U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

36–208 WASHINGTON : 2019

HONORING THE NATION’S SMALL BUSINESS 

HEROES 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

UNITED STATES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

MAY 8, 2019 

Small Business Committee Document Number 116–018 

Available via the GPO Website: www.govinfo.gov 

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Congress.#13
(II) 

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

NYDIA VELA ́ ZQUEZ, New York, Chairwoman 

ABBY FINKENAUER, Iowa 

JARED GOLDEN, Maine 

ANDY KIM, New Jersey 

JASON CROW, Colorado 

SHARICE DAVIDS, Kansas 

JUDY CHU, California 

MARC VEASEY, Texas 

DWIGHT EVANS, Pennsylvania 

BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois 

ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York 

ANTONIO DELGADO, New York 

CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania 

ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio, Ranking Member 

AUMUA AMATA COLEMAN RADEWAGEN, American Samoa, Vice Ranking Member 

TRENT KELLY, Mississippi 

TROY BALDERSON, Ohio 

KEVIN HERN, Oklahoma 

JIM HAGEDORN, Minnesota 

PETE STAUBER, Minnesota 

TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee 

ROSS SPANO, Florida 

JOHN JOYCE, Pennsylvania 

ADAM MINEHARDT, Majority Staff Director 

MELISSA JUNG, Majority Deputy Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

KEVIN FITZPATRICK, Staff Director 

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C O N T E N T S 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Page 

Hon. Nydia Vela ́zquez ............................................................................................. 1 

Hon. Steve Chabot ................................................................................................... 2 

Hon. Abby Finkenauer ............................................................................................ 34 

Hon. Jared Golden ................................................................................................... 22 

Hon. Jason Crow ...................................................................................................... 34 

Hon. Brad Schneider ............................................................................................... 47 

Hon. Antonio Delgado ............................................................................................. 4 

Hon. Chrissy Houlahan ........................................................................................... 22 

Hon. Angie Craig ..................................................................................................... 4 

Hon. Kevin Hern ...................................................................................................... 18 

Hon. Jim Hagedorn ................................................................................................. 5 

Hon. Pete Stauber ................................................................................................... 21 

Hon. Tim Burchett ................................................................................................... 35 

Hon. John Joyce ....................................................................................................... 36 

WITNESSES 

Ms. Gia Giasullo, Owner, Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain, Brooklyn, 

NY ......................................................................................................................... 5 

Ms. Amy Fox, President & Operations, Spiral Brewery, Hastings, MN ............. 7 

Mr. Nels Leader, Vice President, Bread Alone Bakery, Lake Katrine, NY ........ 9 

Mr. Robert Hoffman, Broker, Robert Hoffman Realty Inc., Albert Lea, MN ..... 11 

Mr. Jason Brochu, President and Co-Owner, Pleasant River Lumber, DoverFoxcroft, ME ......................................................................................................... 23 

Mr. Bill Skalish, Owner, Granite Tech, Inc. and The Benchmark GRP, LLC, 

Landenberg, PA .................................................................................................... 25 

Mr. Jerry Kortesmaki, Owner, London Road Rental Center, Duluth, MN ......... 27 

Mr. Dave Walton, Farmer, Iowa Soybean Association, Wilton, IA ...................... 37 

Ms. Brittney Reese, Co-Founder and Head FIT Coach, FIT & NU, Aurora, 

CO .......................................................................................................................... 39 

Ms. Colleen Cruze Bhatti, Owner, Cruze Farm, Knoxville, TN .......................... 40 

Mr. Shawn Pulford, CEO, LB Water, Chambersburg, PA ................................... 42 

APPENDIX 

Prepared Statements: 

Ms. Gia Giasullo, Owner, Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain, Brooklyn, 

NY .................................................................................................................. 52 

Ms. Amy Fox, President & Operations, Spiral Brewery, Hastings, MN ...... 55 

Mr. Nels Leader, Vice President, Bread Alone Bakery, Lake Katrine, 

NY .................................................................................................................. 59 

Mr. Robert Hoffman, Broker, Robert Hoffman Realty, Inc., Albert Lea, 

MN ................................................................................................................. 62 

Mr. Jason Brochu, President and Co-Owner, Pleasant River Lumber, 

Dover-Foxcroft, ME ....................................................................................... 64 

Mr. Bill Skalish, Owner, Granite Tech, Inc. and The Benchmark GRP, 

LLC, Landenberg, PA ................................................................................... 68 

Mr. Jerry Kortesmaki, Owner, London Road Rental Center, Duluth, MN . 70 

Mr. Dave Walton, Farmer, Iowa Soybean Association, Wilton, IA .............. 73 

Ms. Brittney Reese, Co-Founder and Head FIT Coach, FIT & NU, Aurora, 

CO .................................................................................................................. 79 

Ms. Colleen Cruze Bhatti, Owner, Cruze Farm, Knoxville, TN ................... 82 

Mr. Shawn Pulford, CEO, LB Water, Chambersburg, PA ............................ 85 

Questions and Answers for the Record: 

Questions from Hon. Crow to Ms. Brittney Reese and Answers from 

Ms. Brittney Reese ........................................................................................ 89 

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IV 

Additional Material for the Record: 

Statement from Scott Asbjornson, Vice-President of Finance and Chief 

Financial Officer, AAON, Inc., Tulsa, OK .................................................. 91 

Statement from Kristofor Sabey, Owner, Surf Liquors & Market, Seaside 

Heights, NJ ................................................................................................... 94 

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HONORING THE NATION’S SMALL BUSINESS 

HEROES 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 8, 2019 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS, Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:05 a.m., in Room 

2360, Rayburn House Office Building. Hon. Nydia Vela ́zquez 

[chairwoman of the Committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Vela ́zquez, Finkenauer, Golden, Kim, 

Crow, Davids, Schneider, Delgado, Houlahan, Craig, Chabot, Kelly, 

Balderson, Hern, Hagedorn, Stauber, Burchett, and Joyce. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Good morning. The committee will 

come to order. 

I thank everyone for joining us this morning and especially 

thank the small business owners from across the country who have 

taken time from their busy schedule to be here today. In particular, 

I would like to welcome Gia Giasullo, owner of Brooklyn Farmacy 

and Soda Fountain from my district. Thank you all for coming here 

today. 

