NJ entertainment venues start receiving federal COVID-19 grants to reopen, rehire staff

After being ordered to shut down during the pandemic, some of New Jersey's entertainment venues and businesses are now receiving long-awaited federal grants. The grants are meant to get people back to work and to bring arts and culture back to the communities.
White Eagle Hall in Jersey City is one of the concert venues shuttered by the pandemic. The owners say that they are ready to return to work.
Married co-owners Ben LoPiccolo and Olga Levina say the reopening is possible in great part to a nearly $740,000 federal grant that the venue received. It is one of 36 venues in New Jersey that received a Shuttered Venues Operators Grant to cover a percentage of the losses and to rehire staff.
The grant program was set up last December, but the application process was slowed by technical glitches. Awards are only now beginning.
About $11 million has been given out in New Jersey so far, and $16 billion is available through the federal grant program nationwide.