OKANOGAN COUNTY – We present an analysis of the US Small Business Administration (SBA) data for the 2020 Payroll Protection Program (PPP) loans for Okanogan County. These PPP loans are from Donald Trump’s efforts to mitigate the impact of coronavirus restrictions on small businesses and help save businesses and jobs. The data here is from small loans of under $150,000 dollars. 

All told, these local small PPP loans – six hundred in total – brought in $20,036,048.06 into Okanogan County to help preserve a reported 3,930 jobs for 2.5 months in 2020. The jobs involved were self-reported by each loan recipient, and the actual number is probably higher than the total here because there were a number of reported 0 jobs or where a number was missing from the data entirely.

The over twenty million dollar total small loan amount, an average of $33,400 per loan, further breaks down to $5,098 per job supported. The loans brought into Okanogan County can also be extrapolated to show an average of a $24,472 annual wage, (due to the small size of a number of loans per job, many are no doubt based on part-time employment).

Up to 100% of the loans may be forgivable, depending on how many workers were laid off in 2020 as compared to 2019. Any amount that is not forgivable, incurs a 1% interest rate, and a repayment period of either 2 years, or 5 years – depending on whether the loan was finalized before or after the more relaxed rules were put into place later in the summer.

When broken down by business location, the Winthrop area is at the top with 122 loans. Omak is second with 87 loans, and Twisp is a close third at 83 loans. Fourth, Brewster has 76 loans. Tonasket and Oroville are close together in 5th and 6th place, with 63 and 62 loans, respectively. Okanogan is 7th with 49 loans. Pateros, eighth place, has 21 loans. Mazama is ninth, with 10 loans. And Carlton comes up in tenth place, with 8 loans.

The breakdown by industry shows that the largest number of loans to a single industry went to apple orchards, with 57 loans. The next largest single industry, with less than half the number of loans, was new single-family home general contractors with 23 loans. Tied for 3rd place – with 19 loans each – is the hotels and motels sector, (except casino hotels), and full-service restaurants.

Dental offices is 4th with 11 loans. Tied for 5th is supermarkets and other grocery stores, and beauty salons, with 10 loans each.

Other noncitrus fruit farming, all other miscellaneous crop farming, offices of real estate agents and brokers, and offices of lawyers had a 4-way tie for 6th place, with 9 loans apiece.

The logging industry, and site preparation contractors received 8 loans each, tying for 7th place.

The business types of entities that received PPP loans were:
• LLCs and LLPs – 213 loans
• Self-employed, Sole proprietors, S Corps, and partnerships – 199 loans
• Corporations – 147 loans
• Non-profit organizations – 29 loans
• Independent contractors – 5 loans
In addition, there were four loans to Professional Associations. Lastly, there was one Cooperative loan, and one Non-Profit Childcare Center loan.

Of the lenders writing these loans, Glacier Bank (locally as North Cascades National Bank) wrote the most loans, at 249 total. Umpqua Bank was second with 76 loans. Farmers State Bank in Winthrop, WA was third, writing 39 loans. Washington Federal Bank came in fourth with 37 loans. Fifth place was Wells Fargo Bank with 35 loans.

When combined with large PPP loans of over 150K, the total Payroll Protection loans into Okanogan County is $55.37 million dollars. Total reported jobs supported are at least 7500 jobs.

See companion article for data on large PPP Loans - List of large Payroll Protection loan recipients in Okanogan County, with $35.3 million in total loans