Rochester Business Journal Leading source of business news and information in Rochester, N.Y.

Monroe County is allocating $15 million in CARES Act funding for small businesses that have been impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Fast Forward Monroe Small Business Grant Program will provide assistance to businesses with two to 50 full-time employees in ...

Economic data has been trending in a positive direction during the third quarter, after cratering during the second quarter. The latest official reading for second quarter GDP was an annualized drop of 31.7%, the largest ever recorded. The drop in ...

Unshackle Upstate, a non-partisan pro-taxpayer organization, has released a new fact sheet that highlights what it calls the burdens imposed on New York’s taxpayers. “Taxed Out – Assessing New York’s Massive Tax Burden” features state-specific tax rankings from the Tax ...

Tagged with: tax fouondation Taxes unshackle upstate upstate

The city of Rochester was one of 30 cities chosen by Bloomberg Philanthropies to participate in a new effort to help cities confront the budget crisis while strengthening their commitment to equity in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. What ...

A historic Ontario County building is getting a transformation, with help from several grants and a coalition of preservationists. Geneva’s Parrott Hall Coalition has tapped Crawford & Steams, Architects and Preservation Planners LLC to work with engineering firm Klepper, Hahn ...

Tagged with: friends of parrott hall Geneva landmark society parrott hall preservation league of new york

New York’s county leaders last week renewed a call to the White House and congressional leaders to reach an agreement that would provide local governments with direct federal COVID-19 stimulus assistance, following the House of Representative’s passage of an updated ...

Tagged with: covid funding heroes act john marren new york state association of counties nysac

Confidence among upstate consumers improved in the third quarter, following both a statewide and national trend, a new report from Siena College Research Institute shows. Overall confidence, which includes current and future confidence, rose to 73.8 in the quarter from ...

Tagged with: consumer confidence scri siena

What the long-term impact of COVID-19 will be on small businesses is difficult to predict, but area economists believe certain steps — from access to a credible vaccine to additional government aid programs — could help the sector regain its ...

The August 2020 Survey of Consumer Expectations from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shows a continued decline in pessimism about households’ financial situation. The report, from the New York Fed’s Center for Microeconomic Data, shows that home price ...

Tagged with: consumer expectations covid economy inflation Jobs new york fed new york federal reserve bank

The New York State Department of Labor this week said that payments for the Lost Wages Assistance (LWA) program, which provides an additional $300 in weekly benefits to unemployed New Yorkers, will begin next week. Up to 2.4 million New ...

Tagged with: covid department of labor dol unemployment wages

Nearly $90 million has been made available in federal CARES Act funding to assist child care providers through NY Forward grants as they adjust their programs during the COVID-19 crisis. The funding is in addition to $30 million made available ...

Tagged with: cares act Child care covid office of children and family services

For nearly a half century, three generations of the Walther family have trumpeted the virtues of owning a home in Irondequoit. A whole lot of people now agree. Only two ZIP codes in the country are hotter than 14617, which encompasses ...

African American children are nearly four times more likely to experience child poverty than white chidlren, while Latino children are more than three times more likely, an updated report from ACT Rochester and the Rochester Area Community Foundation shows. “Hard ...

Tagged with: act rochester child poverty community foundation disparities graduation rates Hard Facts Jennifer Leonard poverty racf racism segregation

Former Nazareth President Daan Braveman has joined Harter Secrest & Emery LLP as a higher education consultant to help schools face coronavirus- and recession-related challenges, as well as plan for long-term success. “I’m very passionate about the role of higher ...

Delinquencies rates among hotels financed through commercial-mortgage backed securities (CMBS) soared to the highest level on record in July, the result of the massive decline in travel due to the coronavirus pandemic. The percentage of lodging loans that were 30 ...