Volume 1, Issue 2
Table of Contents

Cover Story:
Putting All The Pieces Together
County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef keeps Rockland in his sights as he looks ahead to the Governor's race.

Feature Story:
Everybody's Going Downtown
What four of the county's villages are doing to encourage economic development.

Feature Story:
The Expo's Coming!
Annual Business-to-Business event partners RBA with Mahwah Regional Chamber of Commerce.

DEPARTMENTS:

Economics Roundup
• What's Your Investment Behavior?
• Taxes and Long-Term Care Insurance

Business Roundup
• HVCFI Accepting Applicants
• The Fine Art of Advertising

Retail Round-Up
• It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year
• New in Town

Ask the Expert
• Human Resources
• Legal Matters
• Workplace Hotline
• Information Technology

Invest in Your Community
• Make-A-Wish Foundation
• JCC-Y of Rockland's Capital Campaign
• Other News

Odds & Ends
• From The Publishers
• PR Patter
• Reaching Out to Small Business
• Rockland Joins the Empire
• Big News for Local Small Businesses

Dedicated Section:
Rockland Business Association:

The President’s Desk
Empire Zone designation, grant programs drive new opportunities for business.

The Investor Hotline
Avoid these three common mistakes

RBA Happenings
• Other News
• Committee and Council Info
• Calendar of Events
• New Members

Create visibility, find marketing opportunities, leverage your contacts and build your referral network! Find the group that’s right for you.

CEO Forum
RBA's CEO Forum provides a vehicle by which senior executives can address the challenges inherent in operating a sizable business within the county.

The Women’s Forum:
The Women’s Forum of the RBA is “by professional women, for professional women.” It conducts an interactive monthly meeting structured around high-impact business issues. Sometimes a unique “Facilitated Brainstorming” approach is used; sometimes there is a keynote speaker (from inside the group or an outside professional); other times a small group analysis is employed to come up with solutions to pressing business problems. The group is co-chaired by Fran Reinstein of Mortgage World and Ellen Bernstein of Accent on Promotions, Inc. It is an informal gathering with huge energy and synergy, stemming form the diverse and talented group in attendance.

Small Business Council
The council was begun as a place where small business owners could meet and discuss strategies for improving their companies and overcoming potential obstacles to success. The Small Business Council also offers informative guest speakers on a wide range of business issues, from insurance to marketing, to worker’s compensation, and more. Meetings are the last Thursday of the month at the Iona College campus at Blue Hill Plaza in Pearl River.

Hospitality/Tourism Alliance
Serves as a clearing house on issues affecting this vital segment of Rockland's economy - concentrating on building tourism in Rockland County.

Home Improvement Alliance
Alliance members, for instance, look for ways to help each other understand different permit regulations of the various municipalities in Rockland. Small differences from village to village and town to town can cause a lot of confusion. The Alliance is also interested in advocacy, working toward ways to improve insurance requirements for contractors, which can be unfair in New York. Reforming the infamous “ladder law” — if an employee gets drunk on his lunch break, for instance, and then falls off a ladder and breaks his leg, the business is liable for his injury, and other issues are on the Alliance’s agenda.

Government Affairs
As an advocate for small business on not only the county level, but on the state and federal level, the Government Affairs Council provides critical information to members of the RBA and Rockland’s small business community, and responds on their behalf to the appropriate government officials. This council makes annual trips to Albany and Washington to lobby for changes to laws that affect small business, such as the Wick’s Law, workers’ compensation, and more.

The RBA Small Business Committee
Burt Steinberg of Dress Barn, and Sheldon Horowitz of Safe Harbour Group, are co-chairing a new endeavor from the RBA Board of Directors called the Small Business Committee. Recently formed to help meet the needs of RBA members with nine or less employees, their goal is to help small businesses succeed and assist new businesses by helping them create their own opportunities.

By offering the following, the Committee envisions assisting small businesses:

• Overview of starting and growing a business
• Educate on what starting a new business entails
• Training on simple issues such as networking and presenting oneself to target audiences
• Input from other RBA groups (i.e. Consultants Council, Women’s Forum, Small Business Council, Home Improvement Council, etc)
• Evaluation process

The goal of the committee is to bring resources together and identify markets and business plans. RBD