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The Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce has established a new coalition designed to advocate for better care of the region’s senior/elderly population.

The Tri-City Senior Care Support Coalition is made up of industry and community leaders, including: Carol Moser (Executive Director, Greater Columbia Accountable Community of Health), Roy Wu (Owner, Advent Care & Home Instead Senior Care), LoAnn Ayers (President and CEO, United Way of Benton & Franklin Counties), Johannah Weeks (Co-Owner, Chinook Home Care), and Kirk. F. Williamson (Program Manager, Benton-Franklin Community Health Alliance).

On Wednesday, May 13, the coalition sent a letter to U.S. Senators Patty Murray, Maria Cantwell and Representative Dan Newhouse. The letter outlined three issues for consideration: 

1. Classify Care Givers as Healthcare Workers
   
2. Include hazard pay, stipends, and/or tax relief for Care Givers (Healthcare Workers) for future legislation to incentivize hiring
   
3. Provide support for local supply chain sourcing of PPE’s to senior care facilities

As COVID-19 has ripped through the region, the Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce has been tirelessly working to support its members as well as the community at large.

“As the voice for business in the Tri-Cities, the Regional Chamber strives to bridge the divide between businesses and available resources. Sometimes during this process, gaps in service and resources are revealed – and we help fill them,” said Lori Mattson, President and CEO of the Regional Chamber.

Help Is here. 

Many business owners are struggling to understand the ever-changing available resources during the COVID-19 crisis. The Tri-City Regional Chamber is launching the Business Resource Rapid Response line to provide guidance for Tri-City businesses to connect with the resources available at the local, regional, state and federal levels. 

The Regional Chamber's Government and Regional Affairs Director, Stephanie Swanberg, will be fielding calls on the response line  Monday through Thursday from 10 am - 12 pm at 509-546-1613.

The Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce is here to help you connect to available options and new resources.

We will navigate this crisis, together.

All In Tri-Cities is a locally-organized effort to connect people who feel called to help with those most in need during the COVID-19 crisis. It mirrors a similar effort called All in Seattle which has raised over $27 million to provide immediate assistance for people impacted by COVID-19.

“Our community is struggling. Many businesses are facing uncertainty, many people have lost their jobs, some have lost loved ones, and others their sense of connection. We didn't just want to hunker down in our houses and wait. We wanted to help, but didn't know where to start, where to contribute, or even who needs help the most in our area. All in Tri-Cities came from there" said Lori Mattson, President of the Tri-City Regional Chamber. “It’s going to take a while for us to recover and we need everyone helping to get our community back to where we were.”

A diverse range of community leaders—informed by input from the cities, state and private sector— have identified trustworthy, local non-profit organizations who have an established track record of delivering high quality, inclusive services, hyper locally. These organizations are already on the ground and are quickly deploying resources to help our neighbors. All in Tri-Cities looks to serve as a catalyst to get everyone in the community who can donate or act in some way to help these organizations supporting those across our community who are impacted by the COVID-19 crisis.

Currently, they have curated organizations for:

• Food Security
• Families and Children
• Health Care
• Small Businesses
• The Arts Community
• Housing

For more information on All In Tri-Cities, visit https://www.allintricities.org/.

Eighth District Sen. Sharon Brown and Reps. Brad Klippert and Matt Boehnke, all R-Kennewick, will be hosting a telephone town hall this Thursday, April 23, from 4 - 5 pm.

During the hour-long call, the lawmakers will provide their thoughts on this year's 60-day legislative session and the ongoing coronavirus crisis. They will also take calls from constituents and ask a number of survey questions.

To participate, 8th District residents can call (509) 207-7114.

For more information, contact:

Sen. Brown at (360) 786-7614 or Sharon.Brown@leg.wa.gov
Rep. Klippert at (360) 786-7882 or Brad.Klippert@leg.wa.gov
Rep. Boehnke at (360) 786-7986 or Matt.Boehnke@leg.wa.gov

The Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce was awarded a contract from the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries (L&I) to plan and execute a monthly education series aimed at increasing employer and employee knowledge of L&I rules and regulations.

The 21 planned workshops will target small businesses and nonprofit organizations with 50 or fewer employees throughout the counties of Benton, Franklin, Walla Walla, Columbia, Grant, Yakima, and Klickitat. The workshops will be free of charge to those who wish to attend. Workshop topics will vary county by county. The Regional Chamber will work with the state and local L&I offices to develop the workshops to ensure the material is relevant to the audience. The workshops will be scheduled through June 2021. All workshops will be held in-person or delivered via Zoom.
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More information on the workshops will be released once plans are finalized. Information on the workshops will be posted on the Chamber’s Facebook page as well as here on tricityregionalchamber.com.

Congressman Dan Newhouse will discuss the federal response to COVID-19 on an upcoming webinar hosted by the Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce.

“The Federal Response to COVID-19 with Congressman Newhouse” webinar will take place on Friday, April 10 from 11 am – 12 pm. Rep. Newhouse will brief attendees on what the Federal Government is doing to combat COVID-19 and how they’re assisting small businesses. The congressman is also expected to answer questions. All questions must be submitted prior to the start of the webinar. Questions should be e-mailed to logan.lapierre@tricityregionalchamber.com.

The webinar will be free to view on Zoom and Facebook Live.

The “Ask the Experts: Responding to COVID-19" series is one of the resources launched by the Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce in order to help the Tri-Cities business community during the COVID-19 pandemic. In March, the Chamber launched the Tri-Cities: Open for Business initiative, featuring a comprehensive website featuring special service offers, food and drink pickup options, small business resources, and much more, in order to help Chamber members get the information they need during this crisis. The website, which is updated daily, can be found at tcopenforbusiness.com.

