Sami Roe, small business specialist at the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Salt Lake City, works to propel small businesses towards success. By leveraging funding and loans, Sami helps entrepreneurs scale up their businesses. Working alongside them, he finds resources so that owners have direction when they run into roadblocks.

Now that the pandemic has upset many businesses, Sami’s job shifted gears toward relief assistance. Especially where language barriers exist, Sami’s work remains vital. Many shops and restaurants could evaporate simply because they do not have the language resources they need to save themselves. For the owners of the popular micro-restaurant, Laan Na Thai, in downtown Salt Lake, this especially posed a dilemma. “They’re an older generation paired with a language barrier,” Sami explained. While language barriers present their own challenges, the loans themselves “open and close that fast,” according to Sami.

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