. Davis says.

The scale of PPP and the speed at which the SBA has had to put its $430 billion (and counting) out on the streets is unprecedented.
For context, Wendell said the SBA last year issued $220 million in loans to about 700 Connecticut businesses.

“And that was considered a resounding success,” Davis said during a PPP webinar panel discussion Wednesday hosted by the Hartford Business Journal and New Haven Biz. “When you compare that with the 12.5 days where $4 billion was put on the streets of Connecticut, I mean, it’s a remarkable feat.”

Davis was referencing the more than 18,000 Connecticut companies that received about $4.1 billion in funding during the first round of PPP. He was also  responding to various media reports, both at the outset of the second round of funding this week as well as during the initial rollout earlier this month, about technical glitches that had frustrated bankers struggling to access and use the SBA’s computer system for loan application submissions.

Those glitches are subsiding, according to Davis.

“I like to call them hiccups, because hiccups go away,” he said. “The volume of emails from lenders saying ‘what the heck is going on’ has dropped to almost zero.”

Davis also addressed media reports about large companies, including those that are publicly traded, that have received PPP loans.
In recent weeks, Shake Shack, the Los Angeles Lakers and others have returned PPP money after public criticism.

The scrutiny led the U.S. Treasury to recently pledge to screen larger applications.

“It’s unfortunate that some of those funds were temporarily diverted to entities that are probably pretty well capitalized,” Davis said.

The reports, he said, also detract from the overall picture, which is that of the 1.6 million loans processed across the country, 1.2 million went to businesses requesting $150,000 or less, and 1 million went to businesses with 10 or fewer employees.

“So, notwithstanding some of the press reports out there, this did reach small business America,” he said.

Of those 1.6 million loans nationwide, about 4,400 were in excess of $5 million.

“You’re talking about a pretty small universe,” Davis said.

And of those 4,400, he would “venture to say many of those are critical manufacturers, wholesalers and other entities that desperately needed those funds.”

Sign up for Enews

Most Recent

Most Recent

0 Comments

Order a PDF