The Federal Government has been pushing out trillions of dollars over the past few weeks in an effort to stabilize the U.S. economy during this turbulent time.

Watchdog groups, like the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (U.S. PIRG), have been calling for real-time transparency to know where the money is going and which companies are getting it.

Now, at least one federal authority, the Federal Reserve System, has announced it will answer that call. The Fed has promised it will begin publishing the names of those corporations receiving assistance under its emergency programs on a monthly basis.

“Honestly, it was pretty incredible that the Federal Reserve agreed to this kind of disclosure,” said R.J. Cross with U.S. PIRG. “I am hoping that that level of transparency will be carried forward to all the agencies in the CARES Act.”

The Fed’s move comes amid growing concern around the Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). A week ago, reports revealed at least a handful of large publicly-traded companies had received PPP loans. The fast food chain Shake Shack, with a market capitalization or value of nearly $1 billion, was one of them. Shake Shack, though, was also one of the first companies to return its PPP money, which amounted to $10 million.

However, after initial concerns over some larger companies receiving PPP loans intended for much smaller businesses, a data analytic company, FactSquared, used its resources to dig through some Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Publicly-traded companies are required to report “material events” to investors and getting millions of dollars in loan money from the federal government would be a material event. So, FactSquared, decided to go through thousands of SEC filings, and was able to compile a report that revealed far more larger companies received PPP loans than initially thought.

FactSquared found at least $900 millions in forgivable small business loans went to more that 240 public companies. For example, The Lakers basketball franchise received $5 million and one luxury hotel chain was able to treat each of its hotels as an individual business and applied for 117 loans, getting at least $40 million so far.

That luxury hotel chain, Ashford Hospitality Trust, plans to keep all the funds, according to a recent statement, while the Lakers and more than a dozen other businesses have committed to returning their PPP loan money. Combined, amongst 15 businesses that have stated they will return their PPP loan money, more than $116 million is expected to be return.

“The fact that some companies are saying ‘oops, our bad’, this gets back to the purpose of transparency and why this type of information should be released,” said Bill Frischling with FactSquared.

FactSquared was only able to find less than 1 percent of the companies that took PPP loans through the public SEC filings, but its report is now being used as a real-time example of why real-time transparency is needed.

“It doesn’t do us any good three months down the line to have found out this list of companies, that money would’ve already been spent,” said Cross. “It is because this transparency happened so quickly that we are able to course correct, and companies can give that money and the treasury can readjust its rules moving forward, so that way, this money can actually help those it was intended to help.”

The SBA has not yet agreed to release the information around all businesses that receive a PPP loan. However, the treasury department has now announced every company that got more than $2 million will be fully audited, but companies have until May 7 to return the money to avoid that.

The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) has doled out hundreds of billions of dollars in COVID-19 pandemic relief to businesses in Florida and across the country. But a government watchdog found more than $70 billion may have been lost to fraudulent claims.

Kraig Key discovered a thief used his identity to apply for one of the loans. Key says all his personal information including his Social Security number wound up on an application for a PPP loan filed with the Small Business Administration last fall.

Key, who has worked as an engineer with the same company for the last 20 years, says he's never applied for a pandemic relief small business loan. But in 2020, he began receiving statements showing he owes $7,000 to the SBA.

“It's kind of shocking when you actually see it in print,” Key said.

The SBA’s own watchdog report, released last October, says the agency may have paid over $70 billion in fraudulent and ineligible pandemic relief loans.

“To expedite the process, SBA 'lowered the guardrails' or relaxed internal controls, which significantly increased the risk of program fraud,” the report stated.

Congressman Gus Bilirakis says a congressional oversight committee is working to ensure the SBA implements anti-fraud controls.

“There needs to be multi-level verification there's no question,” he said.

The SBA responded to an email. In a statement, the agency wrote, “New enhanced checks put into place by the Biden-Harris administration have intensified system validations used to mitigate the occurrence of fraud."

Keys and his wife Mara say they called the SBA for months, filed a fraud report and contacted lawmakers for help.

“No one helped us; no one told us where to go!” Mara said.

After contacting the SBA on Kraig Keys' behalf, the agency contacted him saying the issue would be resolved, Keys said.

If you or anyone you know suspects fraud related to a PPP or a disaster relief loan contact OIG’s Hotline at 800-767-0385 or online at https://www.sba.gov/about-sba/oversight-advocacy/office-inspector-general/office-inspector-general-hotline.

This article was written by Jackie Callaway for WFTS.

In her hands, Tobie Whitman carries her pride and joy, as well as her livelihood.

“We source everything from as nearby as possible,” motioning to the bouquet in her hands.

The florist owns

Little Acre Flowers

in Washington, D.C., a small business with six employees.

Lately, business has been tough.

“I'd say about a month ago some of our event clients, who were planning weddings or bar mitzvahs, began to reach out to us and say that they were thinking about possibly having to change their plans,” Whitman said. “And that's when we thought to ourselves, ‘Oh wow, this is really going to be a big deal for our business.’”

And it has been a big deal.

Their flower orders for events –-gone. That side of the business is down 100 percent. The shop is surviving on a small number of daily flower deliveries and something else.

“We're dipping into the savings that we have to keep people on board,” Whitman said.

The federal government recently passed the $2 trillion “

Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act

,” better known as the

CARES Act

. In it, it provides more than $349 billion for small businesses in the “Paycheck Protection Program.” It’s designed to help small businesses hold on to their employees.

“Billions of dollars in small business loans have already been processed through Paycheck Protection Programs,” President Donald Trump said on April 5. “So, we went out on Friday and, literally, it’s become so popular. It’s been worked with the banks. They get it to the small business.”

However, it hasn’t worked quite as smoothly as that.

Banks report a confusing lending program process, which is limiting their ability to get those emergency loans out to small businesses.

Wells Fargo announced it would no longer be accepting any more new applications, because the bank already reached the program’s $10 billion loan maximum. That prompted the Federal Reserve to announce it would now allow the bank to go beyond that amount.

On top of that, the Small Business Administration’s computer servers crashed, as banks attempted to submit those loan applications.

Back at Little Acre Flowers, Whitman said they plan to apply for the federal loan, but in the meantime, also applied for a small business grant from the city to help stay afloat.

"We're small business,” she said. “We're like a family."

All part of an effort to keep the door to Little Acre Flowers open for as long as possible – like so many other small businesses are trying to do.