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COVER STORY: SBS Commissioner Reflects on 2019
COVER STORY
BY BENJAMIN FANG SBS COMMISSIONER SETS HIGH GOALS FOR 2020
The New York City Department of Small Business Services (SBS) had a very busy 2019.
Throughout the year, SBS connected 977 businesses with more than $76 million in financing. It helped more than 21,000 customers connect with services, access capital and assist in other aspects that companies need to thrive.
“We focus on making sure we create opportunities for our small businesses,” SBS Commissioner Gregg Bishop told This Is Queensborough, “not only to start, but to grow.”
The agency launched eight new programs, including NYC Love Your Local, which helps long-standing businesses, WE Fund Credit, which offers lines of credit to women entrepreneurs, and BE NYC, an initiative to help black entrepreneurs.
SBS also continued its partnership with local chambers of commerce and business improvement districts (BIDs), which hosted more than 5,000 events and collected four million bags of trash last year.
Overall, the department has hosted 24 resource fairs, bringing agency officials directly to local neighborhoods so business owners can get the help they need quickly and easily, Bishop said.
Collectively, those fairs served more than 1,300 business owners who may not have had a chance to talk to city officials otherwise.
“We wanted to be more proactive and accessible as an agency,” Bishop said.
SBS will host resource fairs in every borough in 2020, starting with Staten Island in February and Brooklyn in March.
The commissioner said small business owners who will attend can expect to see regulatory and enforcement agencies and their staff there. They will get to talk to someone, get contact information, and learn how to navigate
Commissioner Gregg Bishop discusses the benefits of shopping local and investing in your community with a pair of customers on Small Business Saturday back in November.
government rules and regulations.
Entrepreneurs looking to start their own company can understand the resources and services that SBS provides, including courses on how to launch a business, how to create a public strategy and how to market the business.
“They can expect to be treated as customers,” he said. “We want to make sure the city values their contribution to our economy by making the agencies accessible.”
As busy as SBS was in 2019, Bishop said 2020 will be another banner year, especially as Mayor Bill de Blasio’s last term comes to an end in 2021.
“We have two more years left,” he said. “We want to leave a legacy of supporting small business.”
One focus this year will be to make it easier for businesses to be in compliance and navigate government agencies. Bishop said SBS has already lowered fines for small businesses by $40 million, and will continue to review and reduce regulations.
The department is also looking at additional technology to help businesses understand how to fix their violations and ease that burden.
“We’re working on those strategies,” he said. “More to come there.”
In February, SBS is releasing a report on and doing specific programming for black entrepreneurs, followed by a report and programming for women entrepreneurs.
Bishop said the city has come a long way to help minority and women-owned business enterprises (MWBEs). In 2008, the MWBE utilization rate in the city was at three percent. When de Blasio came into office, it was at eight percent.
In the last fiscal year, the city awarded 24.3 percent of its contracts to MWBE firms. The mayor has set a goal of 30 percent.
“We still have a long way to go,” Bishop said, “but there is light at the end of the tunnel.”
Last year, SBS was directed to certify 9,000 MWBE firms, a goal that they exceeded. Bishop said agencies have more tools and more discretion with contracting. MWBEs also have more access to low interest rates.
At fairs, including one coming up in April, SBS conducts specific outreach for MWBEs as part of a proactive strategy. Firms can now come and start an application or begin a review.
In 2020, the agency is focused on connecting more firms to win contracts. According to Bishop, two-thirds of MWBEs who won contracts utilized a service from SBS last year.
“Our focus is to increase that number,” he said. “A lot of that is smart strategy on how to bid on contracts.”
On the local level, SBS is continuing its Neighborhood 360
COVER STORY
Fellows program. The agency is in the process of recruiting new fellows now, the commissioner said.
The department has also been putting out commercial district needs assessments to understand where to make investments across the city. In Queens, SBS is focusing on how not only to improve the regulatory side, but also on creating a workforce that is able to take advantage of areas of growth in the economy.
Last year, SBS created a new program to prepare underrepresented New Yorkers for indemand data analyst careers. That goes hand-in-hand with Queens College, which graduates one of the largest classes of computer science students in the country.
The department is also looking to expand its commercial driving license program.
From Downtown Far Rockaway to Flushing and Long Island, Bishop said he wants the community to know there are opportunities in health care, technology, industrial manufacturing and the food and beverage industry.
“Helping residents develop skills in those sectors,” he said, “and being paid a decent wage.”
Bishop said SBS would not have been successful without the support of groups like the Queens Chamber of Commerce.
“The only way for us as a city to succeed is to have chambers that understand the challenges that Queens businesses face,” he said, “and be able to communicate with the city on how to partner on those challenges.”
A perfect example of their partnership is their collaboration to help save Neir’s Tavern in Woodhaven, a 190-year-old bar that was on the brink of closure until the chamber, SBS and elected officials stepped in to help negotiate an agreement.
Bishop said part of the solution was having a chamber that understood businesses, had relationships with city agencies and being that connector.
“As a commissioner, it’s so refreshing to have a chamber that can function in that capacity,” he said. “SBS has a lot of work to do, but we’re excited to have a strong partner.”
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SBS Commissioner Gregg Bishop with Department of Buildings Commissioner Melanie La Rocca at the Queens Chamber’s annual Building Awards event.
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