3 Ways ISA Saves Your Company from Costly Red Tape
Every day, sign companies spend thousands of dollars to comply with mandates from Washington, D.C.
According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, federal regulations cost the U.S. economy over $1 trillion a year, and according to the National Association of Manufacturers, it costs the average U.S. manufacturer nearly $20,000 per employee to comply with bureaucratic red tape from our nation’s capital.
While we can all agree that a basic regulatory framework is necessary in order to ensure the safety and health of our citizens, these costs indicate that serious regulatory reform is needed. That’s why the International Sign Association is working to help clean up the regulatory process and to make it easier for sign companies to navigate the mess of mandates coming from Washington, D.C.
ISA works with groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers in urging Congress to enact significant regulatory reform.
- ALERRT SUCCESS: Some of these efforts were successful, such as House bill H.R. 2804, the “Achieving Less Excess in Regulation and Requiring Transparency (ALERRT) Act.” This bill passed in the U.S. House of Representatives by a bipartisan vote of 236-179 in early 2014, but the U.S. Senate never acted on it. This is unfortunate because H.R. 2804 included several major principles of accountability, transparency, and fairness that are much-needed for America’s businesses.
- ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT: ISA staff met personally with nearly 30 federal officials and their staff last year to educate them on how various environmental and workplace regulations specifically impact sign companies. These meetings with Members of Congress, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the White House Office of Information & Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) were, for many of these federal officials, the first time they had the opportunity to learn about the sign industry and the role that our products play in promoting economic growth.
- REGULATORY REFORM: Just last month, ISA’s Vice President of Government Relations, David Hickey, participated in a day-long conference hosted by the Regulatory Improvement Council, a trade group representing thousands of manufacturers. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) and staff from several congressional offices made predictions about the Obama administration’s plans for 2015 and beyond, while Mr. Hickey moderated a discussion featuring Sen. John Boozman (R-AR) and Sen. Angus King (I-ME) on the prospect of getting regulatory reform signed into law in the new Congress.
These are just some of the ways that ISA has been working to represent and defend the sign industry’s interests in our nation’s capital regarding regulatory reform. ISA will continue throughout 2015 to work with allied organizations and members of Congress to relieve the regulatory burden on America’s small businesses and sign companies.
For more information, please contact ISA’s David Hickey.
