Monti’s pioneers use of light-rail loan program

Mom-and-pop businesses have spent years dreading how much their businesses would suffer when Metro light-rail construction tore up Tempe, yet those merchants have all but ignored a low-interest loan program created for them.

The Tempe Chamber of Commerce unveiled a financial assistance program in September 2005 for 134 independently owned businesses along the construction corridor, in a kind of assistance no other community has done to help during light-rail construction. But the program went unused until now.

The first business to get a loan is Monti’s La Casa Vieja, the vulnerable restaurant that Tempe founder Charles Trumbull Hayden built as his home in 1871.

Owner Michael Monti has tapped into the funds to buy radio ads because several street closures have scared away some customers. The ads feature him talking about how his historic building has always been a center of Tempe and how light rail will continue that tradition. His ads didn’t mention the actual construction of the line, however.

“I didn’t think it would be a bright idea to publicize the negative,” Monti said. “I always try to put a positive spin on things.”

Monti’s is a block from the tracks and business slowed with every restriction and closure there, he said.

Chamber President Mary Ann Miller said she was surprised it’s taken so long for anybody to borrow money through the organization. Other businesses have asked previously, but they didn’t qualify. Or in other cases, the chamber helped with a business plan or found another source for a loan that was more fitting for that merchant, she said.

Miller expects more businesses will turn to the chamber because the length of construction could just now have pushed some merchants to need help. And Monti’s could boost awareness, she said.

“We hope it kind of breaks the dam and gives it more visibility,” Miller said.

The chamber offers a line of credit of up to $20,000. Only independently owned businesses can get the money, and they must work with consultants from a nonprofit group called the Service Corps of Retired Executives. Tempe has about 370 businesses along the rail line, and about 143 of them are eligible for the line of credit, through Tempe Schools Credit Union.

No other community has a program like this. Some, like Portland, Ore., offered loans during rail construction. But the Portland plan flopped because the rates were so high that no businesses wanted to take on debt that way.

Monti said he suspects no other businesses have tapped into a line of credit because they don’t know about it.

“Probably many people just aren’t fully aware of what’s happening,” Monti said. “You have to pay attention and know what’s going on.”