There’s good news to report regarding American Samoa’s application under the State Small Business Credit Initiative, a federally funded program made available under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
The territory was awarded $10 million to be used for economic development projects to stimulate the economy and create jobs.
Three previous proposals for the program did not pan out.
The last attempt made it to the stage of identifying a handful of projects which passed the review process and received approval of US Treasury.
However, a US firm that was selected as the venture capital broker was let go for reasons which have not been publicized.
American Samoa received $3.5 million of the $10 million SSBCI award more than four years ago, and Director of Commerce Keniseli Lafaele has assured that this money is safe in a Zions Bank account.
DOC submitted a fourth application and proposal on how it will use the SSBCI funding, and the DOC director says this morning he received word from the US Treasury, that it has given conditional approval to American Samoa’s modified SSBCI program.
US Treasury is now awaiting an executed amendment letter to be signed by both parties.
Lafaele expressed appreciation to Governor Lolo and Lt Governor Lemanu for their leadership, encouragement and patience as DOC worked with US Treasury on the modified SSBCI Program.
He noted that the approval comes when 800 people are about to lose their jobs at Samoa Tuna Processors.
Lafaele said, “It’s been too long a process but now we’re a couple of weeks away from deploying these much needed funds to help prop up our economy.”
