More than half of Minnesota's workforce is employed by the state's 500,000 small businesses. That's more than 1.2 million Minnesotans, many whose livelihoods depend on clean water. This includes many small businesses in tourism, recreation, agriculture and more.
The Clean Water Rule was released last year and is now being targeted by opponents who say it will be bad for business and the economy. Powerful lobbyists and some attorneys general in other states are initiating court battles without considering how important the rule is to our small business community. Most recently, Small Business Minnesota, along with the American Sustainable Business Council and others, helped keep the clean water rule from becoming a bargaining chip in passing the congressional budget.
Our legislators need to understand that clean water is not only good for Minnesota's small business, it is essential to our state's economy:
Minnesota's tourism industry, which includes many small businesses, has doubled in the past decade generating $13 billion in annual revenue and employing 250,000 Minnesotans. Yet, in the state's most lucrative tourist area outside of the metro, half Southern Minnesota's lakes have been designated as unsafe for swimming or fishing, and many have been deemed unrecoverable.
Minnesota's burgeoning microbreweries contributed $1.3 billion to Minnesota's economy in 2014. An owner of one of Minnesota's newest and most successful breweries, the Lupine Brewing Company in Delano, explained that changes in water, either from pollution or from water-treatment to address pollution, can alter product quality, taste and uniformity, which would be devastating to their business. The owner called pollution "extremely hazardous to our business."
Minnesota has the country's most robust wild rice trade. Wild rice has been harvested here for thousands of years and prior to 1970, Minnesota provided 50 percent of the world's wild rice supply. No other native Minnesota plant approaches the level of cultural, ecological and economic value. Yet, Minnesota's wild rice wetlands are under continual threat of being destroyed by unrestrained pollution.
Minnesota's family farms, small growers, high-demand organics sector and pollinator businesses all depend on clean water.
Too often, legislators claim support for small business but primarily focus their time, public policy, our tax dollars and our natural resources on the wishes of powerful lobbyists and big business special interests. That does not make business nor economic sense.
Minnesota small businesses are a major economic growth engine. They are creating two of every three new jobs and nationally, small businesses contribute 50 percent of the GDP. While Minnesota has more Fortune 500s per capita than any other state but one, more Minnesotans are employed by small businesses than all those Fortune 500s combined. Small business is vital to our economy and clean water is vital to many small businesses. Additionally, the American Sustainable Business Council found that 80 percent of small business owners nationwide support the Clean Water Rule; 71 percent said protecting clean water was good for the economy.
We need our elected officials to reflect these realities when making policy decisions.
Britton is chair of Small Business Minnesota, a statewide nonprofit membership association of small business owners.
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