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WILKES-BARRE — The Emergency Relief Loan Program announced Monday by the city for small businesses takes up where the one for restaurants left off.

One-year, no-interest loans up to $3,000 are available for existing non-franchised/locally owned small businesses within the city. To be eligible, businesses can have between one and five full-time employees and must have been completely closed due to the COVID-19 mandated shutdown by the state.

The program is designed to aid projects that will serve a “public purpose,” the city said in a press release. The projects will primarily promote public health, safety or welfare and provide overall benefit to the citizens. They also will stabilize or increase the tax base and increase private investment.The guidelines and applications can be found on the city’s website, www.wilkes-barre.city/emergencysmallbusinessloan.

The applications must be completed and received by Friday, May 22, verified by an electronic time stamp, if sent by email, or postmark if sent through the U.S. Postal Service.

“Extending the successful restaurant loan program to other small business will further help to get Wilkes-Barre’s economy back on track,” Mayor George Brown said in a press release.

The restaurant loan program closed Friday and distributed $241,450 to 36 applicants. The program was available to locally owned, non-franchised restaurants within the city. The terms were almost identical, but the maximum loan was $7,500.

The programs are funded by an underused state Enterprise Zone Development Program for the downtown. The program account had more than $300,000 in it and had not been touched for 14 years. The city received permission from the state Department of Economic and Community Development to appropriate the funds citywide.

Reach Jerry Lynott at 570-991-6120 or on Twitter @TLJerryLynott.