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One City Indivisible
Philadelphia is a city of innovation rather than poverty. Joining the Entrepreneurs' Roundtable for its last convening of 2016, Mayor Jim Kenney foresaw mission-driven, local businesses being at the center of the city’s transformation. Drawing upon childhood memories of Philadelphia as a city of thriving neighborhoods, he outlined a path to transformation that lies in revitalizing neighborhood commercial corridors.
Pedestrian-oriented, storefront retail corridors were once the hub of Philadelphia's consumption and entertainment, providing convenient sources of essential goods and services. Kenney recalled how as a child his mother use to do all the family’s shopping along South 7th Street on Saturday mornings. The second half of the 20th century, however, brought significant economic disinvestment and population outflow that led to the physical deterioration of many neighborhood corridors. The South 7th Street corridor embodies the aftermath of these effects. An arterial of neighborhood businesses, once largely owned by Jewish families, veered towards the brink of extinction before re-emerging in recent day as cluster of Cambodian-owned enterprises.
Scanning the audience of diverse business owners, Kenney outlined how witnessing the transition of South 7th Street drove his strategy for resurrecting commercial corridors and transforming economically-distressed neighborhoods: improved support for immigrant-owned businesses. Immigrant-owned businesses are a critical segment of the Philadelphia economy.
A recent study by the Fiscal Policy Institute found immigrants make up 28 percent of "Main Street" business owners in the city. And, well represented among neighborhood businesses in economically-distressed areas, immigrant business owners are pioneers in entrepreneurship. The significance of immigrants to the city’s economic landscape has prompted Kenney to prioritize helping this constituency navigate the legal maze involved in owning a business as part of his economic development strategy. He cited that under his administration, the Commerce Department has expanding its offerings to Latino and Korean communities, such as increasing the number of bilingual business services managers.
need to know about this emerging policy
For small businesses, where employees often work long hours and are earning more than $455 per week, the proposed rule could be significant. If multiple employees are routinely working beyond normal work hours, overtime pay could reasonably increase personnel expenses.