All three areas are of concern to the chamber’s membership as well as the region’s overall business climate, says Stacey Duncan, president and CEO of the Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce, a pro-business membership organization representing nearly 800 businesses throughout the Binghamton area. Unemployment insurance has been a concern since the increased payouts during the […]
All three areas are of concern to the chamber’s membership as well as the region’s overall business climate, says Stacey Duncan, president and CEO of the Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce, a pro-business membership organization representing nearly 800 businesses throughout the Binghamton area.
Unemployment insurance has been a concern since the increased payouts during the COVID-19 pandemic because those payments drained the unemployment fund, she says. As a result, businesses have been receiving invoices for interest assessment charges that, for some companies, can be as high as $30,000.
“It is an important business issue,” Duncan says. The chamber would like to see the state take a more “prudent approach” to handling the unemployment deficit and previously pushed for the state to use some COVID relief funding to pay it down.
Minimum wage is another concern for chamber members, Duncan says. The wage increased $1 in upstate New York to $14.20 per hour at the end of 2022. “We’ve been watching that closely as well,” she says, with concerns about increasing wages in a recessionary environment. The chamber advocates for judicious increases that don’t put undue burden on job creators.
As the state pushes an ambitious clean-energy agenda, Duncan says the chamber wants to make sure changes happen on a realistic time frame with energy resources that are both affordable and reliable. She says the business community is not opposed to renewable-power generation, as long as it does not compromise their ability to do business in New York state.
Along with focusing on its legislative agenda, the Greater Binghamton Chamber is gearing up for the return of more in-person events as well as bolstering and launching several initiatives.
“This year we’ve just got a great lineup of events,” Duncan says.
The chamber’s annual Spark career event for the area’s eighth graders started the year off right on Jan. 18. The event hosted more than 2,000 eighth graders at SUNY Broome and featured more than 40 businesses and over 120 interactive activities for students to explore as they learned more about career options available to them.
Working with the City of Binghamton, the Greater Binghamton Chamber will host several roundtable events to discuss issues such as public-private relationships, public transportation, and co-operative bidding.
In May, the chamber’s annual meeting returns to an in-person event, and the chamber is looking to create an event in late spring to bring together its new strategic office of placemaking and the Binghamton Film Office to further promote those initiatives.
Duncan says the chamber also hopes to launch a minority-owned business council this year to engage with and promote minority-owned businesses. The council will also serve as a means to connect those owners with financial tools, technical assistance, and other services.
“So, a lot is going on in the year ahead,” Duncan says. With a renewed energy following the pandemic and a desire to get back out there to network, she expects the year to be an exciting one for the Greater Binghamton Chamber staff and members.