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Date: 2/14/2023
AMHERST — On Dec. 29, 2022, the Black Business Association of Amherst Area (BBA) recently expressed dissatisfaction with the Amherst Business Improvement District’s choice of awardees in the most recent round of American Rescue Plan Act funding, saying that the BID was discriminatory against black-owned businesses.
The BID was tasked with distributing the funding to local businesses in need by the town of Amherst. BID and town officials have denied any awareness of the BBA’s existence prior to the press release and maintain their view that the process was just and fair for all applicants.
In the BBA’s view, according to a press release written by founding member Pat Ononibaku, the BID did not award grants to enough black-owned businesses, and the BBA was “not invited to the ‘table’” by the BID or the town “to determine fair and equitable distribution of the ARPA tax dollars to the business community.” Furthermore, the BBA stated it feels that the town’s use of the BID to distribute the grants is an attempt to gatekeep funding and keep the funds within the BID’s network of “mostly white wealthy property owners and land developers in Amherst.”
“The Black Business Association of Amherst Area calls upon Amherst town leaders to engage with local Black business owners who did not receive locally distributed ARPA funding or confused how to apply for it through the Business Improvement District and the Chambers of Commerce … There was no consideration to whether Black business owners who feel invisible would be able to tap into ARPA funds … With more than $11 million of ARPA funds floating around, more businesses should benefit who desperately need it. There needs to be more accountability, transparency and ability to follow the money,” as written in the Dec. 29 press release.
Approximately $100,000 was allotted for the business improvement grants. Of this, $40,000 will go to new business grants, $25,000 to existing business grants and $35,000 to technical assistance grants. Approximately $49,000 was awarded in the first round. According to BID Executive Director Gabrielle Gould, 97 percent of the $49,000 went to “marginalized businesses.”
“The way we look at our grant structure is that we look at BIPOC, LGBTQ+ and women-owned businesses as ‘marginalized’ … Women in small business is very small and it is an uphill battle, as it is for transgender, LGBTQ and BIPOC members … Our definition of BIPOC is ‘Black and Indigenous people of color;’ that is Latinx, that is all Asian and Eastern Asian people, and that is Black and Indigenous people; anyone that does not self-identify as ‘white.’ Ninety-seven percent of our grants from the first round of ARPA funds, which was a total of $49,000, went to those communities. We stand by that we are doing more than the quote-unquote mandate of 50 percent,” Gould said.
When asked about how many of the marginalized businesses that were awarded were specifically Black-owned, Gould said that four Black owned businesses were awarded in total.
“Out of the new business grants, we awarded three [businesses]. Two of them are Black-owned businesses … Out of the technical assistance grants, we awarded three again, and two of them are Black-owned,” Gould said.
She said that only one Black-owned business applied for an existing business grant, and that this business was not selected because it was “not in good standing;” the grants are too small to be used to get back in good standing.
“So far in existing businesses, we awarded 10 existing business grants, and 19 business applied … Only one out of the nine existing businesses that were not awarded was Black-owned, and that was because that business was not in good standing … Only one Black-owned business applied for that grant,” Gould said. “In this case, ‘in good standing’ means that you are up to date on your rent, you have no closures from any government entity and that you are in good standing with the town on your taxes, etc. … This grant cannot be used for rent.”
Gould was adamant that the award selection process free of racial discrimination. She also emphasized the BID’s efforts to make the grant process as a whole more accessible.
“None of that has been done with bias and none of that has been done in any way discriminatory. It has all been open to everybody to apply, and we have tried to keep our grants very, very simple because we do not believe small business owners should also be experts in grant writing and reporting, so we have tried to make things as easy as possible and to do as much of that work as possible,” Gould said.
In her view, the BID was contracted by the town to distribute the funds because of its members’ experience with grants, and the organization’s familiarity with the local business community.
“How the BID came to assist with this grant program was based on the experience we had during the pandemic of awarding over a quarter of a million dollars of grants to the community and having a process in place that could do that, and the town felt that we were a solid community group to steward these funds to the small businesses; a group that has had a lot of experience in not only grant writing, but also grant allocation through the people in our office, because this has literally been our entire lives’ careers,” Gould said.