Our nation's small businesses are facing an unprecedented economic disruption due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. On Friday, March 27, 2020, the President signed into law the CARES Act, which contains $376 billion in relief for American workers and small businesses.
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In addition to traditional SBA funding programs, the CARES Act established several new temporary programs to address the COVID-19 outbreak:

Paycheck Protection Program 

Primarily for payroll expenses, the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) starts today and provides up to $10 million per small business in loan forgiveness for retaining employees. The loan forgiveness portion is dependent on keeping and paying employees or rehiring employees laid off in response to the COVID-19 national emergency. 

To find a PPP lender, contact your current bank or lender to see if they are offering PPP. Or, view a list of SBA lenders on your local district office website who may also be offering PPP: 

• Seattle District (Washington and northern Idaho)
• Portland District, page 30 (Oregon and southwest Washington)
• Boise District, page 30 (southern Idaho and eastern Oregon)
• Alaska District

Economic Injury Disaster Loan Advance (EIDL)

This loan advance will provide up to $10,000 of economic relief to businesses that are currently experiencing temporary difficulties that does not have to be repaid. This complements the traditional SBA Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program which has been in place for the entire nation, all territories and Washington, D.C. since mid-March.
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Please note the application process for the EIDL program was updated March 30. For those who submitted a COVID-19 EIDL application prior to March 30, unless you have already been approved or are currently working with a loan officer, you should re-apply using the new streamlined application if you have not done so already.  The new application is streamlined and faster. Approval notification is estimated at approximately three days.

SBA Debt Relief

The SBA is providing a financial reprieve to small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic. This covers all principal, interest and fees on current and new SBA 7(a) loans made through September 27, 2020, for up to six months. 

Express Bridge Loan

The program enables small businesses who currently have a business relationship with an SBA Express Lender to access up to $25,000 quickly.

With the unprecedented COVID-19 impacting the region, our health care providers are in need of our help.  Critical health supplies are in demand at the four regional hospitals (Trios, Lourdes, Kadlec, and Prosser Memorial) and across the health care industry.  TRIDEC, Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce and Visit Tri-Cities, partnered to help gather the needed supplies.

All our local health care providers have a critical shortage of these items and global supply chains have ceased to exist.  As the Tri-Cities community has come together to meet this urgent need, a central, easy to access location was needed. The members of the Tri-Cities Business and Visitor Center volunteered to be that central donation point while helping to communicate the need to the business community and the public at large.

During the three-day event (Monday, March 23 - Wednesday, March 25, 2020), we collected over 26,000 units of personal protective equipment for our emergency responders and healthcare workers.  The Tri-City community came out strong in support of this effort.  We are grateful to everyone who donated. 

A special thank you to the following businesses who provided large donations: CSS Farms, Kennewick School District, LIGO Hanford Observatory, O’Brien Construction, Pasco High School Bulldog Booster Club, and Spectrum. 

“We were asked by members of our board from the healthcare community to get the word out to the business community and ask them to donate any excess supplies,” said Karl Dye, President of TRIDEC.  “We had no idea what the response would be, but this is incredible!” he added.  “It shows the level of connection and commitment to our community that we all share.”

“Our community is amazing, thank you! The health care teams across our region are so grateful for the support. It is truly inspiring. We would also like to express our appreciation to the business community for launching this effort, and for our EMS partners for being the ongoing community collection site,” said Jim Hall, Director of Executive and Community Relations.

While we received over 26,000 units of PPE, there still is a need for this equipment as the Tri-Cities healthcare community continues to experience shortages.  The demand for PPE has created a severe shortage of PPE across the world.  The supply cannot keep up with the demand.

If you have any of the below items that you are willing to donate, Benton and Franklin County Emergency Management will be accepting ongoing donations Monday – Friday from 9:00am-3:00pm at 1011E. Ainsworth Ave, Pasco, WA 99301.

Personal Protection Equipment in Need:

• Masks – Surgical and N95
  
• Face Shields/Goggles
• Thermometers (Home Use and Touchless/Infrared)
  
• Finger Oximeter – Home Use
• Hand Sanitizer
  
• Isolation Gowns

Stay home. Stay healthy. Wash your hands. And remember social distancing.

The Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with STCU, is launching a free webinar series for businesses owners to stay informed of important business topics during the COVID-19 pandemic.   

“Ask the Experts: Responding to COVID-19" is planned as an 11-week program, with at least one webinar scheduled per week. The webinar will be viewable on Zoom and Facebook Live. Each webinar will be archived and uploaded at tricityregionalchamber.com. 

The first webinar is scheduled for Monday, March 30 from 11 am – 12 pm. The topic is “Navigating Open Enrollment and the Insurance Marketplace.” The speaker is Victoria Wink, Benefit Account Manager at Basin Pacific Insurance + Benefits. More information, including the Zoom conference call info, can be found at tricityregionalchamber.com/asktheexperts.

The “Ask the Experts: Responding to COVID-19" series is one of the resources launched by the Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce in order to help the Tri-Cities business community during the COVID-19 pandemic. Last week, the Chamber launched the Tri-Cities: Open for Business initiative,  featuring a comprehensive website featuring special service offers, food and drink pickup options, small business resources, and much more, in order to help Chamber members get the information they need during this crisis. The website, which is updated daily, can be found at TCOPENFORBUSINESS.com.