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OMAHA — A federal program to help boost small rural businesses would be extended and enhanced under a bipartisan bill to be introduced Thursday by U.S. Sen. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., and a Democratic colleague from Minnesota.
The Rural Microentrepreneur Assistance Program — created in the 2008 Farm Bill and overseen by the U.S. Department of Agriculture — provides low-interest loans to eligible development organizations. Those funds fuel revolving loans that provide help to qualified rural microenterprises.
Currently, the program relies on annual appropriations. The Senate proposal pushed by Ricketts and U.S. Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., would extend the program for five years so it no longer would require annual approval, a Ricketts spokesman said.
“Our bipartisan bill gives rural innovators more tools to expand their businesses and create jobs,” said Ricketts. “By expanding opportunity, we can help grow Nebraska.”
The measure also would increase the maximum amount a rural microenterprise may borrow, from $50,000 to $75,000. It would raise from 75% to 100% the cap on the federal source share of a project’s cost.
The bill specifies that a project loan can’t cover more than half of demolition, construction or related costs of real estate improvements Smith said that too often, residents of rural communities can’t access financing they need. “This bipartisan legislation would help them get their businesses off the ground with federal loans and technical assistance,” she said.
Kalee Olson, policy manager at the Center for Rural Affairs in Nebraska, applauded the effort, saying such programs need to evolve “to serve the changing needs of rural entrepreneurs.”
Companion bipartisan legislation was recently introduced in the House. Efforts to include the program in the next Farm Bill continue, the Ricketts team said, but Ricketts wanted a way to ensure continued growth of the program.