The BID does not pocket any of the funding despite performing the lengthy selection process. According to Gould, the BID is completely transparent with the town and the public in general, and grants can only be awarded to those who apply; businesses cannot just be selected off of perceived merit by the BID at random.
“The BID as an entity takes 0 percent of these funds. If I were any other entity doing this, the average is between 10 and 25 percent in admin fees. We are taking none of that, we are making sure that all $100,000 gets out to small businesses in the community … We report fully to the town of Amherst … What we keep seeing happening is we report on this and then we’re told that we’re not doing it to enough Black-owned businesses. We can only give grants to businesses that apply for grants … We can’t give grants to people that do not apply to the grant program,” Gould said.
Gould stated that neither she nor her BID colleagues had ever heard of the BBA prior to this incident, but also said that she is very reachable and that her organization is always open to working with community members to improve the community.
“Our organization, the BID, has never heard of this BBA. I have never met anyone associated with that. I have been in this office for three and a half years, I have a street-front office, my doors are always open. We as an organization say that our minds are always open and we are always open to new ideas and new ways that we can do more and do better. We have never met anyone from these organizations, they have never come to speak with us, meet with us or help us learn or do better,” Gould said.
Ononibaku refuted Gould’s assertion that she had never come into contact with the BBA prior to the press release. She said the BBA was founded as a support group for Black businesses in 2016.
“The BBA was founded in 2016 by a group of local Black business people. I was one of the founding members. If Gould is saying she does not know [of the BBA], she chose not to, because people know that the BBA exists … The reason why we have this organization in the first place is some Black business owners, myself included, felt very invisible by the discriminatory practices of the Chamber of Commerce and BID, and the whole Amherst business community. My group is free for anyone who identifies as Black. We created this group as a support for one another, to help each other grow,” Ononibaku said.
The BBA represents 20 businesses in Amherst, owned by 17 different individuals, as some members own more than one business, and some businesses have multiple owners. One of these businesses is Hazel’s Blue Lagoon, a restaurant owned by Junior Williams and Patrick Chapman. Hazel’s was the business Gould referred to being denied for an existing business grant due to its not being in good standing. Williams explained that his business was rejected from two different categories, and that the small sums offered in the grant program are “disrespectful” in the context of the larger awards being given to other businesses.
“We’ve been here since 2021 and we’ve yet to be issued anything. The money that was offered to us, that we applied for, again was a slap in the face; $1,000 to $5,000, when you have people getting $75,000 to $300,000, and then still getting turned down and not knowing the reasons behind being turned down. If we’re not an existing business from 2021, we couldn’t apply because we weren’t an existing business, then we applied as a new business, then we’re told that we’re not a new business. So where do you fit in? How can you receive any funding from anybody if we don’t get the understanding from the town that we’re a business? I mean, we’re there,” Williams said.
Hazel’s gives away free food on Thanksgiving, and wants to continue its community-centric giving, but Williams feels that without proper support from the town, this will not be possible.
“Even on Thanksgiving we gave away free food. How many other businesses did that? And to give away food is something that my mother embedded in us. It’s something we love, to give back to the community. We want to continue to do that, but if we don’t have the support and funding from the town, where do we stand? We already feel like being Black is an outcast, and we shouldn’t feel that way. We should embrace everyone wanting to be a part of Amherst. But when you come to Amherst, you don’t feel that way,” Williams said.
In response to Gould’s statement that the grants would be insufficient to get a business back in good standing thus disqualifying Hazel’s, Demetria Shabazz of Black Star Transit LLC and Generation Movement Collective said they felt that it should not be the BID’s place to make such decisions, and that the BBA should be given the same say over its constituents.
“This is the problem with the selection [process]. You have this small group of people making those determinations. Who wasn’t behind during COVID[-19]? Isn’t that what the ARPA money is for? Let’s be for real. And then this handful of people making this determination? Let us have the funding for the Black businesses and make their own determinations. That is self-efficacy, that is empowerment, and that is something this town has been very reluctant to put in the hands of Black people,” Shabazz said.
Demetria’s husband and business partner Amilcar Shabazz felt that the issue was twofold. Not only are some Black-owned businesses being turned down unfairly, he said, but there are also some who have not been properly informed on the grant program, and thus were unable to benefit from it.