Every year going back to the 1960s, our nation has recognized 

National Small Business Week. While on this committee we are focused on improving opportunities for Main Street every week, 

today is a special opportunity to celebrate the national recognition 

of small businesses, which truly are the backbone of our economy. 

This morning, we will hear directly from small firms that we, as 

members of this committee, have been given the privilege of representing in Congress. Today in America, there are 30 million 

small businesses that support over 56 million jobs, and these firms 

are as diverse as the American people. 

Joining us today are small businesses in a wide array of industries such as restaurants, retail, manufacturing, and farming. And 

as we will hear, they are making their communities stronger, adding character to our Main Streets and fueling our economy. I would 

like to thank each and every small business owner testifying today 

for making the trip here and being a part of this important week 

and conversation. 

Throughout our history, so much of the American dream has 

been about starting a small business, creating jobs, and building 

communities around Main Street. When we talk about taking a 

risk, no one exemplifies that better than small businesses. 

While today is certainly an opportunity to celebrate and hear the 

success stories of small businesses, we also acknowledge that starting a business is often not without its own set of challenges. Access 

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to affordable capital, finding and retaining talented workers, accessing new customers, and competing against larger corporations 

all provide headwinds for small business success. Being the only 

committee dedicated solely to the needs of small firms, we are committed to promoting policies that encourage economic prosperity on 

Main Street. That is why I am excited to hear from entrepreneurs 

from across the country on the successful journey you have made. 

Today, we will be able to learn so much for these heroes of small 

business, about determination, hard work, and creativity that truly 

reflect the American spirit. 

With that, I thank each of the witnesses for taking the time 

away from your business to join us today. I look forward to your 

testimony. 

I now would like to yield to the Ranking Member, Mr. Chabot, 

for his opening statement. 

Mr. CHABOT. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And thank you 

for having this hearing today. I would like to also welcome everyone, including our distinguished witnesses to National Small Business Week. 

This week celebrates and honors the hardest workers in the 

country as far as I am concerned. They rise early and retire well 

after sundown on a daily basis, often wearing many hats throughout the day to ensure their customers are satisfied, their workers 

have what they need to get the job done, and that their company 

is a success. You are the nation’s entrepreneurs and startups in 

small businesses, and your stories define the American dream. You 

deserve the ability to operate freely without the Federal Government causing roadblocks and getting in your way. We want you developing the next product and service, not laboring over burdensome regulations. We want you creating jobs, not pouring over compliance paperwork. You play a critically important role by representing over 30 million small businesses that operate all across 

the country. You create nearly two out of every three new jobs in 

the American economy. 

To put it simply, you are the driving force in the American economy. That is why it is critical for this Committee to continue its 

bipartisan—we work both across party lines, Republicans and 

Democrats. I would prefer to be the Chair but, you know, it did not 

happen last time, and we work with the Chairwoman, and she is 

great. So we work together to create jobs and try to get it right for 

America’s small businesses. Main Streets across the country all 

look different but they all have one thing in common. They all have 

the most dedicated and innovative workers around. From Ohio to 

Minnesota to Florida, the nation’s small businesses are busy moving forward. 

I want to thank you for joining us today and sacrificing time 

away from your growing businesses. Some of you traveled across 

our great country to speak with us today and we appreciate your 

time and your thoughts. And if I ever stop talking we will get to 

them. 

We look forward to talking with you and listening to your stories 

and hearing about your successes, from retail to real estate and 

factories to farms, your impact is vast and important to America. 

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And before I yield back, I want to let all of those in attendance 

know, especially our small business witnesses, that you have all 

got great members of Congress representing you, really on both 

sides here. The members of our Committee for the 116th Congress, 

and I think the Chairwoman would agree with me on this, are, I 

think, perhaps the most engaged of any group that we have seen 

in a while, both Republicans and Democrats alike. Just about everybody is at every hearing working across party lines to produce 

real bipartisan legislation that benefits the American small business owners. So it is an honor to serve with them, and I hope you 

send them all back to the next Congress. 

Now, after saying that we are all here at every hearing, I have 

to announce that I have to go back to Judiciary and Foreign Affairs. We are dealing with the Attorney General in contempt motions there, and we are dealing with the simple matter of China 

in Foreign Affairs. So those issues pale in comparison to the issues 

dealt with in here, but I have to head over there. And I want to 

thank Mr. Hagedorn in advance for filling in for me, and my other 

colleagues who will be filling in after him. 

So thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman, and I yield back. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back. Thank 

you. 

And I agree with the gentleman that this is a committee that 

works in a bipartisan way. We are here to really represent your 

issues and I have to say that when I was the Ranking Member, he 

treated me with respect. Now as the Chairwoman, I am doing the 

same but I have to recognize there is nothing more important than 

holding the gavel. 

I would like to take a few minutes to explain the timing rules. 

Each witness gets 5 minutes to testify and members get 5 minutes 

for questioning. There is a lighting system to assist you. The green 

light comes on when you begin, and the yellow light means that 

there is 1 minute remaining. The red light comes on when you are 

out of time, and we ask that you stay within the timeframe to the 

best of your ability. 

We will begin with introductions for each panel before moving on 

to your testimony. 

With that, it is my pleasure to introduce Ms. Gia Giasullo, owner 

of the Brooklyn Farmacy and Soda Fountain located in my district. 

Brooklyn Farmacy opened its doors in 2010, and since then has 

been serving up fresh, friendly, and delicious sundaes, sodas, and 

ice cream floats. Along the way, Ms. Giasullo has worked closely 

with our local small business development center on business planning and recently obtained an SBA loan so she can continue to 

grow Brooklyn Farmacy. While running her business, Ms. Giasullo 

remains committed to improving her community by hiring neighborhood youth each year and offering leadership opportunities to 

aspiring local entrepreneurs. Nominated in 2016 as New York’s 

Small Business Person of the Year, in so many ways she embodies 

the American dream and Brooklyn Farmacy reminds us that a 

great food company never goes out of style. 

Welcome, Ms. Giasullo. I am very happy you could be with us 

today. 

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I would now yield to Ms. Craig from Minnesota to introduce our 

second witness. 

