Offering artistic pieces for indoors and out, the K. Newby Gallery and Sculpture Garden in Tubac Village is one of the first businesses in Santa Cruz County to receive Silver
Local First Arizonaâs sustainability programs can lend a hand in helping businesses save energy and improve the bottom line.Â
Our Southern Arizona Green Business Leaders program has recently helped more than a dozen local businesses achieve savings. Here are a just a few examples:
⢠Tucson Clean and Beautiful upgraded to a new location and became more resilient by updating their sustainability policies, and created a plan to install passive rainwater infrastructure.Â
⢠Literacy Connects signed up for a water audit, which resulted in hundreds of dollars in savings annually and improved their resiliency planning in order to continue serving frontline communities.Â
Last year the coronavirus pandemic threatened many small local businesses. Health and safety protocols exposed vulnerabilities, among small businesses, exacerbating disparities among women entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs of color. Many were denied access to the Payment Protection Program (PPP) designed to provide relief to small businesses, creating direct incentives to keep employees on payroll during the pandemic.Â
According to the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonprofit group combatting abusive lending practices, 90% of minority and women owners were shut out of the program. Entrepreneurs of color and female entrepreneurs are denied the same access to capital as their white male peers.Â
In response, Local First Arizona, a national leader in the buy-local movement, and YWCA of Southern Arizona, one of the oldest and largest multicultural womenâs organizations in the nation, are working to introduce sustainable business practices while supporting women of color entr
Local First Arizona's SCALE UP Program Launches Dynamic New Sustainability Project | Business insidetucsonbusiness.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from insidetucsonbusiness.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.