The Shenandoah County Industrial Development Authority contemplated reducing the threshold for lending money to small businesses during its annual meeting Monday.
The loans come from a cash pool awarded to the IDA as a rural business enterprise grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The idea behind the program is that small businesses (with profits of less than $1 million and fewer than 50 employees) apply for a loan from the county’s pool of cash that they couldn’t get otherwise.
Shenandoah County Director of Economic Development Jenna French said these loans could be used to supplement a bank loan, and IDA Secretary Evan Vass suggested the loans could also go to businesses that had a high likelihood of creating jobs in the county, but might be too risky for a bank to consider.
