El Paso receives grant for minority women business owners

The El Paso Hispanic Chambers of Commerce announced Tuesday that it received a $400,000 grant to launch a new National Assistance Center.

The center will be called the Minority Women’s Enterprise Diversity Center, funded by a grant through the U.S. Minority Development Agency.

The CEO of El Paso Chamber of Commerce, Cindy Ramos-Davidson, told ABC-7, “This is amazing. We have made history today in El Paso, Texas. This is a global opportunity because the center is not just for El Paso, It is in El Paso, housed and operated by the El Paso Hispanic Chamber, but it has a global footprint because it’s about building minority women business all across the United States.”

The MWEDC will help assist minority women owned businesses grow their business by connecting them with financing, contracting, and exporting opportunities.

Minority business owner Crystal Cholewa attended the news conference. She was a biology teacher who quit her job to open Xtreme Core Fitness in Horizon City. She told ABC-7 it wasn’t easy at first.

“There have been a ton of obstacles. Contractors are not very nice to women. A lot of it was ‘Tomorrow, tomorrow,'” Cholewa said.

Cholewa added every bank she went to for a business loan, told her “No” until finally she got the call to start her business.

Cholewa opened her business in 2015 and now she said she has 448 members.

She used the resources the El Paso Hispanic Chamber of Commerce had available at the time and now, the MWED is considering having Cholewa on the committee to give minority women advice for their own businesses.

The MWEDC will be open and available to minority women January 2019.

According to the Chamber of Commerce, it is estimated that 5.8 million minority women-owned businesses employ 2.2 million people across the country, generating $386.6 billion in revenue.