According to a report released today by the SBA, the US Small Business Administration has used the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) to process and distribute grants to just 50 venue operators and live performance companies. As of June 3, noon, 13,783 applications have been received by the SVOG, which corresponds to a total of 0.3% of the granted scholarships. 3,471 of the submitted apps are checked, the remaining 10,262 are waiting to be checked. To date, a total of $ 52.4 million in funds has been distributed.
The SBA has experienced numerous delays and glitches in distributing funds to venue owners and operators whose livelihoods have been turned upside down by the pandemic. In March, U.S. lawmakers sent a letter to the SBA to inquire about the delay in setting up a portal for the SVOG, which went into effect in December 2020. The agency was originally supposed to start accepting SVOG applications on April 8, but had to postpone the start to April 23 due to technical difficulties.
As reported by the New York Times, some venue operators say they have received notifications from the government that they are not eligible for aid because their name appears in the Death Master File, a list of deceased people kept by Social Security Administration is carried out.
Pitchfork reached out to representatives of the SBA for further comments.
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