BANKING & FINANCE - April 20, 1994

SBA Made Quake Disaster Loans Totaling $1 Billion: The figure is a new record for SBA assistance in a single disaster, said Mike Howland, acting regional administrator for the federal Small Business Administration. He said the agency is getting faster at processing the flood of applications it received, taking two months to reach the first $500 million in approvals and only one month to reach the second $500 million. Still, the SBA, which has approved more than 35,000 low-interest loans to homeowners, renters and business owners, has many thousands more applications to process.