Ms. CRAIG. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I am honored to introduce to the Committee Mrs. Amy Fox of 

Spiral Brewing of Hastings, Minnesota, in my congressional district. I also want to introduce to the Committee her husband, Nick, 

and sister-in-law, Jen Fox, who are seated behind her this morning. 

Madam Chair, when members were asked to invite a hero of the 

small business community to testify before our Committee, Amy 

and her team immediately came to mind to share their story here 

today. Spiral Brewery has an amazing story to tell. It is a womanowned business that has been open for just over a year now, and 

in that time it has proven itself to be a destination brewery and 

tap room that excels in sharing its craft. And I have been there, 

and it has been shared with me, many times. 

Over the past year, Spiral Brewery has become a destination for 

beer lovers across Minnesota’s metropolitan area and a beer to seek 

out at liquor stores, bars, and restaurants in our region. I am eager 

to have Amy tell you a little bit more about her entrepreneurial experience, and again, I am so, so honored and pleased that they are 

able to be here with us today. 

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I yield back. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Ms. Craig. 

Now, I would like to yield to my colleague from New York, Mr. 

Delgado, to introduce our next witness. 

Mr. DELGADO. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I am thrilled to introduce my friend and an exemplary small 

business owner from New York 19, Nels Leader, vice president of 

Bread Alone Bakery, as he testifies about the economic success and 

sustainable business practices of Bread Alone Bakery in Kingston, 

New York. 

In 1983, Daniel Leader, Nels’s father, moved to the Catskill 

Mountains and started a small business baking naturally fermented artisan breads he sold out of the trunk of the family station 

wagon. Today, Bread Alone Bakery has grown to four locations 

across the Hudson Valley and the Catskill Mountains to farmers 

markets and to dozens of retailers across New York State. Under 

Nels’s leadership, Bread Alone has expanded and maintained its 

commitment to certify organic artisan bread and to our planet. The 

Leader family kicked off their 35th year in business in 2018 by 

launching a solar array on the roof of their headquarters in Kingston, and last year, at least 25 percent of Bread Alone’s energy 

came from the sun. 

In addition to serving as vice president of the family business, 

Nels is a trained climate leader for Al Gore’s Climate Reality 

Project, and a lecturer at the MBA and Sustainability Program at 

Bard College in New York 19. Nels is also a community leader in 

the Hudson Valley and Catskills as he serves on the board of 

Woodstock Land Conservancy and Farm Ferments. Nels holds a 

B.A. in economics from Colby College, an M.B.A. from NYU’s Stern 

School of Business. The engine of NY 19’s economy is the work of 

small businesses and farms. As we join to celebrate Small Business 

Week, I am proud to host Nels Leader and highlight the example 

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of Bread Alone, an innovative small business that continues to improve while honoring their family roots. 

Good to have you here. I yield back, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Delgado. 

And now, finally, I would like to yield to my colleague from Minnesota, Mr. Hagedorn, to introduce our last witness on our first 

panel. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. I really appreciate you holding this hearing and celebrating Small Business 

Week. It is a pleasure and honor to be with you. 

I have the pleasure to introduce to you Mr. Robert Hoffman, and 

his wife Angie seated behind him, from the great city of Albert Lea, 

Minnesota, down there at the intersection of I90 and I35. And the 

Hoffmans own Robert Hoffman Realty, Inc., a small real estate brokerage and property management firm in Albert Lea. The Hoffmans are licensed in Minnesota and Iowa, and they specialize in 

residential, rental, and commercial real estate sales, and management in southern Minnesota. Owners Angie and Robert are each licensed in real estate and members of the Realtor’s Association, the 

Minnesota Multi-Housing Association, and the Hoffmans own and 

manage about 80 rentals and are active volunteers and pillars to 

the community in Albert Lea with their work and dedication to the 

Human Society, the Chamber of Commerce, Lions Club, Heritage 

Preservation Committee, and the Children’s Center, and their local 

political organization, believe it or not. And the Hoffmans do not 

happen to have children, but they do have four rescue dogs. And 

we welcome you and are looking forward to your testimony, Robert. 

Nice to see you. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Hagedorn. 

Ms. Giasullo, you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENTS OF GIA GIASULLO, OWNER, BROOKLYN 

FARMACY & SODA FOUNTAIN; AMY FOX, PRESIDENT & OPERATIONS, SPIRAL BREWERY HASTINGS; NELS LEADER, VICE 

PRESIDENT, BREAD ALONE BAKERY; ROBERT HOFFMAN, 

BROKER, ROBERT HOFFMAN REALTY INC.; JASON BROCHU, 

PRESIDENT AND CO-OWNER, PLEASANT RIVER LUMBER; 

BILL SKALISH, OWNER, GRANITE TECH, INC. AND THE 

BENCHMARK GRP, LLC; JERRY KORTESMAKI, OWNER, LONDON ROAD RENTAL CENTER; DAVE WALTON, FARMER, IOWA 

SOYBEAN ASSOCIATION; BRITTNEY REESE, CO-FOUNDER 

AND HEAD FIT COACH, FIT & NU; COLLEEN CRUZE BHATTI, 

OWNER, CRUZE FARM; SHAWN PULFORD, CEO, LB WATER 

STATEMENT OF GIA GIASULLO 

Ms. GIASULLO. Hello. Is that working? Okay. All right. 

Hello, my name is Gia Giasullo, and I am the co-owner, along 

with my brother, Peter Freeman, of the Brooklyn Farmacy and 

Soda Fountain. 

I want to thank Madam Chairwoman, Nydia Vela ́zquez, for inviting me, and the Committee, to participate in this testimony. It is 

my honor to be here, and I thank you for the opportunity to speak 

on behalf of small businesses. 

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There are a million faces of small businesses and I am just one. 

I am here to give a face to one small business. And I am here in 

solidarity with all the other small businesses across America. Like 

me, they are committed to making their street, their state, and 

their country a better place. 

I am also here to express my gratitude to the Small Business Association and the NYBDC, who invested in us and who continue to 

support us. We received a 504 loan from the NYBDC and we were 

also graciously awarded the Small Family Business of the Year. 

I would not be here with you speaking to you today without their 

commitment. Their support came to us and allowed us to invest in 

our business when despite our best efforts no big banks would. 

