PROGRAM SUCCESS – JULY 2010
PAGE 33
The First Coast African American Chamber of Commerce
The Chamber On The Move
Dr. Carlton Lamar Robinson
President - FCAACC
The First Coast
African American
Chamber
of
Commerce is on
the
move.
Effective June 1,
2010 the chamber
will enter a one
year pilot as a
Business Mentor
&
Exchange
Center in beautiful
d o w n t o w n
Jacksonville, FL.
In this new role
Dr. Robinson &
the chamber can
be reached at:
The First Coast African American Chamber of Commerce,
841 Prudential Drive, 12th Floor
Jacksonville, Florida 32207
(904) 371-1979
Purpose: The purpose of this initiative is to help increase the
business participation rate and sustainability of entrepreneurs within
the First Coast region through mentoring and information exchange.
Why now? Funding is a major issue in all communities and
declining quickly. When funding becomes restricted the emphasis
on how we support entrepreneurs, as a community, shifts.
Unfortunately, that normally spells bad news for aspiring business
owners and entrepreneurs. For example, in the state of Florida
nearly 92% of all businesses are either self-employed or Stage One.
And yet, the grant deliverables are shifting towards creating more
Stage Two businesses.
To make matters worse there is a strong push towards race-neutral
programs in public contracting. When you review the totality of
“most” race neutral programs it has more to do with legalese than
business practice. Think about it, if segments of your business
population struggled to get 10% or less of available contracts with
supporting programs what will happen without them? Some have
successfully argued that it is cheaper to “purchase” an inaccurate
disparity study that implies no disparities exist (from a legal
perspective which can be different from reality) than it is
to develop an effective business environment that creates
opportunities for “all qualified” businesses. These might
be good talking points for your political leadership as we
near upcoming elections.
For these reasons and many more we must begin to
develop more Business Mentor & Exchange Cen ѕ