The City of Aberdeen is providing $100,000 in grants for hospitality businesses harmed by COVID-19-related restrictions and shutdowns.

It’s called the Small Business Resiliency Grant Program, and focuses on service industries — lodging, food and beverage, events, tourism and transportation. Businesses that include other activities can also qualify if the main goal of that business is to provide service and customer satisfaction, according to a city report.

To qualify, businesses must have 10 or fewer full-time employees. Individual grants will be $6,000 and distributed on a first-come, first-served basis until the funding is depleted.

The City Council has been working for some time to provide city-funded relief to its small businesses and had already approved the $100,000 in the 2021 general budget at its Jan. 13 meeting.

“I think with the latest shutdowns, restaurants and bars and breweries and other hospitality related businesses just felt like it was a blow that a lot of them couldn’t take,” said Ward 4 Councilwoman Deborah Ross. “We worked really hard to come up with a plan to help them recoup some of the losses they are experiencing during this latest shutdown to keep them going until they can reopen at a higher capacity.”

“I personally am really excited about it,” said Ward 3 Councilwoman Kati Kachman, chairwoman of the city’s finance committee. She said some of the federal CARES Act money the city freed up for business grants had some restrictions “that were very difficult to work around, and I think the way we designed this will help those who are struggling.”

The council Wednesday approved a contract with Greater Grays Harbor Inc. to manage the grant for the city for a 10% fee for administration of the funds.

The area-wide chamber of commerce was selected to administer the grants because it has done so with success in the past — with the City of Hoquiam for instance — and already has the mechanisms in place to properly process the applications and distribute the funds. It will take the strain off city staff, many of whom are already pulling double-duty or more outside their own job descriptions.

“Instead of having staff administer this — when we were doing the CARES funding it was a real strain on the city staff — we decided it would be better to have an organization like Greater Grays Harbor that really has their finger on the businesses in our area to do the administration of the grant,” said Ward 2 Councilman Nathan Kennedy. “They’re going to be able to really make sure the money gets where it needs to go.”

Eligible businesses are defined as those that have been under the same ownership since Jan. 1, 2020; are in the hospitality industry as previously described; are located within the city with a current city business license; have a permanent, physical storefront with walk-in facilities; and are for-profit businesses.

Community Development Director Lisa Scott Thursday had sent the paperwork to Greater Grays Harbor to get the process going. While the program hasn’t gone live yet, keep looking to aberdeenwa.gov for applications.