Finally, and most importantly, I am here today because I strongly believe that small businesses provide priceless contributions towards the overall wealth and health of a community, and therefore, 

deserve your special attention and support. We are like you in that 

we serve our community. So I invite you to visit us and I invite 

you to speak with us. 

The Brooklyn Farmacy is located on the corner of Henry and 

Sackett in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. We are housed in a restored 

apothecary and the original interior boasts a 100-year-old penny 

tile floor, wooden drawers, and a tin ceiling. There are nine red 

twirling barstools and a Bastian Blessing soda fountain made in 

Chicago. We are a full-service soda fountain with a staff of 15. 

We are best known for our creative ice cream sundaes with 

names like Affugazi Affogado and the Sundae of Broken Dreams, 

made with vanilla ice cream, warm caramel, broken pretzel rods, 

and fresh whipped cream. 

In the late 1940s, before drive-thrus and bottled sodas, the number of soda fountains in America reached 125,000 at its height. 

There was a fountain on almost every Main Street USA, serving 

as a watering hole for the community. Today, the Brooklyn 

Farmacy is one of only a handful of full-service soda fountains in 

America, but we proudly serve the same purpose as a gathering 

spot for young and old alike. We are a slam dunk for visiting 

grandparents, as well as several regulars who are just hitting the 

ripe age of 4. 

It has been 9 years since we opened our doors in 2010, and since 

then we have watched gapped-tooth kids turn into college-bound 

kids, several of them we have hired. We have hosted birthdays, anniversaries, and showers. We have made hundreds of egg creams 

at local fund-raisers. We have hosted senators and assembly members for civic talks, even a wedding. The pink bench outside our 

store has seen more than one bent knee proposal. 

We donate year-round to schools, and class visits are a regular 

event. We have been featured on numerous cooking shows and 

media outlets. We are visited by tour groups from all over the 

world and we offer free egg creams all day on election days, this 

most recently noted in an editorial in the New York Times on how 

businesses can encourage citizens to vote. 

Though we are a tourist attraction, we are committed to our 

neighborhood. With weekly events like taught singalongs, a knitting group, and a civics night, we have the opportunity to be part 

of our community and in the end serve them more than something 

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to eat. We have antique rotary phones, typewriters, and adding 

machines. In fact, our collection is getting a bit out of hand. We 

have comic books, piles of them that we gently place on the table 

if the cellphones come out. We have candles and songs for birthdays. We make treats before your eyes. And sometimes we invent 

things on the spot because, hey, kid, that is a good idea. 

We source locally and we pride ourselves on working with vendors, some of whom deliver items on their bike. Our staff is offered 

flexible schedules, and many have worked with us for years as we 

employ them through schooling, travel, sports, and performance 

schedules. We strive to foster community amongst our staff, and we 

value their voices. We know that we are not the last train stop for 

them, so to speak, but we encourage them to embrace the philosophy of how you do anything is how you do everything. We value 

hard work and by example teach them. For many, we are a first 

job after school and weekends. We also value the transitional time 

for youth gaining independence, and we provide a safe place in a 

big city for those who are away from home for the first time. 

Can I have 10 more seconds, please? 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Sure. 

Ms. GIASULLO. Okay. This is not to say that this is not a hard 

game to play. As business owners, we often wear all the hats. If 

you give us an eighth day of the week, we would probably work it. 

The cost associated with doing business can be almost prohibitive, 

from insurance to payroll taxes to credit card swipe fees, all before 

we have even bought a tub of ice cream. A big company has the 

resources to hire for all these positions, yet a small business person 

often needs to juggle many positions at once. Look at me. Me, a designer, marketer, copywriter, photographer, event planner, social 

media producer, window designer, chef, waitress, soda jerk, and on 

some occasions, a dishwasher who trains, schedules, hires, and 

fires. For the record, I am the mother of two teenagers and this 

summer I will be celebrating 25 years of marriage. 

As I said from the beginning, I believe that small businesses provide immeasurable value to neighborhoods and communities. In 

our case, memories are created before our eyes—first birthdays, 

first egg creams, first jobs. We are the spot tourists plan to visit 

or find by luck. We are the spot you would bring your visiting sister. We are the spot you come to sit alone at the counter to read 

the paper. We are a real place. We are that place. We value our 

customers, and by extension, we value our community. We are not 

just the corner store, soda fountain, a business without a face. I am 

my customers’ neighbor, and I am the face of a small business in 

America. 

I thank you for your time today. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Ms. Giasullo. 

And now, Ms. Fox, you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF AMY FOX 

Ms. FOX. Thank you, Chairwoman Vela ́zquez and the other 

members of the House Small Business Committee for the opportunity to speak with you about Spiral Brewery and our experience 

as a small business in Hastings, Minnesota. Thank you also to Representative Craig for inviting Nick, Jen, and I here today to testify 

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and represent Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District and our 

hometown. 

About 6 years ago, we started dreaming of beer. Jen, Nick, and 

I were drinking Minnesota craft beer and discussing our deep love 

for our hometown, Hastings, Minnesota. In that moment we saw 

Spiral Brewery. After a few months of dreaming, we started transforming our big ideas into a plan, with countless and tiring hours 

of industry research and informational interviews. With the generous craft beer community in Minnesota, we had the beginning of 

a business plan. After being reconnected with our friends, Luke 

McGuire and Claire Sandahl, we had the beer and we had our 

team. At this time, the craft beer market was beginning to boom 

in Minnesota, but our region was completely void of a tap room and 

distribution brewery. 

Hastings is a unique town on the Mississippi River that was in 

a time of transition and growth. The combination of this geographical brewery void, the town’s continued growth, and our desire to contribute to our beloved hometown made it the perfect time 

to bring Spiral Brewery to fruition in Hastings’s historic downtown 

Riverfront District. 

After releasing our business plan in 2015, in order to publicly announce Spiral Brewery, we began working with the City of Hastings to amend brewing ordinances and regulations. We are grateful that the city, both staff and elected officials, and our local 

Chamber of Commerce, are supportive of new business and were 

yearning for creative entrepreneurs. 

