You try to open your “brick and mortar” Big Island enterprise and it takes you up to a year to get your store, shop, restaurant, whatever, into operation. What’s wrong with this picture? A lot.
I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of hearing about Hawaii being the worst place in the country to do business in just about every category. OK, so maybe it’s true, but how about we stop bemoaning the situation and dissuading small business people from fulfilling their dreams. Let’s do something about it.
There’s nothing we can do about our geographic isolation, and indeed it’s the blessing of our geography that drew everyone here, from the Polynesian voyager to the recently retired snowbird. That leads to things like long-distance transport and the high prices that we’ve all made a bargain with as the tradeoff for living here.
But what about the things we can change; the man-made barriers to economic development? Can we do something about those?
The primary barrier I hear about over and over again, in excruciating detail, is the permitting process in Hawaii County. Maybe you read about a recent study reported in Hawaii Business Magazine on the permitting process in Honolulu. That study placed Honolulu dead last in the nation in the length of time it took to get a construction project permitted, and by a large magnitude. Although this study focused only on metropolitan areas, I can’t help but believe that we have a similar situation here on Hawaii Island.
I listen to the shop owner who wanted to replace a water heater in his new location. This morphed into a project that required seven months of waiting, double the price of the water heater in engineering drawings, and nine separate signatures from various planning entities. The result of all this was seven months of rent and no income until a state representative intervened on the owner’s behalf. Then, miracle of miracles, the owner got action within a few days of that political pressure.
I listen to another shop owner who paid rent and insurance for 11 months without being able to open because of continually changing and escalating requirements on a variety of items from inspectors. This shifting and piece meal delivery of information forced him deeply into debt and literally doubled the expected price of startup.
I hear about the business that got three different interpretations on one issue from three different people on the same visit to the planning department. How do you proceed in the face of that kind of confusion and with that kind of direction?
Over and over I hear about what seems to be a Goliath-sized problem about grease traps, with extremely large and expensive installations being required for operations with minimal discharge, no room for perhaps more efficient alternatives, and with finger pointing all over the place, from planning to wastewater to health departments and back again.
And I hear about inertia, about how having a “friend” who can put a word in the right ear helps, about misinformation, about trying your best to stay on the good side of the powers that be to prevent sabotage. And finally, I hear about lots of unpermitted operations because owners are afraid of or can’t afford to enter the planning morass. So, in addition to masses of confusion, we have a totally contradictory process: A process that is supposed to ensure public safety that is in fact persuading businesses to cut corners and endanger public safety.
All of this gives Hawaii it’s perhaps well-deserved bad name and position on the bottom of all those “ease of doing business” lists. We’re working against ourselves in our efforts to promote economic development in our communities and increased opportunities for businesses and their employees.
So, what to do?
How about we look at the process of getting a business started in a new location holistically, as one whole scenario. So instead of running an owner from department to department and from inspector to inspector we centralize the permitting function so all required information is provided at one time and in one place.
How about we take a look at the slurry of building regulations that currently exists to eliminate redundancies and weed out what we don’t need while still achieving the needed result: public safety.
How about we apply some common sense to the economic development process and realize that erecting barriers to business shouldn’t be the business of government, but that overcoming barriers should be.
Can we start the discussion?
Despite the above, businesses do start up — and succeed — on the Big Island. Please join us for “How to Start a Business in Hawaii,” co-sponsored by the Bank of Hawaii, from 9-11:30 a.m. Wednesday. Registration and details available at www.hisbdc.org
Dennis Boyd is the director of the West Hawaii Small Business Development Center. Hawaii SBDC Network is funded in part through Cooperative Agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration and the University of Hawaii at Hilo.