Nashville

At the Tennessee Governor's Conference on Small Business, Gov. Lamar Alexander presented guest speaker Michael Cardenas, chief of the Small Business Administration, with a pair of brand new cowboy boots. The governor himself ended up with a different reward -- a list of 19 recommendations for legislative and administrative changes intended to assist Tennessee's 78,000 small businesses.

More than 1,000 people, including small businessmen from every corner of the state, converged on Nashville August 12 in a show of support that one observer termed "a true grass-roots resurgence." The state government was "clearly impressed with the turnout," says Bill Nourse, one of the catalysts behind the conference and chairman of the Nashville Chamber of Commerce Small Business Committee. "I don't think they have quite adjusted to the fact that we have a real movement out there ready to do something productive."

The day's events were more than just ceremonial. Participants attended morning and afternoon workshops on such issues as business financing, paperwork and regulations, and state taxation. Not surprisingly, the debate over money -- its cost and availability -- led to some of the most important recommendations of the conference. Participants in the business finance workshops, for example, voted overwhelmingly to create a general issue industrial revenue bond pool in Tennessee from which small businesses in the state could draw funds at favorable rates. Across the hall, discussion in the tax workshops led to a recommendation to adopt a graduated excise tax on the first $50,000 of a small firm's net income.

A third high-priority recommendation concerned the sensitive subject of Tennessee's sales tax. Small businessmen, who feel they bear the brunt of these taxes, voted to mark the system more equitable. Specifically, they suggested increasing the fee paid for collecting sales taxes, and changing payment dates from the 20th to the 30th of the month for companies with credit sales.

The top priority of the paperwork session was a recommendation requiring the state government to consider how new regulations will affect small business, before the regulations are issued. Other resolutions called for improved entrepreneurial training in the schools, and also for the establishment of small business subcommittees and committees in the state legislature.

The conference drew an array of guests whose presence alone attested to the clout of the small business lobby. Gov. Lamar Alexander made three appearances during the day and has already agreed to set up a committee to review conference recommendations. Joining SBA head Cardenas were Commerce Secretary Baldrige, Tennessee's Lt. Gov. John S. Wilder, Speaker of the House Ned Ray McWherter, Economic and Community Development Commissioner James C. Cotham III, and John Sloan, chairman of the National Advisory Council of the SBA.

Just as important as the 19 resolutions voted on during the day was the feeling among participants that small businessmen were finally getting their due. "Two years ago if someone had proposed a small business conference, he would have been laughed out of Nashville," says Jere Glover, a Washington attorney who served as counsel to the conference. "But after today, there is a recognition on the part of state officials that small business has to be dealt with."

Governor Alexander, for one, seemed convinced. "Now that the conference has been convened," he told the crowd of small businessmen at one point, "the rest is up to both of us, working together. No one is suggesting any miracles will occur because of this meeting. They won't. But we'll listen to you and we'll do the best we can."

EDITOR-NOTE:

Editor's note: This is the first in a series of occasional articles on statewide small business conferences. Although each conference has its own format and agenda, the goals and essentially the same -- to alert state legislators and government officials to the needs, and the increasing influence, of their small business constituents (See INC., September, page 22).

Around 25 state conferences have been held in the 21 months since the White House Small Business Conference in January 1980. Four more are scheduled for this fall in Florida, Minesota, Wisconsin, and New Hampshire.

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