Minority Business Assistance Center Opens at Mycap
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Jerome Franklin of JEF Enterprises, Youngstown, is confident that the newly opened Minority Business Assistance Center will help businesses like his.
In addition to owning the Starting Lineup Barber Shop, Franklin also has a product line called the Nail Biter, a patent-pending line of fingernail clippers featuring images of college mascots, logos and cartoon characters. He has licenses for YSU and other schools, and this weekend he will head to Washington, D.C. with special clippers featuring President Obama that he's taking to the inauguration.
The new Minority Business Assistance Center will provide businesses with the tools they need, and has provided Franklin with leadership for running a business. “It’ll be a great help,” he said.
Franklin was among the entrepreneurs and small-business owners who attended Tuesday’s open house for the Minority Business Assistance Center, which is housed within the offices of Mahoning Youngstown Community Action Partnership, 1325 Fifth Ave. Mycap received a $75,000 grant from the Ohio Development Services Agency, formerly known as the Ohio Department of Development, to establish the center, one of 10 such offices across the state.
The focus of the center “is to be a catalyst for growth for high-performing minority-owned businesses” by providing effective business counseling, resources, services and assistance so those companies will be able to compete for contracts with government agencies and institutions such as Youngstown State University, as well as in the oil and gas industry, says Chauncey Hilson, director of the Youngstown MBAC office and Mycap’s financial stability coordinator.
“The goal is to create top-of-the-line companies so that those companies can qualify for top-of-the-line opportunities,” he explained. “As we show that we have what it takes, organizations like the Ohio Development Services Agency, the oil and gas industry, and Youngstown State as well as others will respond by showing they want what we offer.”
Counselors will provide minority and disadvantaged business owners with information and guidance from the research and discovery phase through writing a business plan to getting them qualified for the 15% of state business that is set aside for minority and disadvantaged businesses, or about $350 million through June 30.
“If you aren’t certified, you are truly missing an opportunity,” said Sharon Smith, assistant deputy chief of the ODSA’s Office of Business Assistance.
“Our leadership is not accepting anything less than that 15%,” she added. “That’s not a goal. It’s the law.”
Smith joked that Robin Renee Walton, Mycap’s CEO, “stalked” her to convince her to establish an MBAC office here. “We’re extremely excited with this partnership,” she remarked.
In addition to providing qualified businesses with assistance to secure Minority Business Enterprise and Encouraging Diversity, Growth & Equity certifications, the center will help businesses identify contracting opportunities, offer information resources such as Dodge construction reports, and provide assistance with joint venturing and teaming, and with exporting.
Smith outlined the opportunities for contractors in the oil and gas industry. Just the prospects for direct involvement include opportunities for site construction and preparation, heavy equipment operators and manufacturers, and supplying water, she said.
Smith, who visited Cranberry Township, Pa., to see the activity going on there, noted how one contractor capitalized on the need for gender-specific safety jumpsuits for women and is “making a mint,” Another contractor, a food vendor who had been earning up to $75,000 annually just supplying one meal a day to a worksite has seen his business grow substantially by meeting meal demand for the round-the-clock operation.
Programs available to assist businesses also include the Ohio Capital Access Program, which can provide cash guarantees of up to 80% of a credit line for minority businesses to encourage banks to make loans, and a new program that puts money into banks to support collateral for loans, said Allen McConnell, loan/bond officer with ODSA’s business assistance office. The state also has a minority bonding program to help businesses secure contracts and a minority business direct loan program.
Although Bill Williams has been in business since 2003, he is looking forward to the kinds of services and opportunities that are being offered through the center.
“For me it is for information purposes, to understand some of the opportunities that some of the small businesses have in this area,” Williams remarked. Williams owns Imaging Results, a Youngstown document management company. Williams said he has been the “sole source of funding” for his business since the beginning. “I’m trying to look for some other opportunities to obtain contracts as well as funding for my business.”
Copyright 2013 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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