The next time you're out shopping or dining, we encourage you to take a moment and chat with the owner or manager. Ask them how their business is doing.
We're afraid the answer is predictable. People are eating out less. Delaying purchases and projects. They're even getting their hair cut less.
And that means many businesses are adjusting their expectations. For some who'd been planning on a healthy profit, the goal is now keeping the doors open.
It's against this landscape that the city is proposing a business tax increase of 4.1 percent. It's small ($40 or less for most businesses) but, in the minds of business owners, not insignificant.
From the city's standpoint, the increase is to cover inflation. There are times when such fees are warranted ... just as businesses must budget for inflation every year, so too must government adapt to increasing costs beyond their control.
This year is different. It has brought a crashing stock market, bank failures, a record number of foreclosures and the general uneasiness all of those things are causing consumers.
The business tax increase is a small thing monetarily, but it's a big thing in terms of the unsympathetic message it would send.
For a city striving to earn a reputation as business friendly, the correct message is quite the opposite.