Gov. Gavin Newsom sounded upbeat when he announced at a press briefing Friday afternoon that he has submitted a $227 billion budget for the 2021-22 fiscal year to the State Legislature for approval. ... read more »

The Southern California Virtual Business Center (SC-VBC) is an online facility designed to prepare business owners to scale and grow through the emphasis of corporate and government contracts. The SC-VBC hosts different programs for entrepreneurs at different stages of their business, through the program’s curriculum, resources, and mentorships. ... read more »

Strategically placed in the Ninth Council District in the City of Los Angeles is an historic campus of buildings, known since 1895 as Casa De Rosas.  At a time when Councilman Curren Price, the proud public servant of the New Ninth is working tirelessly to increase the availability of affordable housing we can all be very excited that Casa De Rosas’ transformation to a home for 36 single parent Veteran families with a child.  ... read more »

With the freeze placed on student loan repayments set to end December 31, Biden has gotten behind the Democrat-led House’s HEROES Act, which calls on the federal government to pay off up to $10,000 in private, nonfederal student loans for economically distressed borrowers. “People having to make choices between paying their student loan and paying the rent … debt relief should be done immediately,” Biden stated during a news conference on Monday, November 16. ... read more »

Supporters conceded defeat of a union-backed initiative that would have resulted in higher property taxes for commercial and industrial property to provide additional funding for local governments, schools and community colleges. ... read more »

In a recent interview with BlackPressUSA, Le Nette Rutledge, the head of Military Talent Programs at Wells Fargo, shared her perspective about being a military veteran now serving in the ranks of corporate America. ... read more »

City Planning released a draft of its Local Emergency Code Amendment for public comment. The ordinance would take steps to eliminate financial and regulatory burdens on small businesses affected by the novel coronavirus. If adopted, it would expand the city’s ability to activate regulatory relief during a declared local emergency. ... read more »

“All Americans deserve equitable access to affordable housing and the physical, emotional and financial security it represents,” said Lisa Rice, CEO, National Fair Housing Alliance. “JPMorgan Chase’s new commitments will help make owning or renting a reality for more Black and Latinx families, whose housing access has been impeded by decades of systemic racism and are now disproportionately affected by the impact of COVID-19. Addressing the affordability crisis, now overlaid with the pandemic, will require many players on many fronts, and these commitments are concrete, meaningful steps in the right direction.” ... read more »

A new report released this week by the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL) finds debt collectors in California may have seized more than $700 million from consumers between 2012 and 2017, even though they frequently lack sufficient documentation to establish the validity and ownership of an individual’s debt. ... read more »

There is no way around it—California’s Assembly Bill (AB) 5 has been a disaster for our state. The so-called “gig economy” legislation passed last year has been a short-sighted and dangerous attack on nearly ten percent of our state’s workforce. What’s worse—businesses continue to be attacked on all sides from attorneys looking to exploit the vague “ABC test.” And all this is peaking during the worst health crisis in a century, when millions of Californians remain jobless and small businesses are struggling to survive. ... read more »

Congresswoman Maxine Waters (CA-43), Chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee, released a district data sheet which summarizes Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) data provided by the Small Business Administration (SBA) regarding loans made to businesses in Gardena, Harbor City, Hawthorne, Inglewood, Lawndale, Lomita, Los Angeles, Playa Vista, and Torrance. Over one billion dollars in PPP loans were awarded to 10,750 businesses within Congresswoman Waters’ congressional district. ... read more »

My phone buzzed. Like every other text message, I grabbed my phone immediately to read it. But this was no ordinary text. I looked down and read three words that suddenly meant someone’s life was about to change forever: “I chose Berkeley” ... read more »

A historically Black university in Louisiana has received a $20 million donation from MacKenzie Scott, the former wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. The gift is the largest private contribution in the school's history and part of hundreds of millions of dollars Scott announced that she had given away. ... read more »

Over the last month, several corporations have stepped up to fund the Black community.   ... read more »

Local community partners will have a role in this initiative, President of Greater Los Angeles Raul Anaya stated, “We are looking to potentially partner with philanthropy and other large businesses in L.A., because our goal is to create a program ideally that is sustainable with long standing impact. ... read more »