Pilot Program to be Developed in Darlington County, SC

COLUMBIA, SC – March 30, 2007 – The South Carolina Women’s Business Center (SCWBC) announced today it has received a grant of $105,000 to expand its participation in a three-year national initiative to increase the reach of microenterprise development in underserved rural areas of the country. SCWBC will use its money to create a Rural Underserved Pilot Program in Darlington County, with the plan of replicating it statewide. The grant is a project of the Association for Enterprise Opportunity (AEO) in Arlington, VA, and is funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

Pilot Program to be Developed in Darlington County, SC

COLUMBIA, SC – March 30, 2007 – The South Carolina Women’s Business Center (SCWBC) announced today it has received a grant of $105,000 to expand its participation in a three-year national initiative to increase the reach of microenterprise development in underserved rural areas of the country. SCWBC will use its money to create a Rural Underserved Pilot Program in Darlington County, with the plan of replicating it statewide. The grant is a project of the Association for Enterprise Opportunity (AEO) in Arlington, VA, and is funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

SCWBC is one of four organizations nationwide chosen to participate in the program, along with others in New Mexico, California and Oregon. Selected organizations will create rural microenterprise development programs in their targeted regions and serve as a model for other microbusiness development services in the rural U.S. South Carolina microenterprises – defined as companies with five or fewer employees – number more than 270,000 statewide and represent more than 16 percent of all state employment. SCWBC provides training and technical assistance to microenterprises across South Carolina to facilitate business development, poverty alleviation and community growth.

SCWBC is targeting Darlington County with its Rural Underserved Pilot Program because it is a predominately agricultural economy with high unemployment rates, a high concentration of minority population, and per capita income significantly below South Carolina’s urban areas. The program will be a natural continuation of SCWBC’s previous work with Darlington in creating an entrepreneurial community.

Through the program, Darlington will gain a part-time facilitator for entrepreneurial training; SCWBC will create a website and marketing materials for Darlington; develop a locally-based micro-loan pool with local banks to leverage other SCWBC public and private funds; capitalize on the Darlington Raceway and NASCAR to promote tourism and develop locally based businesses; create leadership development initiatives; and put in place a replicable and sustainable Rural Facilitation Model to be used in other rural areas in South Carolina.

SCWBC will work with the City of Darlington, the Greater Darlington Chamber of Commerce, and the Clemson Institute for Economic and Community Development (CIECO) to facilitate the Rural Microenterprise Development Project. An advisory committee comprised of faith-based organizations, local government personnel, small business owners, state economic development personnel, Chamber of Commerce staff and other community organizations has been formed.

“The AEO Kellogg Foundation Grant has energized community leaders in Greater Darlington. We are grateful to SCWBC and to [SCWBC Executive Director] Haidee Stith for the partnership we enjoy,” said Nancy Matthews, executive director of the Greater Darlington Chamber of Commerce. “Our community has been struggling to find an economic identity, and the Darlington Microenterprise Project will enhance the economic stability of our community and its citizens.”

According to Natalie Woodroofe, AEO’s Senior Program Officer for Special Initiatives, “Microenterprise development programs are a highly effective approach to fighting poverty and lifting communities as they assist people in starting and growing their small businesses. Whether the business is the sole source of family income or a crucial supplement to family earnings, tens of thousands have achieved the American dream of business ownership through the help of microenterprise development programs. This important work requires support and funding at the local, regional and national level.”

This is the second grant SCWBC has received from AEO and Kellogg Foundation funds. The first grant, received in 2006, enabled SCWBC to participate in the three-year Rural Policy Networks Learning Cluster project.

About AEO

AEO’s mission is to support the development of strong and effective U.S. microenterprise initiatives to assist underserved entrepreneurs in starting, stabilizing and expanding businesses. To learn more about AEO or microenterprise, visit http://www.microentepriseworks.org/.

About W.K. Kellogg Foundation

The W.K. Kellogg Foundation was established in 1930 “to help people help themselves through the practical application of knowledge and resources to improve their quality of life and that of future generations.” Its programming activities center around the common vision of a world in which each person has a sense of worth; accepts responsibility for self, family, community, and societal well-being; and has the capacity to be productive, and to help create nurturing families, responsive institutions, and healthy communities.

About SCWBC

The South Carolina Women’s Business Center opened it doors in 2002 and has provided about 13,500 hours of counseling to almost 2,900 aspiring and established women entrepreneurs in various parts of South Carolina. It was formed by the S.C. Manufacturing Extension Partnership (SCMEP) to assist the 128,000 existing women-owned businesses in South Carolina, as well as new female-owned ventures. It is a grant-funded program of the U.S. Small Business Administration. Read more about the Center at http://www.scwbc.org/.