D.C. potpourri

It's Wednesday evening and I’m sitting in a D.C. hotel room after an interesting day.

I was asked to join Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon in a press teleconference call today on the tax cut issue eating up Washington. As readers of this blog already know, the Small Business Chamber is opposing the extension of tax cuts on incomes in excess of $200,000 for an individual and $250,000 for joint filers. It’s a $700 billion bad business decision and Senator Merkley agrees.

This afternoon I was invited to attend a meeting on health care cooperatives sponsored by the Center for American Progress. CAP is working with the Obama administration to encourage the creation of these non-profit co-ops, which are required by the new health care law to be offered in each state as part of the 2014 insurance exchanges.

Ironically today was also the official announcement of the South Carolina Health Cooperative, a venture launched by a Georgia Tech student (Cooper Littlejohn) with assistance of some independent insurance agents. While Littlejohn’s business plan hasn’t been totally revealed, his co-op at this time is more of an insurance buying organization for small businesses formed as a group (which would not fit the criteria under the new health care law for being included in the insurance exchanges). But who knows how this effort will turn out and I wish Cooper success and applaud his initiative.

Tomorrow (Thursday) holds more meetings for me. First up is Sen. Mary Landrieu’s hearing on regulatory burdens facing small businesses. Then I’ll see my friend John Spratt and wish him the best in his post-Congressional future. Then it’s a meeting with key staff in Colorado Senator Michael Bennet’s office on the tax cut issue. I’ll end the day with a workgroup session at the Security and Exchange Commission where I’ll be supporting a petition effort to enable small businesses to capitalize with $100 or under investments without going through the regular time and expense normally required under SEC rules.

I’ll be back on a plane after a Friday breakfast meeting with some D.C. small businesses interested in starting their own small business chamber (inspired by our success in South Carolina). 

Now I'm off to Common Wealth Gastropub to meet some folks.