TESTIMONY
Rafael Moure, District Manager, Bronx Community Board 6 on Merchant Organizing Challenges and Accessing Small Business Services Funding in East Tremont
1:04:32
·
130 sec
Rafael Moure discusses the difficulties of organizing merchants and securing funding from Small Business Services (SBS) in the low-income neighborhood of East Tremont.
- Moure emphasizes the historic significance of East Tremont Avenue as a commercial hotspot and its decline since the 1970s.
- There is a lack of infrastructure for merchant organization, making it challenging to access Avenue NYC Funding by SBS.
- In fiscal year 23, no nonprofits in East Tremont applied for SBS funding due to the absence of a fitting applicant, leaving supportive funds unutilized.
- Moure suggests SBS could improve awareness of funding opportunities by being more proactive and considering neighborhood-specific nonprofits as potential applicants.
Rafael Moure
1:04:32
So I'd like to thank the committee for allowing me to speak and thank counsel for for his and his new advisory team on his new role, looking forward to working with him on working with merchants in concert district 15 and in committee board 6.
1:04:45
My name is Rafael Amora.
1:04:46
I'm the district manager of committee board 6.
1:04:49
And as the consformer mentioned, the the board has been working on organizing merchants along East Tremont Avenue in the neighborhood of East Tremont.
1:04:56
And I wanted to speak to some of the challenges in merchant organizing and trying to access SBS funding in neighborhoods that are low income, and there isn't already infrastructure in merchant organized.
1:05:09
East Vermont used to be a bustling commercial district that peels from all over this that he knew about.
1:05:14
When FTR was running for reelection, he would drive down East Tremont Avenue to see voters.
1:05:19
There's like a key area in the Bronx.
1:05:21
And when the economy of the Bronx changed in the seventies, it became very depressed and has yet to recover.
1:05:26
There's no merchant or there's no merchant Association.
1:05:30
There was one for a couple of years.
1:05:32
There was an attempt at forming a bid, which fell apart because of infighting over who would get the avenue NYC SBS funded.
1:05:39
And so I think that really what I wanna highlight for the committee is the challenge in in accessing Avenue NYC Funding in neighborhoods where there isn't an infrastructure of nonprofits that can apply for the money, and that's what we're seeing in East Tremont.
1:05:53
In fiscal year 23, I spoke to several nonprofits about applying for the Avenue in Wesley Funding, and no one really saw that was within their wheelhouse, and no one applied for the funding.
1:06:02
And so money that SBS has ready and available to support businesses wasn't spent in a low income neighborhood.
1:06:10
That could really benefit from assistance from the city in Merchant Organizing.
1:06:15
Part of what I think the feedback that I wish SPS was here to hear is that SBS, I think, could look more proactively in how to promote Avenue NYC Funding.
1:06:25
They mentioned they have a mailing list But if you're not already doing merchant organizing, you're not gonna be on that mailing list and be aware of these funding opportunities when they come around.
1:06:34
That's why I think we think that SBS can really expand upon is being more proactive and thinking about what kind of nonprofits in a neighborhood could access this funding.