Opening a brewery is an extremely expensive small business endeavor. Spiral Brewing needed to raise $1.2 million for the initial 

construction and upfront costs. Through consultation and advice 

from the brewing community, industry research, and valued business consultants, we knew we would like to solicit over half our 

funds from an SBA loan to support our business. Finding a financial institution to back a brewery is a complex process and quickly 

became one of our biggest challenges. 

Our team met with and discussed possible loans with about 10 

different financial institutions locally and statewide. We ended up 

securing funds through Pioneer Bank out of Mankato, Minnesota. 

Pioneer Bank makes it their business to support brewing and distilling in Minnesota. They understand the beer and liquor industry 

and are willing to learn and grow with their customers. This was 

most apparent in their creative structuring of our financing. Pioneer Bank’s intimate knowledge of the SBA 504 loan program, 

along with expertise of Prairie Land Economic Development Corporation, our SBA loan financier, allowed for the appropriate budgetary line items to be covered under the SBA 504 loan while other 

items were financed by a loan direct from the bank. Simply put, 

Spiral Brewery would not be able to open without the financial assistance from our lender and the SBA 504 loan program. 

The remaining financing of Spiral Brewery came through individual equity investors. With community being in the forefront of 

our business, a community-based funding model was developed 

with nearly 100 percent of our equity investors coming directly 

from the Hastings area. It has been this community’s support that 

has been one of our biggest joys and kept us going through the 

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countless challenges of opening Spiral Brewery. They continue to 

be a pillar of support in our ongoing progress. 

Every day our Spiral team act as manufacturers, custodians, 

event planners, servers, apparel designers, saleswomen, delivery 

drivers, and cicerones. Running a small business comes with daily 

joys and challenges as we often face unexpected hurdles, but we 

would not be where we are today without each one of our backgrounds and experiences. 

Spiral Brewery has been open for just a year now and we have 

become a destination brewery that distributes to bars, restaurants, 

and liquor stores. Our brewery adds to the vitality of established 

small businesses along our Main Street where over half are also 

woman-owned and operated. Spiral builds and encourages our local 

business and helps our city prosper with new people to experience 

our community and spend time and money in our historic downtown district. The story of Spiral Brewery encourages our community to believe in people with a dream and supports people who 

work hard for things they are passionate about. 

Thank you again for allowing me to testify today before the 

Small Business Committee. I am happy to answer any questions 

you may have. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Ms. Fox. And you were 

on time. 

Mr. Leader, you are now recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF NELS LEADER 

Mr. LEADER. Good morning, and thank you for having me. I appreciate your time very much. 

My family and I own and operate Bread Alone Bakery, a certified 

organic bakery in upstate New York. We have about 200 employees 

and every day ship about 15,000 loaves of bread to our customers 

around the northeast. 

I am here today to share with you the story of Bread Alone and 

some observations from running our business. There was not an 

exact plan when my father started the business in 1983. He was 

a philosophy major guided by his instincts. He ended up in cooking 

school with contemporaries, like Anthony Bourdain. In reflecting on 

his decision to start a bakery he said, ‘‘Sometimes you have to lose 

your mind to come to your senses.’’ 

As a young child, I can remember my dad trying to teach me the 

responsibilities of running a business. I remember him showing me 

the newspaper, pointing out the challenges that people faced in our 

community and around the world. Though we were never a political family, there was always a civic ingredient in our breads. By 

baking simple, honest food, my father contributed to our community. By setting an example of a simple, moral life, my father aspired to touch more people than he could feed. We use a quote from 

Nelson Mandela to capture the spirit of the business: ‘‘Let there be 

work, bread, water, and salt for all.’’ 

I joined the business 7 years ago, fresh from business school and 

experiences gained from my first career as a consultant. I found my 

passion at Bread Alone though, building a thriving, viable company 

that also sustains our people and planet. In this way, I strive to 

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honor the history of Bread Alone while maintaining a healthy bottom line. 

First, a few words about our people. Unemployment in our area 

is as low as 3.6 percent, but the poverty rate is as high as 20 percent. The fact of the matter is that economics of hourly work are 

untenable for too many of our employees and community members. 

Though Bread Alone’s average hourly wage is 50 percent above the 

New York minimum, and more than double Federal, support services are insufficient. Too many of our employees lack affordable 

childcare. Healthcare is too expensive. Employees do not have access to transportation to and from work. What would be a basic life 

interruption to many, a car break down, a sick child, becomes an 

obstacle to economic freedom and well-being. 

Some of our employees have spent time in the criminal justice 

system, often from a young age. These employees often know little 

else. Adaptation to the workplace is a struggle. I see our employees 

striving to do well, build a career and a family, but the deck is 

stacked against them. Whether the contradiction of the bakery, we 

are surrounded by underemployed individuals, yet building a quality team remains our biggest challenge. Though we invest all we 

can back into our employees, financial realities only allow us to do 

so much. 

This is where government can be most effective. Provide the support that our hourly employees need to overcome the bumps and 

bruises of life, a health emergency, job retraining, even a brush 

with the law. When you invest more in your working class constituents, you build up the workforce and give small businesses, like 

Bread Alone, the ability to thrive. 

And now some words about our planet. The last 4 years are the 

hottest 4 years on record. I lived on East Seventh Street in New 

York City when Hurricane Sandy brought flood waters to within 

blocks of my apartment. Did the Capitol feel warm last month? It 

was. It was about 6 degrees above the average for April. 

While the brunt of climate change is borne by the least fortunate 

among us, we all feel its effects, even at the bakery. An historic 

bomb cyclone in the Midwest this past April flooded over a million 

acres of farmland. Farmers are struggling to get crops in the 

ground for the harvest so prices may increase this fall. 

I hope for us and for all the hard-working farmers across the 

world these dramatic conditions subside. But hope is not a plan. 

We must decarbonize our economy to avoid the worst effects of climate change. One of the farmers, Marshall Cargill, that my father 

visited in the early days said, ‘‘If we do not take care of our land 

and take care of it now, who will?’’ 

To this end, we have rolled up our sleeves at the bakery and gotten to work. On Earth Day 2018, we officially commissioned 196 

kilowatt solar array on the roof of our bakery. We have committed 

to getting to 100 percent renewable energy by 2030, and we plan 

to get there much faster than that. This means more solar energy, 

adoption of battery-electric vehicles, energy efficiency retrofits and 

more. 

