Secretary of State Matt Brown recently sat down with a cross-section of 20 small-business owners to hear what’s on their minds.
He got an earful.
Among the chief gripes were rising health care costs, difficulty finding workers, a dearth of available financing and the maddening process of getting the necessary permits and licenses from city and state agencies.
ISO 9001:2026: A Practical Opportunity to Build for What’s Next
For Rhode Island manufacturers, ISO 9001 has been much more than a certificate on the…
Learn More
Brown listened intently and, in the end, made no promises. But he said his office – which has spent much of its time on election reform since Brown took office in January – has turned its attention to “making life a little easier for small businesses.”
For example, Brown’s office is working toward development of a “single master application” for registering a new business in Rhode Island. Brown said the process now is so tedious and time-consuming that it deters some people from starting a company.
“If you’re starting a small business in Rhode Island, you have to fill out 27 applications for licenses and permits with 14 separate agencies just to open your doors,” Brown said.
He said his office is working on the initiative with a dozen state agencies that issue permits or licenses to businesses, including the Department of Administration, the Department of Business Regulation and Department of Labor and Training.
Included in the roundtable discussion in Providence last week were owners of a butcher shop with 14 employees; a boutique marketing company; a new fitness center; a 280-employee plumbing company and others.
Several attendees complained about the difficulty lining up funding to expand or invest in equipment. Many said the loans available through the U.S. Small Business Administration seem geared toward either very small businesses or larger, more established companies.
“Between $200,000 and $1 million is a very hard number to get,” said David Jaacks of Exhibit A, a marketing firm in Providence.
Also, despite rising unemployment, many business owners said it’s tough finding qualified workers. And when they can find new people, training them is costly.
“I think the availability and quality of labor is bad,” said Steven Gelfuso of Cruise Brothers in Cranston. “We can’t get people to respond to our ads.”
Anthony Gemma, the chief operating officer of Gem Plumbing & Heating Co. in Providence, said the 280-employee company spends $250,000 a year on training. While some public funds are available through groups such as the Workforce Investment Board, he said it’s a “drop in the bucket.”
Lana Amodei of Carcieri’s Market, on Charles Street in Providence, said the business’s health insurance premium spiked 37 percent last year – a disclosure that was met with nods around the table.
“We see a crisis in providing health insurance in this state,” said Joel Cooper, a partner at Benefits Unlimited, an employee-benefits advisor in Cranston, who attended the roundtable. A recent survey conducted by the firm shows that small employers saw an average health-premium increase of 22 percent in 2002.
But the most searing complaints during the roundtable were directed at state and municipal agencies such as building departments and the state fire marshal’s office.
“The system is archaic,” said Seth Asser of the new Davol Square Fitness & Spa. Asser said undue permitting snags delayed the health club’s opening by three months.
A number of roundtable participants also complained of the shabby treatment they’re subjected to at state and municipal offices. The business owners said that if they treated their customers the same way some bureaucrats treat the public, they’d be out of business.
Brown said: “It sounds like a different attitude in government is needed toward small business, one that respects what small businesses are trying to do and helps them do it more quickly.”
That sounds like an intriguing – if ambitious – goal to Patrick Engeman, co-owner of JavaSpeed Scooters, a hybrid coffee shop and scooter sales-and-repair retailer that opened last fall on North Main Street in Providence.
“It’s exciting to think that that could come from the top down … institutionalizing the idea that these offices should treat people like customers,” he said.
The Secretary of State’s office is hosting the Small Business Expo 2003 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 13 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Warwick. For more information, contact the office’s Business Development Division at (401) 222-2185.
