Supporting Immigrant-Owned Small Businesses During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Supporting Immigrant-Owned Small Businesses During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Immigrant-owned small businesses are often the lifeblood of Main Street and urban, suburban, and rural communities. With sometimes unique needs and/or limited access to government, private sector, and nonprofit supports, these businesses are often among the hardest hit during economic crises like the COVID-19 pandemic.

Learn practical, holistic approaches to helping immigrant-owned businesses weather the current storm and survive the recovery, as well as some of the nuts and bolts of building inclusive approaches to small business support efforts that can best sustain everyone in our communities.

Please join Steve Tobocman of Global Detroit on a national webinar on how to support immigrant small businesses during the COVID-19 crisis and throughout our recovery. The webinar is sponsored by Welcoming America and will contain three excellent speakers from across the country, including:

• Mihailo Temali, Neighborhood Development Center (St. Paul, MN) - Mihailo has led this local comprehensive micro-enterprise training, lending, technical assistance and neighborhood development organization for over 20 years. NDC serves as the model for ProsperUS Detroit and other micro-enrerpreneurship programs serving low-income communities of color, including immigrant communities.
• Gloria Yen, University YMCA (Champaign, IL) - Gloria leads the New Americans Welcome Center and has been featured for the innovative outreach and service strategies she has deployed in wake of the COVID-19 crisis.
• Dan Cowen, Build from Within Alliance - Dan has led evaluation efforts and helped coordinate the COVID-19 response of this 9-community alliance of micro-enterprise training, lending, and support organizations that span from Miami to Anchorage. Prior to his work with the Build from Within Alliance, Dan helped provide micro-enterprise training and supports services to immigrants, refugees and minority residents in Syracuse, NY.

The webinar is designed for 

1. Small business support organizations that desire to better serve immigrant entrepreneurs; 
2. Immigrant welcoming initiatives that desire to connect immigrant small businesses with support services; and 
3. Organizations that already serve immigrant small businesses that are looking to continue to advance their approaches during the crisis. 

There will be break out discussion rooms during this 90-minute webinar, so it is helpful if you pre-register so we can assign you to a room based on your experience and interests.