This process is not easy, but the good news is that our customers 

want to see changes like never before. Our record high 72 percent 

of Americans indicate that global warming is personally important 

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to them. Eighty-three percent of millennials indicate that they 

want companies to implement sustainability programs. 

Both business and small government have an incredible opportunity to respond. We have the technology. Our customers and constituents want the change. But under current conditions, resource 

constrained small businesses struggle to invest now what they will 

not see back until later. This is a market failure that the government can fix by more aggressively incentivizing investments and 

renewable energy and sustainable technologies. Bridge this gap 

and small businesses will thrive by delivering both what our customers want and what our world needs. 

One more point. Decision-making is one of the constant challenges of running a business. Decisions never feel perfect. They are 

often scary. Almost all require change and adjustment over time. 

We always remind the team at the bakery progress, not perfection. 

The only bad decision is not making one at all. The world will pass 

you by. 

I am not a policymaker, but I imagine that your work is extremely difficult. So many competing interests and constituents to 

address, not to mention different views of the world within yourselves. But supporting the best work of your small businesses demands action. During your time of public service, I urge you to embrace the moment, each other, and the opportunity to serve your 

constituents. Like the small businesses in front of you, seek 

progress every day. Thank you. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Leader. 

And now, Mr. Hoffman, you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF ROBERT HOFFMAN 

Mr. HOFFMAN. Thank you very much. 

A very interesting panel to follow after listening to the two speak 

on their foodservice and the brewery. I personally quit drinking 

quite a few years ago but speaking in front of Congress, a beer is 

starting to sound pretty amazing. 

My wife and I have not traveled in a long time, and this is our 

first time actually leaving because of the small business that we 

own. As a matter of fact, I own a small business that you have 

probably all heard of. There is a Robert Hoffman Realty in every 

single city in every single state. And honestly, most of them are not 

Robert Hoffman Realties, and many of them are not real estate 

companies at all, but we all know a Jensen Excavating or we have 

all had Mrs. Jerry’s salads. We have all been saved by Jim Kelly 

from Kelly Plumbing and Heating. We have bought flowers from 

Addie’s Florals or had our watches fixed at Fisher’s Jewelers. It 

just turns out that we are really not good at naming our companies. We have all just named them after ourselves. I do not think 

we have the time or the resources for a proper advertising campaign. 

My name, as I have mentioned, is Robert Hoffman. I run a small 

real estate brokerage in Albert Lea, Minnesota. So small that it is 

Robert Hoffman Realty, and I actually do not even own it. My wife, 

Angie, owns 51 percent of our S corp, so Angie owns Robert Hoffman. And Robert Hoffman Realty. A lot of lost arguments happen 

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when I say, ‘‘I am Robert Hoffman,’’ and she says, ‘‘I own Robert 

Hoffman Realty.’’ 

Right after college I started in real estate, and now I have about 

15 years of real estate experience. And what I want to talk about 

just quickly is that small towns are obviously the hometowns to 

small business, and every little bit helps in small business. My wife 

recently was able to leave her career of 11 years to work for our 

small business, and that is not nothing when it comes to small 

business. For her to leave a large, fair, corporate position with a 

local newspaper that she was at for 11 years to come work for our 

small business is actually an honor. 

We have actually been married for 514 weeks today. We got married on Wednesday, July 1st, and every Wednesday I have wished 

her a weekiversary. And today is our 514th weekiversary. We will 

actually have been married for 10 years this July. Angie and I actually met at a leadership class, and again, how every little bit 

helps, I walked into a random leadership class in Albert Lea, sat 

next to a, as you can see, very good looking gal. Asked her what 

she was doing that weekend and she accidentally gave away my 

surprise birthday party. So that is how I met my wife who I currently work for. So that is how I met my boss. 

Like Jim had said, we are a small business. We just run and 

manage and own 80 rental units, a nice real estate brokerage in 

Albert Lea. We do commercial real estate as well, and one of our 

successes is we have helped sell a couple of vacant Walmarts to a 

nice company called Bomgaars from our area. As a matter of fact, 

one of the Walmarts that we sold that was vacant was in Jim’s 

Blue Earth and in my Albert Lea. A success story to that was filling places that were void. In Albert Lea, it had actually sat vacant 

for 10 years, and then we were able to fill it. With Jim’s, that was 

the second one we had sold, and that one did not take as long. You 

start to feel good about selling Walmarts when you get a few of 

them under your belt. However, if you have sold one or two, you 

have sold all of them in your region. 

Our small business, like so many other small businesses, have 

the little things that help a lot. And our downtown just went 

through a nice revitalization where my office is located, so having 

the historic grants to help with our downtown revitalization has 

helped my small business grow. And as a matter of fact, this weekend, excuse me, this weekend, Albert Lea is actually hosting the 

Governor’s Fishing Opener. So a small group of people got together 

and said, you know, I think it is going to help with Albert Lea and 

our businesses if we dredge our lake, and they started that about 

12 years ago. Now, our lake is being dredged, and this weekend our 

Governor’s Fishing Opener is in Albert Lea. So again, all these little things really do help. 

Many have given their all to see small businesses succeed. We 

chose not to have kids. Work came first. This is only the second 

time we have ever traveled. You can tell the small businesses mean 

a lot to people. To even pole punch and say that this does not mean 

everything to us, obviously, I would be lying. We have had our successes and our failures. We have concerns of one small accident 

and we are not there to run the business anymore. We have employees that work for us and look to us for their employment. It 

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something goes wrong with that, it is rather intimidating to not be 

there for them. So, like I had mentioned, small businesses thrive 

in small towns, and every little bit helps. 

Just a real quick conclusion, two things. Just a small story I like 

to tell about any situation, but it definitely reflects small business. 

And the story goes, there is a gentleman in a hole screaming for 

help and a small business government regulator works up and 

says, ‘‘I will pass a new law,’’ and walk away. And the gentleman, 

scared and in this hole is still yelling for help. So then an inspector 

walks up and says, ‘‘We will change the process so this never happens again,’’ and walks away. And the small business owner is in 

a hole, scared and still screaming for help. Then another small 

business person jumps in the hole with him and he says, ‘‘You are 

crazy. Now we are both in the hole together.’’ And the other small 

business owner says, ‘‘Yes, but I have been down before and I know 

the way out.’’ 

