Here are the essentials from the Washington Policy Center.
Small business owners and policymakers from around the state will gather in SeaTac tomorrow to discuss the state's business climate and ideas for how policymakers can make Washington more supportive of businesses and job growth. Washington Policy Center's biennial Small Business Conference comes as Boeing announced its decision to build a second 787 line in South Carolina rather than here, a move which shows Washington faces serious competiveness challenges from other states.
What: WPC's Statewide Small Business Conference
When: TOMORROW! Tuesday, November 10th, 8am — 1:30pm, with optional 2-3pm session
Where: SeaTac Hilton (17620 International Blvd, Seattle)
How: Visit www.smallbusinessconference.org or call 206-937-9691 for more information.
You can read the agenda here.
Posted by Jim Miller at November 09, 2009 01:20 PM | Email ThisOf course the libs are crowing about their victory. If they had lost they would simply go to court.
When you have a county filled with liberals you get Dow Constantine and Mike McGinn. I'm willing to give them a chance but you can be assured they will never have enough tax money. Is there historic evidence anywhere to indicate that won't be the case?
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on November 9, 2009 04:39 PM1. Eliminate the B&O tax. Permanently. There is no more regressive way to tax new businesses.
2. Lower the L&I rates, or let businesses opt out if they provide medical insurance for their employees. Right now, you end up paying for two insurance policies and those two (the private insurance and the L&I department) will point fingers at each other for months.
3. Eliminate the minimum coverage requirements that the WA State Insurance commissioner mandates. Those required riders jack costs for businesses.
4. Allow companies to move to less-frequent reporting periods if their revenue slips. Right now, as your revenue increases your required tax reporting periods shorten, down to monthly. But they never go backwards; if you have one good month you can bump from annual to monthly and never get a chance to go back down, meaning a lot of extra work every month for no benefit for any party.
5. Actually spend DOT money on roads, not bike paths, or squirrel crossings, or light rail to nowhere. The vast majority of business commuting and deliveries are done on roads, so improve them. The roads in WA are worse than the constant-construction zone that is Shanghai. That's sad - truly sad.
All are simple and all will help small businesses.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on November 9, 2009 06:37 PMThere is more to Washington than just Seattle... Please see the WSDOT money being spent on light rail. And open your eyes to the other 99% of the State!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on November 10, 2009 02:31 PMWSDOT doesn't spend money on light rail construction. WSDOT's revenues are from gas taxes, which our state constitution prohibits gas taxes from being spent on public transit.
Seattle and Tacoma have the only light rail in the state, and they were funded by local taxpayers and federal contributions. Voters approved light rail plans in 1996 and 2008. I, for one, respect democracy.
Posted by: John Jensen on November 10, 2009 03:14 PMWSDOT spends money on studies for regional and metro operations. Now, to big Government types like you, $300,000 or so on a study is no big deal; for a small business, that's 4-5 employees, or a few years operational/capital budget.
And there are plenty other studies being done with WSDOT dollars in the name of light rail and Sound Transit. You just have to look for the times that SoundTransit asked WSDOT to help out to see your claim of WSDOT not spending money on light rail is patently false.
If you want to help small business, don't squander precious tax dollars on big-ticket projects that drain money from the infrastructure used by small business. It's chump change to heavy spenders like you, but to small businesses it's critical and DOES impact employment (you do know that small business is where the VAST majority of new jobs are created, something like 40:1 in terms of small business versus Fortune 100 companies).
In fact, look no further than the Sound Transit light rail package; if ST wanted to help small business, then run the train to someplace big and economically important like, say SOUTHCENTER MALL so that shoppers can get to all those small businesses at and around the mall, rather than run it miles away...
Again, this is just a case of misplaced priorities. WSDOT has not concern for small business or its needs, much like METRO or any Government agency.
About 8 years ago, when I ran a small manufacturing business on Elliott Avenue, METRO decided unilaterally to relocate the bus zone to RIGHT IN FRONT of my business (and of course, the 4 other businesses in the building). This resulted in the whole front of the building - the only street/parking/loading access - to be rezoned as a bus zone (building is 1111 Elliott Avenue, for anyone who wants to see it). Meaning that NO ONE could have a delivery truck park for unloading/loading of product. Shutting us down.
Never mind that - just 40 feet to the West - was a 300 foot VACANT LOT that would have ZERO impact with a bus zone. No, they wanted to put the bus zone where it would cover both sides of the only loading/unloading dock for a building containing 5 small businesses. Shutting down deliveries that take longer than a minute or two.
I called METRO, was told "tough - live with it". Ultimately I called Dave Ross, we talked a few times live on the radio, and finally got METRO to listen up and respond.
But it's entirely indicative of the mindset of Government; the small business is an inconvenience, something to be taxed at will, and to spend their hard-earned dollars on whatever they want. Hey, it's only $250,000 here, $150,000 there. Never mind that just that little bit of money could mean the difference between life and death for a small business...
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on November 10, 2009 05:08 PMTukwila prevented the light rail line from going to Southcenter Mall, not Sound Transit. We both agree that it's unfortunate but guess which party those Tukwila councilmen leaned toward?
Of course the government makes mistakes, and substantial ones at that. Metro buses need a place to park and sometimes they choose the wrong place. The end result is that you got something changed even if it was frustrating in the interim. And "big government" is why you had a street and a load/unload zone in the first place.
Saying transit agencies don't care about business is a cute refrain, but transit agencies serve primarily businesses and their workers. By 2030 half of the people who work in downtown Seattle will get there by bus or rail. That sounds like serving businesses to me.
Posted by: John Jensen on November 11, 2009 10:27 AMWSDOT has spent money on light rail that went nowhere; you're too stubborn to admit it.
And what about the other things I listed? How would you change Government to help small business? Or is all you do criticize?
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on November 11, 2009 02:23 PM