Looking for money to expand a business or start a new one?
Maybe a Preserve America grant from the U.S. Department of the Interior, a loan from the American Sheep and Goat Center, or Madison facade improvement funds would help.
The examples illustrate how far Thrive has gone to amass a list of more than 300 financial resources for entrepreneurs, businesses and economic development projects in the eight-county region based in Madison.
Thrive is the economic development organization for Dane, Rock, Green, Iowa, Sauk, Columbia, Dodge and Jefferson counties.
The list, called the Capital Connections Inventory, is expected to be available online at www.thrivehere.org/capitalinventory, said project director Brad Elmer said. It includes information about each program, including funding amounts, eligibility requirements, deadlines, phone numbers, addresses and links to the programs.
"One of the things we've seen is that due to tighter lending requirements and cash-strapped companies, it's been extremely difficult to finance what are otherwise quality programs in this region," Elmer said. "There's a need to fill that gap; one of the ways to do that is to make businesses aware of all the public, private and nonprofit financing sources out there."
It took four months to compile the information, which includes grants, loans, loan guarantees and tax credits. Some are fairly well-known, such as U.S. Small Business Administration programs and Wisconsin Department of Commerce technology development funds. Others are very specialized for communities and causes.
"These are all financial programs that would complement traditional financial sources, such as bank lending," not compete with them, Elmer said. "They are all programs that would reduce a bank's risk and make (the bank) more apt to lend to a project."
The city of Madison "wholeheartedly supports" the financial inventory project, said Michael Gay, Madison business development coordinator.
"We get together as economic development professionals every quarter and we're always looking for ways to improve connections between ourselves and between the resources out there," Gay said.
Madison, for example, is looking for funding for the BioLink business incubator in the BioAg Gateway Industrial Park, on the Southeast Side, Gay said. The planned incubator building, focused on young businesses in the fields of agriculture, biotechnology and sustainability, could be sustainable if funds are found to make it geothermal, with a green rooftop, solar panels, rain barrels and other energy-efficient features.
"We're also looking to raise venture capital for the companies that locate there," Gay said.
Thrive's Elmer said there are all sorts of pockets of money available that businesses may not know about. "One of the most valuable incentives that we documented is the New Markets Tax Credit Program," he said. The program has $600 million in tax credits available for those who invest in qualified projects in low-income areas in Wisconsin.
Elmer said Thrive's inventory should streamline the money hunt for businesses and development projects.
"It's an overwhelming amount of information for an individual business owner to go out and try to find programs that might be a fit for their company without a resource like this," Elmer said.