So every little bit helps. We appreciate things as small as even 

this hearing or anything that you guys do for us in the future. I 

appreciate all the time. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Hoffman. 

Let me thank all of the witnesses. Your moving stories, powerful. 

I wish that every member of Congress were here because sometimes, as Mr. Leader said, we need the synergy of the work that 

you do to improve and strengthen Main Street, but also how can 

the government play an important role, whether it is knowing the 

unintended consequences of legislation that we pass and that you 

are not an afterthought, that you are provided a voice, and that is 

exactly what we are trying to do here. So thank you so much for 

all the work that you do. And when people say that small businesses are the engine that fuel our economy, we mean it on this 

committee. 

So Ms. Giasullo, I would like to hear from you, what was your 

experience, as well as Ms. Fox, because both of you got an SBA 504 

commercial loan that you went through, and if there are any improvements that you feel should be made to help expedite, streamline the process, how can we better improve the lending programs? 

Because that is one area that I intend to put some energy into. 

Ms. GIASULLO. I am very happy to answer that question. And 

first of all, just want to again reiterate that one of the unique aspects of working with the SBA and the NYBDC to get the loan is 

that they heard and took into account our story. Because, you 

know, as you have heard, the small business is not just a business. 

There are actually people behind it and there is a story. And I felt, 

you know, when we walked into the big banks and we started off 

with telling our story, we came down to three pieces of paper that 

they needed to analyze in order to give us funds. We were more 

than those three pieces of paper. And so I just want to acknowledge 

and the process and that the totality of who we were was taken 

into account. 

I think that the process took longer than it needed to, and I 

think that there was information about what was needed from us 

that could have been given more in the front that would take more 

time to produce reports, et cetera. So I think that the streamlining 

of the process could be stronger. 

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Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. 

Ms. GIASULLO. I also think just to get some younger people in 

some of those higher positions who are hungry, like we are. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. Thank you. 

Ms. Fox? 

Ms. FOX. I would actually just second everything that she just 

mentioned. We actually were pretty lucky in finding Pioneer Bank 

because unlike your experience, we actually found a partner that 

did listen to our story and found that important. And actually, we 

had a really seamless process working with them and Prairie Land, 

who was our financier going through the 504 loan process. It was 

pretty smooth. I mean, having just opened a brewery, we were very 

comfortable with mountains of paperwork, so that was not unusual 

to us. But they really made it seamless and explained everything 

and were really accommodating to our schedule in getting it all to 

work. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. 

Mr. Leader, I am so pleased to see how you have grown, and in 

the process you have done so in an ecofriendly manner. And I really thank you for your commitment to sustainability and protecting 

our environment. 

But there is also one thing that you mentioned that struck a 

chord, and that is investing in the working class, investing in workers. How can the government help? What can we do? What type of 

investment? Is it infrastructure? Is it training, retraining? 

Mr. LEADER. Sure. Thank you so much for the question and the 

opportunity to talk about this a little bit more. 

I will relay a very brief personal story. I think, like many people 

in this room, I recently dealt with the care of an elderly person in 

my family and saw them through the end of their life. And in two 

recent experiences I engaged with the Medicare system and it 

worked well. My grandparents were able to pass with dignity, and 

the family was able to maintain our lives without sacrificing our 

economic well-being because of the success of that program. 

What I see every day as a small business owner is that that security, that healthcare security simply does not exist for too many 

of our working class employees. So an issue that affects all of us, 

and I know this is not a new issue to highlight for you all but it 

deserves extra attention and I want to use my time here to highlight it because that cost and a lack of security that our employees 

have in their lives needs to be fixed. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. 

Mr. Hoffman, you mentioned that renovations in your downtown 

area has led to many successful businesses and that cleaning up 

a local lake would potentially bring in more tourism. Do you think 

that a large scale infrastructure package that modernizes roads, 

bridges, and lakes in towns like Albert Lea would spur economy development in those areas? 

Mr. HOFFMAN. I honestly do, but I do not want to fall peril to 

not the small pieces of the puzzle as well. Small deed grants that 

were available for buildings such as mine in an historic area that 

helped small businesses with the non-sexy things with our buildings sure have helped smaller scale. Large broad stroke and large 

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sweeping programs definitely do help but often look past the smaller ones of us. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. 

And I now recognize Mr. Hagedorn. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the 

testimony of all the witnesses and congratulations on building up 

small businesses, successful small businesses. It is very difficult. A 

lot of businesses, unfortunately, do not make it to your level. And 

so we commend you and appreciate what you are doing for our 

communities. 

Ms. Fox, I would say thank you for mentioning Pioneer Bank in 

Mankato. Those community banks of small businesses as well are 

helping you, and I guess that access to capital is pretty important, 

is it not? 

Ms. FOX. Yes. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. And what would you have done if you could 

not go out and borrow the money or get the loans in order to start 

your business? It would have been tough. Thank you. 

And Robert, it is good to see you, Mr. Hoffman. Knowing you a 

little bit, I can tell you that you are a hard worker. You are the 

embodiment of what it means to be a small business person. You 

and Angie both. And you put your capital at risk. You put everything into this business. You work hard. You are entrepreneurial, 

innovative, and what you do is so critically important for our communities. You are helping to sustain folks and help them find a 

nice roof over their heads. You are creating opportunities where 

maybe sometimes the big box stores leave our little towns and you 

are trying to fill those and make sure that our communities are as 

vibrant as possible. And we appreciate all that. 

Robert, what exactly, when you look at government’s role, you 

talked a little bit about that being down there and needing help. 

Government can be good and government can be bad. In the areas 

of regulations and taxes, energy, workforce, healthcare, what are 

your thoughts about what has been good and maybe what needs to 

be better? 

Mr. HOFFMAN. Honestly, Jim, I am in real estate, so we really 

do not have much for regulation or paperwork, which is not true 

at all. 

We probably spend more time in regulation in our industry than 

we do improving our industry, and I think that makes us take two 

steps back every time we try and start a race. Somewhere we fall 

peril to is being so close to Iowa with a different business structure 

in both business and real estate development. One example, obviously, is the Affordable Care Act is not affordable for employers. 

