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Greeley unveils Small Business Land Use Center and $5,000 technical-assistance mini-grants for downtown projects
Summary
City planners presented a new Small Business Land Use Center that centralizes development-review resources for small business owners and offers technical-assistance mini-grants of up to $5,000, with priority tiers for the downtown historic area; officials said the site went live in January and Edison Ice Cream received the first grant.
GREELEY — City planners on the Greeley Historic Preservation Commission outlined a new Small Business Land Use Center aimed at simplifying development review for small business owners and helping them navigate historic-preservation requirements.
Planner Caitlin Puga, speaking for the City of Greeley Community Development department, said the program creates a “one-stop shop” that brings together city departments and external partners so small-business customers can get targeted guidance faster. “This is just housed within community development … not a new department. It’s just a new program where we can actually cater to specific needs that they might need,” Puga said.
The program includes a redesigned small-business website and an interactive development-review guide that Puga said went live in January. It also launches a technical-assistance mini-grant intended to offset the cost of professional services such as preparing plans; Puga said the city is offering up to $5,000 per project with tiered eligibility that favors downtown historic properties. “That dark purple area is the downtown, which again kinda correlates with historic structures … and that’s really incentivizing them to make improvements … and now they have $5,000 to put forth towards that,” Puga said.
Puga described eligibility criteria discussed to the commission: applicants must be independently owned businesses locating in Greeley, occupying spaces under 20,000 square feet or employing fewer than 25 people. She said Edison Ice Cream (Salzman Building) was the program’s first grant recipient and that staff hope to see more downtown, preservation-related projects come forward.
During follow-up questions, commissioners asked whether the initiative functions as a recruitment office or an informational program; Puga reiterated that the center is a service housed in Community Development to guide applicants through review and is not a separate department. She said the concept was introduced to the City Council about two years ago and that implementation has accelerated within the last year.
The commission did not take formal action on the program at the meeting; staff invited commissioners to suggest additional partners and outreach strategies as the center expands.
