The Shuttered Venue Operators Grant program received more than 17,000 applications in the first 24 hours of the portal opening, the Small Business Administration said Tuesday.
The portal reopened Monday afternoon after weeks of closure resulting from a technical difficulty on April 8, the portal’s originally scheduled opening date. Thus far, 7,884 applications have been submitted and 9,472 have been started, according to the SBA.
Grants are expected to be awarded starting in May, a spokesperson said Wednesday.
Broadway theater owners, producers and productions are eligible for grants of up to $10 million, which can be used to cover expenses such as rent, mortgage payments, utilities and personal protective equipment.
“We understand that the first day was generally successful,” a spokesperson for the Broadway League wrote to Broadway News.
The SBA has a pool of more than $16 billion in grant funding to distribute and it plans to award it on a first-come, first-served basis.
