(Photo: Michael Baker International courtesy of Boulder County)Businesses and homeowners hit by the massive flooding along the Front Range a year ago got nearly $110 million in loans from the Small Business Administration in the past year.
In the past year the SBA approved more than 2,500 low-interest disaster assistance loans for Colorado businesses, homeowners, and renters hit by flood waters.
The disaster assistance loans are long-term and meant to help people who didn’t have insurance or didn’t get everything covered.
SBA regional administrator Matt Varilek says the anniversary of the floods is a good time to remind small businesses to try to prepare for a disaster.
Click to see flood recovery photos:
"If you’re a sole proprietor for example, that means you’re everything from the CEO, to the accountant, to everything in between," Varilek says. "You don’t have a risk management officer so you probably haven’t spent a whole lot of time focused on disaster preparedness."
He says some steps include reviewing insurance coverage, creating a crisis communications plan, and coming up with ways to keep a business running even if the building is in, is destroyed.
Varilek says sometimes insurance won’t cover everything, so the loans helped some businesses reopen. The SBA says in general, a quarter of businesses that close because of a disaster never reopen.
You want to know what is really going on these days, especially in Colorado. We can help you keep up. The Lookout is a free, daily email newsletter with news and happenings from all over Colorado. Sign up here and we will see you in the morning!
Colorado Postcards are snapshots of our colorful state in sound. They give brief insights into our people and places, our flora and fauna, and our past and present, from every corner of Colorado. Listen now.
Join us for these upcoming events!
It takes a good day’s drive to cover Colorado, but we’ll help you do it in a few minutes. Our newsletters bring you a closer look at the stories that affect you and the music that inspires you.