“Publicity is an aspect. How are people to even know that funds are available to the town to help in a recovery? And to reach out and then jump through hoops as an existing or new business only to have some, who are represented in this room, that did all of that and applied, and were turned down? So you’ve got both those who are not even aware that funding is coming to the town to help with the recovery, but then it’s also those that are aware being turned down with no real explanation as to why,” Shabazz said.
Ononibaku named a number of BBA members who were rejected by the grant program, and said that even more were unaware of it as Amilcar said.
“The town gave the money to BID, which is a commercial landlord, white people that are culturally incompetent to deal with our group. A number of BBA members applied. Hazel’s [Blue Lagoon] applied and was turned down. Aimee Salmon, who has Africana Dance, was turned down. One of our group members Tiffany Joseph is self-employed [she’s a dancer], her boss who is white was given the funding, but she didn’t get anything. With publicity, not everyone received an email from the Chamber of Commerce, so they were not aware of this,” Ononibaku said.
Yasmin Branford of Amherst Hair Extensions and Beauty Salon echoed Ononibaku’s sentiments regarding the need to take a stand.
“We feel like we’ve been overlooked. That’s exactly what happened. Our businesses are kind of nonexistent in people’s eyes … We’ve always had each other’s back in a certain sense, but now it’s time for us to actually stand together and fight back … We deserve help too,” Branford said.
In terms of why the town chose to contract the BID to select and award these grants, town Finance Director Sean Mangano gave a similar explanation to Gould’s.
“The BID is a quasi-governmental entity – meaning it has a special tax status than 501(c)3 nonprofit. We’ve had a long relationship working with the BID to support downtown and to support businesses around the community. One of the goals of the [Town] Council is to continue working with the BID and the Chamber of Commerce on economic development and supporting businesses … we reached out to both the Chamber of Commerce and the BID, and the BID determined that they would be best able to help us. We thought they had a better sense of the business community in town, and that they would be better positioned to help evaluate business proposals. This is mostly an economic development grant, so we thought they would have better expertise to evaluate start-up business applications and grant applications for growing businesses,” Mangano said.
The grant program was created with a stipulation stating that a minimum of 50 percent of funds must go to businesses owned by individuals from marginalized communities, which Mangano said was designed to prevent the gatekeeping which the BBA feels the BID is engaged in.
“I think we’re all really sensitive to the issue of making sure these grants help the most disadvantaged communities; it’s part of the ARPA grant program. That’s one of the reasons why we put in the grant rules itself that at least 50 percent of the funds have to go to businesses owned by someone who’s from a marginalized community. We were excited that the results we’ve seen so far exceed that 50 percent,” Mangano said.
The BID is made up of local business owners. When asked if this posed a conflict of interest, with business owners potentially carrying bias in awarding other businesses in the community, Mangano said that such conflicts do exist but felt that a system built on transparency is the best solution the town can provide for them.
“Part of our rules is that [the BID] was supposed to have a process, and I believe they do, to award grants and consider applications, and then there’s also reporting so that there’s transparency with how decisions are being made. I think there’s always lots of conflicts that exist out there for any entity but I think the biggest thing we can do is make sure that there’s a process that people feel okay about so that there’s transparency after the decisions are made,” Mangano said.
This issue is only in relation to the first round of funding which was recently awarded; the second round is still up for grabs. The program still has to time to right its wrongs, if any, according to Mangano.
“This grant program isn’t over yet, it’s still ongoing. I know we’re doing this check-in because there were some concerns about the program, which are totally valid to have concerns and check in on things, but I do want to say this program isn’t over yet. We allocated up to $100,000 for it, I think last time I checked they’ve spent around $40- to $50,000, so there’s still quite a bit left for this program to do and hopefully to help more businesses get started and to grow,” Mangano said
The second round of funding is currently in the application stage. The BBA demanding a seat at the proverbial table. Rather than applying to the BID in an attempt to receive awards, the BBA said it would like to be similarly contracted by the town with ARPA funds of its own to distribute among the town’s black-owned businesses.
“What we’re asking for is the town to fix the problem that they created. We are demanding $150,000 to our group for us to decide how to distribute the funds. We’re not stupid. We’re smart people and we can handle that. We do not want to go through BID, period, because we don’t feel included,” Ononibaku said.