Listening Tour

Rising health care costs, government regulations and high taxes are choking small businesses during the recession, small-business owners told Lt. Governor Walter Dalton Friday. Billed as a stop on Dalton's "listening tour" of the state's small-business community. Dalton met with about 40 business owners, company managers and local officials at the W.C. Witherspoon Memorial Library in Elizabeth City. Several business owners, after introducing themselves, said that at one time they had employed anywhere from 40-50 people, but were now - because of the economy - down to a few dozen. When asked about health insurance premiums, Dalton said businesses and others need to find ways to pull together and buy insurance in groups to help lower costs. "We need to get rid of these impediments," Dalton said. "There is no reason there should not be a blanket policy everyone can buy into." Dalton also used the opportunity to discuss his proposed Small Business Assistance Fund, legislation modeled after the state's disaster loan program implemented following hurricanes Floyd and Fran in the 1990s. The fund, if approved by lawmakers, would provide loans up to $50,000 or loan guarantees of up to $100,000 to small businesses - those with fewer than 100 employees or annual receipts of less than $1 million. Dalton noted that North Carolina businesses aren't the only ones suffering in the current economy. "It's a tough year...," Dalton said. "But this recession is not a North Carolina recession or a US recession. It's a global recession." (Toby Tate, THE DAILY ADVANCE, 7/1/09)