CLEVELAND, Ohio — Several businesses that were damaged after protests in Downtown Cleveland will soon be receiving much-needed financial relief.
“Total shambles. You couldn’t even walk in here because there was glass all over the place,” said Gary Cohen.
Gary Cohen is the vice-president of Colonial Coin and Stamp Company in Downtown Cleveland. In May, his business was one of many damaged when peaceful protests turned to violence and looting. Now, financial help is on the way for the businesses impacted.
“We wanted to ensure the business was going to reopen and we wanted to concentrate most of our dollars towards the physical damage that occurred on the evening of the 30th,” said Joseph Marinucci.
Joseph Marinucci is the president and CEO of the Downtown Cleveland Alliance. The non-profit organization partnered with other groups to find financial relief for the businesses.
“We brought together the City of Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, the Cleveland Foundation, Greater Cleveland Partnership, and ourselves and began to look at ways that we might one, secure funding and two, begin outreach to some of the businesses that were impacted,” said Marinucci.
Nearly two months after that civil unrest, some businesses are still boarded up and closed. The money from the relief fund will help those businesses reopen their doors.
“88 of those businesses were small businesses that represent a lot of the storefronts that were impacted. About fifteen additional ones were property owners, and some were different other types of businesses that we’re working with,” said Marinucci.
The organization and its partners were able to secure $1,450,000 —
$50,000 from Downtown Cleveland Alliance
$100,000 from Greater Cleveland Partnership
$400,000 from the City of Cleveland
$400,000 from Cuyahoga County
$500,000 from the Cleveland Foundation
Marinucci said 103 businesses will receive money from the grant.
“We want the businesses to be able to reopen. We want them to hire the staff that they had in place and, by the way, those businesses represent almost 1,500 jobs. Many of those jobs are Black and Brown people and residents of Cleveland.”
Cohen said the money from the grant is much appreciated.
“The grant’s a real lifesaver because we have a lot of costs involved to get us back up operating. The grant is going to just help us get everything back on track, everything fixed up, everything fixed up real nice, and help us with inventory.”
The Downtown Cleveland Alliance said they specifically wanted to target small locally-owned businesses — especially ones that are minority- and female-owned.
