Buried deep in the 900-page stimulus package that Congress passed in March, a single paragraph has sparked an outcry from small restaurants as major chains and mom-and-pop places alike scramble to survive a devastating financial crisis.

The provision, in a section outlining which small businesses qualify for loans from the federal government, allowed big chains like Shake Shack, Potbelly and Ruth's Chris Steak House to get tens of millions of dollars while many smaller restaurants walked away with nothing when the $349 billion fund was exhausted last week. On Monday, Congress and the White House were nearing a deal to replenish that fund with $300 billion in additional relief.

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The Small Business Administration on Wednesday will temporarily allow only the smallest financial institutions to access the small business coronavirus relief program, known as the Paycheck Protection Program.

The move to restrict access comes after concerns that the smallest of businesses, and particularly those owned by people of color, were shut out of the first round of the program, which ran out of money in 13 days.

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Makeshift distribution centers, furloughed employees, and countless frustrations: This is the unfortunate reality for Christina Stembel, the founder and chief executive officer of San Francisco-based startup Farmgirl Flowers.

Farmgirl Flowers was founded in 2010. At the time, Stembel used her own savings account and a cash-back credit card to cover business expenses and get her business off the ground.

"I had this idea about how I could disrupt this very large floral industry and create something that I would want to receive myself as a consumer," Stembel told Business Insider. "We were the first company in that space to embrace the idea that less is more."

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The second round of the Small Business Administration's (SBA) emergency coronavirus lending program is struggling to bounce back from a disastrous start.

A crush of applications locked out thousands of furious lenders and desperate business owners on Monday, requiring many applicants to give it another go on Tuesday after waiting weeks for the new pool of money.

Small businesses have flooded banks, credit unions and financial firms across the country to secure forgivable loans through the SBA's Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) after President Trump and Congress approved an additional $310 billion in funding last week.

The original $349 billion allocated for PPP loans ran dry in less than two weeks, leaving thousands of businesses without relief as more states extended coronavirus restrictions.

The backlog of PPP requests that built up during the weeks without funding crashed the SBA's beleaguered processing system, preventing thousands of applicants from securing government assistance.

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