Reesheda Graham Washington | https://rgwashington.com
Reesheda Graham Washington | https://rgwashington.com
The owner of the now-defunct L!VE Café and its manager both received tens of thousands of dollars in PPP loans prior to the cafe closing.
Reesheda Graham-Washington, under the LLC name “LIVE 2.0 LLC,” received a $20,900 PPP loan in April of 2020 for running “a Snack and Nonalcoholic Beverage Bars.” Byline Bank signed off on the loan.
L!VE Café general manager Makesha Benson also received a loan through her LLC Hush Dev & Management Group.
Benson pulled in $14,928 in May 2020. JPMorgan Chase Bank provided the loan.
The cafe closed when it turned over the space to Brewpoint Cafe.
Washington walked away with the PPP loan monies as well as around $30,000 she raised through a GoFundMe account after reporting an alleged hate crime.
The cafe had been closed for several months at the time and was serving as a campaign headquarters for two Oak Park candidates.
RGW Consulting, owned by Washington is heavily involved in bias training in local schools and governements.
The Village of DuPage paid $15,000 for a 25-hour workshop developed by Washington.
Media were on site at L!VE Café immediately after the incident was reported by an anonymous passerby.
PPP loans have been ripe for fraud and abuse across the state and nation. In April an O’Fallon man pleaded guilty to charges he fraudulently obtained nearly $500,000 in loan funds.
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