OUR VIEW - 5/6/2010
Newport Daily News
OUR VIEW
Plan to help businesses is good start
It has been a familiar refrain in Rhode Island: The state is unfriendly to business, particularly small businesses.
This week, state leaders finally unveiled a plan to do something about it.
Gov. Donald L. Carcieri, Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed, D-Newport, and House Speaker Gordon Fox, D-Providence, unveiled a nine-step proposal to streamline business regulations and speed up permitting and inspections processes.
Cutting government red tape is one part of a three-pronged approach — along with improving the skills of the work force and providing access to capital — to helping businesses to establish themselves and grow in Rhode Island.
The legislation released Tuesday was developed with the state Economic Development Corp. and other state departments, the state fire marshal’s office and the small business community.
“The Senate’s Small Business Task Force listened to the concerns of small business owners and took specific steps to address those concerns,” Weed said in a prepared statement. “Rhode Island businesses told us ways that the state makes it hard to do business here. We worked closely with the admin-istration in developing this very practical agenda to respond to their specific concerns, and to replace the hard with the easy.” Several proposals make absolute sense, such as establishing a statewide electronic master application system, expediting state licensure processes, and allowing multiple agencies to work simultaneously and together in rule making, decision making and setting of procedures and practices.
Such measures would make it easier for businesses to navigate the maze of permitting in Rhode Island and reduce the timeframe for review and approval, which in theory should reduce everyone’s costs. Other proposals may face an uphill battle, such as reducing the timeframe for approval or denial of fire alarm, smoke detection and carbon monoxide plans from the current 90 days to 15 days. That may prove burdensome for some departments, particularly smaller ones.
While the legislation makes its way through the General Assembly, Carcieri has signed an executive order to establish an Office of Regulatory Reform within the EDC and to start implementing some regulatory reforms within executivebranch agencies and departments.
The office will be charged with overseeing and streamlining the regulatory permitting process for the benefit of Rhode Island businesses, including working with local communities — an essential piece of the puzzle.
“A responsive, uniform and fair regulatory system is vital to advance a competitive Rhode Island economy and (EDC) is dedicated to supporting this regulatory reform initiative,” said Keith W. Stokes, executive director of the agency.
We have no doubt state leaders — and particularly Stokes, the longtime executive director of the Newport County Chamber of Commerce — have the best interests of small businesses in mind. Small businesses historically have been the backbone of Rhode Island’s economy and, with support from state and local agencies, have the potential to generate much of the job growth the state so desperately needs.
We just hope it isn’t too late.
