Boise-area companies dominated in obtaining the largest coronavirus-relief loans
Three Idaho healthcare groups were some of the largest recipients of federal aid meant to prevent layoffs during the coronavirus pandemic.
Alliance Medical Group, which operates 20 Primary Health Medical Group clinics in the Treasure Valley, was among three employers that obtained between $5 million and $10 million in forgivable loans from the $670 billion Paycheck Protection Program.
Bonner General Hospital in Sandpoint and Healthwise Inc., a Boise nonprofit health education company, also obtained loans in that range, according to a disclosure Monday from the Small Business Administration, which administers the program.
Twelve of the 15 Idaho companies that obtained loans of between $5 million and $10 million are located in the Treasure Valley. The others are Commercial Tire of Meridian; Dennis Dillon Auto Park & Truck Center of Boise; Compunet Inc., a Boise information technology company; Cradlepoint, a Boise tech company that makes wireless routers and provides cloud-based services; Engineered Structures Inc., a Meridian construction company; J-U-B Engineers of Boise; RM Mechanical Inc. of Boise; Teancum LLC., a division of Boise-based Peterson Motor Co.; Thomas Management LLC, a Meridian foodservice company that provides chefs to hospitals, senior living homes, businesses and private colleges; and Valley Agronomics LLC, a Nampa company that helps farmers increase yields.
The list contained the names of 660,000 small businesses and nonprofit organizations that obtained at least $150,000 in funding. It was the first time the SBA publicly identified loan recipients.
The companies identified represent only a small portion of businesses that received PPP funds. More than 80% of the loans were for smaller amounts.
However, the disclosure helped temper criticism of the Trump administration, which for months had rejected requests from lawmakers and news organizations to identify recipients of the funds.
Several news organizations, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, Bloomberg, Dow Jones & Co. and ProPublica, filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking business names and loan amounts for all PPP recipients.
The data released includes information for only about 15% of the 4.9 million loans issued. The SBA did not release the names of borrowers for loans of less than $150,000.
The government issued $521 billion in loans, with an average loan of $107,000. The program helped support around 51 million jobs, according to self-reported data from borrowers. The SBA said that accounts for 84 percent of all employees working at small businesses, based on Census Bureau data.
The program is part of the $2 trillion federal CARES Act economic stimulus legislation passed by Congress. The purpose was to quickly provide money to workers at businesses with fewer than 500 employees to keep them employed until the pandemic receded. Businesses applied through their banks, which approved loans and sent them to the SBA for final approval.
Congress passed legislation extending the deadline to apply to through Aug. 8. About $130 billion remains in the program, and the administration plans to release more data about the program after that deadline.
This story was originally published July 6, 2020 at 1:17 PM.
