(Davenport, IA) -- The Iowa Restaurant Association is calling on Congress to provide relief for Iowa restaurants after nearly 2,000 restaurants in the state qualified for a federal funds, but received nothing.
“So in the state of Iowa, only 850 of the restaurants actually received the funding that they qualified for through the program,” says Jessica Dunker, the President and CEO of the Iowa Restaurant Association.
Dunker tells 6 News around 2,600 restaurants in Iowa qualify for government funding through the Restaurant Revitalization Fund, but 1,800 of them haven't seen a single dime.
Dunker says the state lost out on around $245 million in grant money.
“The Restaurant Revitalization Fund would have been the way we could replenish what was lost and really in many cases, to move forward and push ahead,” said Dunker.