WATSONVILLE, Calif. — Job loss from the virus is four times as bad as the 2009 financial crisis, a report Monday from the U.N. showed. As businesses continue to struggle amid COVID-19, one local non-profit meant to help those businesses said they’re not immune to the effects of the pandemic either.

What You Need To Know

  • El Pájaro Community Development Corporation strives to help promote equal access to economic opportunity

  • But even though they are meant to help struggling businesses, they said they're not immune to the effects of the pandemic either

  • Requests for help rose and it wasn’t possible to keep up until Congressman Jimmy Panetta said he would fight for them

  • Now, El Pájaro has the funds they need to keep running and even established a new Women's Business Center

El Pájaro Community Development Corporation in Watsonville strives to help promote equal access to economic opportunity. The Executive Director Carmen Herrera-Mansir said the non-profit has been around for more than forty years but has never seen a disruption like the pandemic.

“Nobody thought that we were going to be here, almost a year from when all this started,” Herrera-Mansir said.

Business owners and entrepreneurs flocked to El Pájaro amid the pandemic to gain resources for business planning, various workshops, counseling, and professional guidance for grants and loans. Other El Pájaro resources include retail business incubators, support for food businesses, a house lending program, and online classes to teach owners about technology changes.

 

Herrera-Mansir said they had plans to raise even more attention to the under-served with the new center just women, but those plans were delayed with COVID-19.

“The increase for our services skyrocketed right away and we didn’t have the funds to provide all the services,” Herrera-Mansir said.

Herrera-Mansir said requests for help rose by the hundreds and it wasn’t possible to keep up until a local congressman said he would fight for them. Representative Jimmy Panetta of Carmel Valley said he would work to secure money for El Pájaro and for the creation of Herrera-Mansir’s Women’s Business Center.

“I had a conversation very early on with Congressman Jimmy Panetta and his staff about this and they were very, very receptive,” Herrera-Mansir said.

Panetta wrote a letter to the Small Business Administration “urging the establishment of a WBC on the Central Coast to provide greater resources to local female business owners.”

By the end of the 2020 fiscal year, Panetta successfully joined his colleagues to pass Congress’ FY2021 omnibus package that included funds for El Pájaro and a new women’s center.

“El Pájaro WBC will ensure women-owned small businesses have the tools they need to thrive during this bruising pandemic and long after,” Panetta said in a statement.

Related Stories

Herrera-Mansir said she’s grateful for the congressional support and is actively helping business owners with the federal Payment Protection Program. Now she said she’s happily working out the details to establish the Women’s Business Center, with a launch date in early Spring.

“Knowledge is power and I think that women, we need to take that opportunity and learn everything that we can so that we can survive and thrive,” Herrera-Mansir said.

Herrera-Mansir said providing more resources to local women entrepreneurs is critical to growing small businesses and employment in California. She hopes the new center will “address the unique barriers and issues that female and other under-served entrepreneurs face." 

 

Their grant was for $112,000, which they hope to maintain every year starting now.