Advertisement
Northwest Reports
Listen on
00:00 /
Northwest Reports

Who Got WA’s COVID Small Business Money?

Who Got WA’s COVID Small Business Money?

Who Got WA’s COVID Small Business Money?
The Working Washington program aimed to get pandemic relief to small and “historically disadvantaged” business owners. Did it?
 

In April 2020, Washington distributed $10 million to businesses navigating the pandemic, the first of many rounds of grant funding delivered by the state.   

The Working Washington grant program was established to get money to small businesses overlooked by federal COVID relief efforts, with officials calling on the Department of Commerce to emphasize “historically disadvantaged” and BIPOC businesses.    

Crosscut filed records requests for the individual grants, finding large corporate chains among the recipients. 

In this episode, host Maleeha Syed speaks with reporter Brandon Block, who recently published a story on these findings, about where the relief dollars went – and if the state made good on its plan to reach small and historically disadvantaged businesses. 

Read more about Crosscut's analysis of Working Washington here

---

Credits

Host/Producer: Maleeha Syed and Sara Bernard

Reporter: Brandon Block

Story editor: Ryan Famuliner

Executive producer: Sarah Menzies

---

If you would like to support Crosscut, go to crosscut.com/membership. In addition to supporting our events and our daily journalism, members receive complete access to the on-demand programming of Seattle’s PBS station, KCTS 9.

Topics

Hosts

Sara Bernard

Sara Bernard

Sara Bernard is a senior podcast producer and co-host of Northwest Reports at Cascade PBS. She was previously the host and producer of This Changes Everything.

Maleeha Syed

Maleeha Syed

Maleeha Syed is a podcast producer and the co-host of Northwest Reports. She previously worked as the Cascade PBS communities reporter and as a staff reporter at the Burlington Free Press in Vermont.