Chicanos Por La Causa gets $5 million grant from billionaire MacKenzie Scott

For nearly 30 years Botas Juarez Western Wear has been a fixture on the northwest corner of South Central Avenue and East Broadway Road in Phoenix.

Founded by husband and wife Miguel and Hilda Peña, the store has survived as western apparel has come in and out of style through the years, mostly by catering to Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants from the neighboring Mexican ranching states of Sonora and Chihuahua.

But when the coronavirus pandemic hit earlier this year, many of the store's customers stopped coming as waves of furloughs and layoffs took hold, hitting especially hard Latino workers employed in restaurants, hospitality and other service sector industries most severely impacted.

The economic blow from the pandemic came on top of a loss of customers because of the construction of the light rail extension on South Central Avenue, Hilda Peña said.

She recalls how scary sales got in April, when Arizona lost 283,000 jobs and unemployment shot to 12.6%, the state's highest jobless rate in nearly 50 years.

"There were a few days where the dollars were zero," Peña said. Not a single customer came into the store.

By Christmas, the customers were back, though not as many as last Christmas. But Peña is optimistic that Botas Juarez will survive, thanks in part to a $5,000 loan the business got in May through Prestamos, a community development financial institution administered by the Phoenix nonprofit agency Chicanos Por La Causa.

The money for the loan came from the federal government's Paycheck Protection Program created under the CARES Act to help provide relief to small businesses affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

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Peña said the loan, which was repaid by the federal government's Small Business Administration, helped keep the business afloat, although she still had to lay off one of her two full-time workers, who she recently rehired part-time.

She credits the free business coaching she also received from Prestamos' staff of experts as being just as valuable as the loan, if not more so.

"The time, effort and knowledge that I have received to improve my businesses, ... it's been amazing," Peña said.

Soon more businesses such as Botas Juarez also be receiving help to get through the pandemic. CPLC announced recently that Prestamos is receiving $5 million from MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire philanthropist and ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

The $5 million grant is the largest in Prestamos' 20-year history as a separate entity of Chicanos Por La Causa, said Jose Martinez, the president.

The donation came as a total surprise, he said. 

"I'm pretty sure 'thank you' was the first thing out of my mouth," Martinez said. The name MacKenzie Scott "was clearly a name I was familiar with."

Over the past several months, Scott has given away $4.1 billion to more than 100 nonprofit organizations across the country, including Prestamos. The $4.1 billion is part of the $6 billion she has donated in 2020, after pledging to give away the majority of her wealth.

More than 90% of the racial equality organizations on the list are run by people of color, according to a statement Scott posted on a blog. 

Martinez said the $5 million Prestamos will receive will be used to provide affordable loans to small businesses, as well as technical assistance coaching to businesses that receive the loans.

Prestamos, which means "we lend" in Spanish, mainly targets businesses in low-income areas owned by women and people of color, Martinez said.

"This will help us reach those struggling businesses that are getting by today just holding on by a thread," Martinez said.

Martinez said a consultant contacted him in November to inform him that a philanthropist was interesting in donating money to Prestamos without providing the name of the donor.

Martinez, and David Adame, the CEO of Chicanos Por La Causa, believe the organization's work administering $26 million in loans to 920 small businesses through the Payroll Protection Program caught the attention of Scott's foundation. The loans preserved about 4,000 jobs.

"I think we got noticed by MacKensie Scott based on the work we did during the CARES Act," Adame said.

Martinez said Scott's representative asked him to provide some additional information and then called to let him know who the donor was and how much money Prestamos would receive.

"What's interesting is that this donation that we received wasn't to do something MacKenzie Scott wanted to fund ... but it's really about work we are already doing," Martinez said.

Botas Juarez is an example of a business that Prestamos has helped in the past.

Hilda and Miguel Peña, the co-owners, are originally from Chihuahua, Mexico. Now in their mid-60s, they started the business when they were in their 30s.

The store sells cowboy boots, work boots, cowboy hats and western apparel.

Hilda Peña said the business coaching she received from Prestamos has helped the couple bring the store into modern times.

"They've been extremely helpful" improving "my business knowledge and improving me as a business owner," she said.

With the coaching she received, they replaced handwritten signs with more professional ones, and passed out fliers at neighboring mechanic shops advertising the store's line of work boots.

Peña also received coaching on improving the store's presence on social media to help promote the store's products and bring in more customers.

For example, "they showed me how to take pictures on Instagram,"  Peña said. "If you see my Instagram from four months ago to now, it's totally different. They showed me how to create more traffic."

2020 has been a bad year, Peña said, but it has provided an opportunity "to learn and grown."

Reach the reporter at daniel.gonzalez@arizonarepublic.com or at 602-444-8312. Follow him on Twitter @azdangonzalez.

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