Covina wants to grant wishes, but has no takers
Pasadena Star-News
By Ben Baeder
... The city has $300,000 to practically give away to small business owners, but so far this fiscal year nobody has asked for it. Since 1996, Covina has been running two programs that offer federal grants to small businesses. If the business owners abide by rules set by the city, the money does not have to be repaid...
... While it's not uncommon for money from grant programs to go unused, one expert was perplexed that business owners were not applying.
"The only thing I could think of is poor marketing," said Gary D. Painter, who studied such programs in the 1990s and is USC's director of research at Lusk Center for Real Estate. "You would think with the economy the way it is that business owners would be seeking these types of programs out," he said...