SNAP awarded grant to provide services, workshops to businesses impacted by COVID-19

The nonprofit association SNAP was recently awarded a grant to provide new services and workshops for businesses impacted by COVID-19.

The U.S. Small Business Administration awarded the grant to SNAP’s Women’s Business Center, which offers a wide variety of workshops that include logo design, social media, website development and e-commerce, among other topics.

SNAP also offers a four-part workshop to develop methods to gain and retain sales.

“As the pandemic has continued, we have discovered new opportunities to bridge the digital divide that many businesses are currently challenged by,” Women’s Business Center manager, Nicolle Hansen, said in a statement.

“We’ve expanded our course offerings to account for emerging needs required for businesses to stay functional in a remote setting, to better market their services, and adapt to changing consumer demands.”

Workshop clients are able to access up to 10 hours of consultation, which is flexible based upon needs of the participants.

“Website development is one area that can be quite expensive if you’re going through outside firms,” Hansen said. “But through this funding, we can make it accessible to businesses that need to quickly pivot to an e-commerce platform.”

The SNAP workshops are free to all local business owners.

Those interested can find more information at: snapwa.org/sfa/womens-business-center

The grant award follows a vote this week by the Spokane Valley City Council to funnel much of its federal COVID-19 assistance to SNAP, the acronym for Spokane Neighborhood Action Partners.

SNAP CEO Julie Honekamp said on Tuesday that it’s difficult to predict how far the money for rent and mortgage assistance will go because families have missed different months of payments and because each renter pays different amounts.She said her agency’s data indicates there are between 240 and 300 families in Spokane Valley that need rental assistance, but she does not have data on how much the need for mortgage assistance has grown because that’s not a service the nonprofit normally offers.