ABA President to President-elect: Make Small Business Survival a Priority

Gayle Shanks

American Booksellers Association President Gayle Shanks, co-owner of Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, Arizona, has written President-elect Barack Obama and his transition team urging them "to ensure that the survival and long-range health of ... independent, locally owned businesses are a prominent part of [their] economic stimulus package."

In her letter, which was transmitted a day after the president-elect announced the selection of Maine venture capitalist Karen Gordon Mills as the new head of the Small Business Administration, Shanks wrote that "we must address the destabilizing combination of growing job losses, falling incomes, and shattered household wealth that has significantly damaged consumer confidence and short circuited the prospects for retail sales growth this holiday season and beyond."

Highlighting the "central challenge" to independent, locally owned businesses as "access to capital," Shanks called on the Obama/Biden administration to "work immediately to address the credit crisis that threatens U.S. small businesses by implementing steps ... outlined during the campaign," specifically:

• Establishing a nationwide emergency lending facility for small businesses that can be run through SBA's Disaster Loan Program;
• Temporarily eliminating fees on the SBA's 7(a) and 504 loan guarantee programs for small businesses, to help increase private lending for small businesses; and
• Implementing a green economic stimulus package for small businesses focused on sensible steps to energy efficiency. This would pay dividends on Main Streets across the country far beyond the cost of implementation.

Reminding the incoming administration that locally owned, independent businesses "have a far greater economic impact on communities than larger, chain businesses; contribute more to local charities; and are largely responsible for our villages, towns, and cities retaining their unique characteristics," Shanks wrote that "if the current downward economic spiral continues into 2009, the attendant losses of sales tax and other revenues will further widen the budget deficits of municipalities and states nationwide, which will only increase the demand for federal assistance in the face of spreading economic loss and pain."

Booksellers who would like to offer input to the incoming Obama/Biden administration regarding necessary steps to address the current economic challenges can submit ideas at change.gov/agenda/economy_agenda/.

The full text of Shanks' letter is available below.

Dear President-elect Obama:

I'm writing on behalf of the American Booksellers Association's 1,700 member bookstores -- now facing the worst economic environment in more than 75 years -- to ask you to ensure that the survival and long-range health of these independent, locally owned businesses are a prominent part of your economic stimulus package.

You wrote in your wonderful book Dreams From My Father, "Communities had to be created, fought for, tended like gardens. They expanded or contracted with the dreams of men." In order to tend these communities, we must address the destabilizing combination of growing job losses, falling incomes, and shattered household wealth that has significantly damaged consumer confidence and short circuited the prospects for retail sales growth this holiday season and beyond. Given the enormous economic challenges the country will face throughout 2009, small businesses today are facing a potentially fatal environment. Locally owned, independent business is not only the web that ties our communities together but also the backbone of this nation's economy. If we were to go, it would make the breakdown of the automotive industry pale by comparison.

Access to capital is a central challenge to small businesses, and the liquidity crisis has only exacerbated this situation. We hope that the Obama/Biden Administration will work immediately to address the credit crisis that threatens U.S. small businesses by implementing steps you outlined during the campaign, specifically:

• Establishing a nationwide emergency lending facility for small businesses that can be run through SBA's Disaster Loan Program;
• Temporarily eliminating fees on the SBA's 7(a) and 504 loan guarantee programs for small businesses, to help increase private lending for small businesses; and
• Implementing a green economic stimulus package for small businesses focused on sensible steps to energy efficiency. This would pay dividends on Main Streets across the country far beyond the cost of implementation.

The continued financial success and growth of locally owned, independent businesses is important for many reasons, including the viability and health of America's cities and towns. While small businesses like mine and other ABA members don't have the resources to retain expensive lobbyists to plead our case, we do have a far greater economic impact on communities than larger, chain businesses; contribute more to local charities; and are largely responsible for our villages, towns, and cities retaining their unique characteristics. Small businesses are, as you so aptly wrote, "Places where families might invest their savings and make a go of business, and where entry-level jobs might be had; places where the economy remained on a human scale, transparent enough for people to understand."

If the current downward economic spiral continues into 2009, the attendant losses of sales tax and other revenues will further widen the budget deficits of municipalities and states nationwide, which will only increase the demand for federal assistance in the face of spreading economic loss and pain. And, locally owned, independent businesses will begin to close at an alarming rate.

On behalf of ABA members nationwide -- and tens of thousands of other locally owned, independent businesses -- I respectfully ask that your administration move quickly and aggressively to address these Main Street issues.

Sincerely,

Gayle Shanks
President, American Booksellers Association
Tarrytown, New York

Co-owner, Changing Hands Bookstore
Tempe, Arizona