Small-business owner reflects on board victories

"Government regulation is one of the top worries for small-business owners," said Scott George, general manager for Mid-America Dental and Hearing Clinic in Mount Vernon. "I know because I deal with lots of government regulations myself."

George deals with regulations and guidelines established by federal agencies ranging from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to the Internal Revenue Service. Over the years, he's seen the number of regulations and laws that small business owners must follow increase, and, he said, he's had enough.

For years, George has worked through the National Federation of Independent Business and National Small Business United to combat excessive and overzealous government regulations. In 1995, George was one of 2,000 delegates who attended the White House Conference on Small Business.

The following year, Sen. Christopher "Kit" Bond appointed George to serve on the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board. The board was formed in 1996 following the passage of the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Act.

The act directed the U.S. Small Business Administration to create a program that would allow small-business owners to comment on the enforcement and compliance activities of the federal agencies that regulate them. The legislation also directed the SBA to appoint a national ombudsman and 10 Regional Regulatory Fairness boards.

George was appointed to serve on the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board for Region VII, which covers Missouri, Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska. During his four-year tenure, he helped implement changes that have affected small-business owners in southwest Missouri and around the country. The most significant changes involved working with the Internal Revenue Service to develop policies that emphasize regulatory compliance rather than punishment.

"Prior to the formation of the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board, small-business owners were always complaining about the number of IRS regulations they had to comply with," George said. "A lot of these regulations were enforced subjectively, and the IRS was handing out a lot of fines. Business owners were tired of playing the gotcha' game with the IRS."

Members of the Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board worked with the IRS on the matter. The IRS took the board's suggestion and formed a small-business unit to study the issue.

As a result of that study, the IRS began developing policies that emphasized identification of offenders and regulatory compliance instead of punishment, George said. The IRS also began publishing tax guidelines for small-business owners that were easier to understand.

In addition, members of the Region VII Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board served as a liaison between the oil and gas industry and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. As a result, George said, OSHA issued more effective guidelines rather than just more regulations.

"What the board really did is work with OSHA on the front-end of the regulatory process," George said. "Two to three workers per year were getting killed in workplace accidents. We worked in cooperation with members of the oil and gas industry to help develop the new regulations, which were passed along to OSHA by our board's national ombudsman. After the guidelines went into effect, there were no deaths for 22 months."

Since George's term expired, three new members have been appointed to serve on the five-member Region VII Small Business Regulatory Fairness Board. However, none of the new board members live or work in southwest Missouri.

According to George, regulatory fairness is an issue that should be addressed on the state level, as well as the federal level.

"I would like to see Missouri follow the lead of states like New York and Hawaii, which have established their own state-level regulatory fairness boards," George said. "Small business owners need and deserve representation at the state and local levels."

George is watching with interest to see how the national board handles the many new guidelines, regulations and laws that will affect small business owners.

"Many regulations are being passed during the final hours of the Clinton administration," George said. "OSHA rushed through a new ergonomic standard that added more than 20,000 pages of new workplace regulations. The Environmental Protection Agency also was able to get a number of new regulations and guidelines passed. It will be interesting to see how the board and small-business owners deal with these changes in the coming year."