Davis Hopes to Extend Time Limit on SBA’s Save Our Stages Grants

By Benjamin Cox on October 11, 2021 at 1:06pm

A local Congressman is hoping to extend COVID relief money with an extension to a program for performance venues.

13th District Congressman Rodney Davis has announced that he is sponsoring the SOS Extension Act along with Vermont Democrat Peter Welch. If passed, it would extend the deadline of the Small Business Administration’s Shuttered Venue Operators Grant created in the bipartisan Save Our Stages Act.

The SOS Extension Act, would extend the timeline for using the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant funds from the end of 2021 to spring of 2023. Davis says bureaucratic delays have caused some venues struggling to stay open to wait for months for the SBA to distribute money. The Save Our Stages Act, which Davis co-sponsored, was signed into law as part of the omnibus funding bill on December 27th of last year. Davis also says many venue owners are struggling to find ways to spend their grant funds by the end of year and he hopes this bill get to the President’s Desk by the end of the year. Davis says he does not want to see venues have to return grant dollars to the SBA because of the delays and due to the short window of the program.