National Governors Association Working With 5 States on Improving Business Regulations

WASHINGTON — The National Governors Association announced Tuesday it is working with five states – Colorado, Alaska, Delaware, Rhode Island and Tennessee – to help them improve their business regulatory processes to promote economic development.

This work is being completed in partnership with The Pew Charitable Trusts.

The five states are part of a two-year policy academy, tailored to their respective needs, to identify ways to remove barriers for business to launch, grow and thrive.

Recent Pew research has found that states and territories can strengthen their economies by improving regulatory processes.

It identifies examples from around the country of state governments reducing compliance costs and boosting economic opportunity for businesses by administering regulations more efficiently and providing greater predictability and clarity in their processes, all while continuing to safeguard public health and safety.

In partnership with Pew, the NGA Center for Best Practices will work with the five states to identify baseline data and action steps for pilot initiatives so that successes can ultimately be scaled up.

The focus areas for the five states’ involvement in the policy academy are:

• Alaska: Streamlining licensing and permitting functions across five state departments by eliminating administrative barriers to support the governor’s message that “Alaska is open for business.“
• Colorado: Identifying regulatory constraints and opportunities for clean energy practices in the related cannabis and outdoor recreation industries.
• Delaware: Enhancing access to information and resources by: entrepreneurs starting and growing businesses, small businesses seeking to grow beyond initial start-up phase, and state agencies promoting, supporting and regulating entrepreneurs and small businesses across all industries.
• Rhode Island: Developing a modernized and easily navigable system of building and land-use regulations to enhance economic development.
• Tennessee: Improving efficiencies in the administration of regulations such as business registration and licensing procedures.

“Governors around the country are committed to advancing sensible, predictable business regulations that balance public health and safety with the flexibility to allow entrepreneurs to pursue their dreams and create jobs that are essential to the economy,” said Martin Simon, NGA’s economic opportunity director, in a written statement. “Through our partnership with Pew, we’ll help give governors the perspectives and tools they need to reform their own states’ regulations in ways that fulfill the priorities and the needs of their states.”

Chaaron Pearson, senior manager at The Pew Charitable Trusts, said she is pleased to see the five states in the program take steps to encourage economic development.

“By partnering with businesses and changing processes to make it easier for companies to grow, states can support economic growth at little or no cost. That’s good for state budgets—and good for the economy,” Pearson said.