The devastation of September left the hundreds of businesses housed in the World Trade Center with some very difficult decisions.  Decisions about how, where, and whether to rebuild where chief among them.  Many programs have been set up to assist WTC and other Manhattan businesses recover from the terrorist attacks.  These programs include:

•    The World Trade Center Business Recovery Grant program had, as of August 2002, awarded grants totaling over $236 million to more than 8,500 business and was expanded to better support businesses south of 14th Street. 

•    The Small Firm Attraction and Retention Grant Program, as of September 2002, had approved 253 business for a total of over $12 million. 
•    The Job Creation and Retention Program had approved almost $140 million in grants.
•    The Employee Training Assistance Program, as of September 2002, had allocated $10 million for training grants to help small business owners.
•    Janel Patterson of Empire State Development Corporation responsible for distributing many of these funds, reported that they had awarded $366 million to businesses located south of the canal.

Are former WTC tenants taking advantage of these opportunities to stay in the Manhattan area?  According to Ms. Patterson exact statistics are difficult to compile.  However, Tenantwise.com has managed to compile some statistics by keeping in close contact with the larger firms.  According to Tenantwise.com, on September 11, 2001 the destroyed properties of the world trade Center had 450 tenants, 75 of which were non-governmental. They assumed that %100 of the governmental tenants would remain in Manhattan, and predicted the relocation probabilities of the smaller tenants by applying the same percentage trends seen in the larger tenants.  The results, as of July 2002 were as follows:

•    53% will remain Downtown.
•    45% will leave Downtown.
•    2% is undecided.

The tenant relocation summary as of July 2002 reported 40 in Midtown, 11 in New Jersey, 14 Downtown, 7 elsewhere, and 3 undecided.

These statistics are by no means final.  Because the factors affecting the decisions made by former WTC tenants are dynamic, the situation is still in flux.  For instance, in October 2002, several members of Congress began calling for changes in the rules for September 11 business programs.  Under the current rules, small businesses that were housed in the trade center when it was destroyed are treated the same as small businesses on the blocks around them.  Alan J. Gerson, chairman of the City Council’s committee on Lower Manhattan redevelopment said,” It only makes sense that businesses destroyed totally are treated differently from business that remained physically intact.”  It remains to be seen whether such changes will further affect the choices made by former WTC tenants.
 
For more information on this topic, go to the Manhattan Chamber of
Commerce web site at www.manhattancc.org,  the Empire State Development Corporation web site at www.nylovesbiz.com, or to www.tenantwise.net.