Peer-to-peer lending: borrowing and lending for every man

I had the following conversation with Janet Etheridge, Certified Business Analyst at the University of West Florida Small Business Development Center.  The subject:  peer-to-peer lending. Business owners are frantically searching for ways to finance in these lean times.

Sue:  I can see you’re excited about Kiva, Janet!  Tell me more.

Janet:  I was watching the evening news and a story featuring web-based micro-loans caught my attention. As a Certified Business Analyst at the SBDC, I am barraged daily with clients who are in need of funding in some way or another to either keep their businesses afloat, or to start a new business. The news story was about a website called KIVA.org. Their tag line is “Loans That Save Lives”.

Sue:  Considering business loans are few and far between right now, I can see that would stir interest in the business community!

Janet:  Kiva’s mission is to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty in the world. This website is the first ever person-to-person micro-lending entity, empowering individuals to lend directly to unique entrepreneurs around the globe.

The people are real. They are screened through the KIVA network of partners for qualification and then their story is posted on the website. People can view and choose whomever they would like to lend to as little as $25. The terms of the loan are up to a year, and repayment is at a 98% rate. Wow! This is a really neat example of how innovative we can be in times of huge financial crisis and it shows that socially-minded people are out there making a difference $25 at a time.

Sue:  Janet, this is exciting!  Even I can be a venture capitalist with Kiva!  Thanks, Janet, for the insight.

Sue A. Evans

Making your voice heard: The Florida Office of the Small Business Advocate

The rewards of entrepreneurship are great; in this current economy many people who have never considered running their own businesses are doing so. As much as the State of Florida is encouraging entrepreneurship and thus promoting economic development, sometimes the regulations that help protect the citizens, the environment, or special interest groups create undue hardships on small businesses.

Well, now you have someone to go to when you feel the state has enacted a regulation that makes it hard for you to do business. Last year the state approved funding for a new office which will look at bills and regulations that affect small businesses in the state and make recommendations to the state legislature. The Florida Office of the Small Business Advocate (FOSBA) is a program of the Florida Small Business Development Center (SBDC) Network, and is co-located with the state SBDC office in Pensacola.

The bill that established the office also established the Florida Small Business Regulatory Advisory Council (SBRAC) to hear complaints submitted by the FOSBA and make recommendations to the Governor. The nine-member council, appointed by the Governor, Speaker of the House and President of the senate, are current or former small business owners and meet regularly to review any laws under question.

What should you do, then, to make a complaint? Write a letter to the FOSBA, incorporating the following information:

• The bill (or current regulation), including the bill number
• How the bill impacts your business
• How many other businesses, in your estimation, the bill impacts
• What the impact will be on the state of Florida, in dollars and cents, if the bill remains in effect

If it sounds like you have to do your homework to have your voice heard, you’re right. The new FOSBA office has a skeleton staff and currently can only review information that is well presented and complete. You may have to contact your state industry association (Click here for a link to a live Yahoo list of trade associations) to get the information or make the contacts you need; but you can rest assured that, at the least, every legitimate complaint will be presented for review.

Sue A. Evans

Catch the Vision, Part 3

“We raise our kids here, love living here, and then feel we have to send them away to get a real job.”  This is the sentiment of John Peacock in a Blab TV interview about Escambia All for One (http://escambiaallforone.com/).  Escambia All for One is a citizen-led effort to create a unified government in the Pensacola Metropolitan Area.  According to Peacock, unifying the city and county would create a community that will rank 65^th in the nation in population size.  The purpose?  This community already exists and acts as a single community.  But some citizens complain that the government process here is hampered by the bureaucracy of the government system of each local jurisdiction.  According to supporters, not only will the unification streamline the government process to help get things done quickly and save taxpayer dollars, but can also help the community attract state and federal monies for the purpose of economic development.

Peacock continued, “When other leaders of major cities come here, they say, ‘You guys are willfully poor.’”  Although the large city mayors lament over their wish to have the undeveloped waterfront that we have here, they say they couldn’t make the progress that they have made in their cities (Charleston, Jacksonville) with our present form of government.

Supporters of the effort said that a unified government gives local citizens an opportunity to not only get involved but to make their vote count for change.  Read more about the Escambia All for One project and decide for yourself.  A few concerned citizens are making an effort to improve our community; let’s follow their lead.

Sue A. Evans