Another example is we see a strong brain drain in our region, two 

larger areas that just plain may offer a little bit more, and the 

brain drain, students leaving and not returning, has actually led to 

a generation drain. So the students will leave Albert Lea, for example, start a family somewhere else, and then soon to follow is actually their parents who were community members of ours but left 

now to be near their grandchildren. If we had something to make 

things just a little bit easier to sustain the population rather than 

maybe lose, and honestly, we have not even been talking about 

growth yet. We are not in growth. We are just trying to sustain. 

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So, yes, a lot of extra regulation has made it, honestly, a little bit 

easier to leave than it has been to stay. As with investors. It is 

easier not to invest in real estate in my area in particular, than 

it is to invest. And what it has led to is no new market rate apartments have been built in my town since 1990. So it is tough to 

grow a community when we do not have a roof for the new people 

trying to move to town. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. So there is some competition between, for instance, big businesses that can offer benefits and have some hooks 

to bring in folks to be employed and smaller businesses that sometimes have a tough time competing. And then there is also a little 

difference between some urban areas and the rural areas. And do 

you think that it would be important for government to have some 

extra incentives to make sure that folks have opportunities in the 

rural areas and that—— 

Mr. HOFFMAN. Yes, I definitely do, especially, like I said, under 

the umbrella of housing. Right now, if somebody was to look to Albert Lea to come live, whether it be a teacher, an officer, or a new 

transferee to a company, and they know they may not buy a home 

right away but they are looking for just a comfortable market-rate 

rental to live in and we do not have that to offer, we just plain lose 

them now to communities just a little bit larger than ours who do 

have that housing available. And we do not have housing being 

built in town because it is just far too expensive to do it. Not just 

expensive in the wood, the shingles, and the windows, but the regulations required behind housing. In Minnesota, it is so expensive. 

There was a recent MinnPost article just last week stating building 

a building in Minnesota or across the river in Wisconsin, that it is 

close to 30 percent more expensive to build in Minnesota. Real 

tough to compete. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. Maybe this weekend when you have the governor down for the Fishing Opener you can talk to him a little bit 

about that. 

Mr. HOFFMAN. A couple of friends of mine that I honestly grew 

up with and had a paper route together are the two hosting the 

governor. Yeah, I am going to put a few bugs in their ears. They 

are going to be in the boat with them for quite a while. 

Mr. HAGEDORN. We appreciate your appearance. Thank you 

very much 

Madam Chair. 

Mr. HOFFMAN. Thank you. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. The gentleman’s time 

has expired. 

And now we recognize the gentleman from New York, Mr. 

Delgado, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. DELGADO. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And thank 

you, each and every one of you, for your truly inspiring stories, and 

to hear you all speak with such love and affection and passion for 

what you do. It is incredibly heartwarming. So thank you for your 

dedication and for your commitment and all the opportunities that 

you provide for others in your community. 

I want to personally thank you, Nels, for coming. It is good to 

have you hear and good to hear from you. 

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I want to talk a little bit about, or at least revisit your conversation about the need to invest in green energy technology, and so 

much of the incredible work that you and the company as a whole 

have done to invest and help spur that growth and take us in the 

right direction. 

As somebody who has sort of prioritized this, can you describe for 

me the ways that Congress can play a role in incentivizing sustainable behavior so small business owners, like yourself, are able to 

build and promote small green businesses? 

Mr. LEADER. Absolutely. And thank you for the question and 

for having me here, Congressman Delgado. I greatly appreciate it. 

So let me start by saying that as big as this problem is, in it I 

see incredible opportunity for small business. I highlighted in my 

testimony that folks want to support sustainable businesses out in 

the world. They want to vote with their dollars, but everyone’s life 

is busy so you have to give them an easy choice. We have to do a 

lot of the work for them. But there is great opportunity for small 

businesses to respond to that demand. 

To your question, Congressman Delgado, of what do we do, let 

me give you some examples of what does work and what does not 

work. I am going to start with the latter, what does not work. 

In winter 2018, when Bread Alone was planning the solar array 

for our bakery, Washington announced and then rolled out a 30 

percent import tariff on solar panels. That changed the economics 

of our project overnight. We had to spend money in soft costs to 

replan it and then the economics of the project overall were not as 

strong. So that sort of signaled to business that there is uncertainty in doing this work is not what we like to see. No business 

likes uncertainty. So we cannot do that. What we can do, there are 

lots of tools that are established that work to incentivize investments within business. The section 179 program is a wonderful 

program. That allows Bread Alone to purchase equipment and depreciate it on an accelerated basis, thereby bringing down the cost 

of the equipment. That is a great program. Federal investment tax 

credits on renewable energy, that is a great program. So those are 

examples of things that Congress can promote, extend, do more of 

to incentivize renewable energy with small business. 

Mr. DELGADO. That was great. Thank you. 

And just a quick follow up. You know, obviously, there are environmental benefits. You know, that is the goal. But, you know, 

from a business mindset, can you detail a bit of the economic outcomes from your vantage point with these kinds of investments? 

Mr. LEADER. Thank you for the follow up because that is a critical point. 

I highlighted earlier in my testimony that although I have these 

values as an individual, I also see after the bottom line of our business, and I come from a very traditional business background. So 

I do not make decisions just out of a moral judgment. I do it because it is good for our business. 

We financed our solar array in a way that is essentially cost neutral. We could have financed it a little bit longer and it would have 

been cash flow positive. 

Right now, across this country, the least expensive ways to create energy are through solar and wind. That is the least expensive 

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way that we know to create energy on this earth. So when you substitute more expensive energy with less expensive energy, you can 

save money. It is a scary investment that pays out over the long 

term and that is where government can step in to solve that market failure. 

Mr. DELGADO. Thank you. 

With that, I yield back my time. Thank you, Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back. 

And now we recognize Mr. Hern, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Tax, and Capital Access from 

Oklahoma, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. HERN. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I really appreciate you all being here today, and your testimony 

is certainly near and dear to my heart. I have been a small business person for 34 years, job creator, franchisee, banking, manufacturing. I could go on and on, 30 or 40 small businesses today. 

I appreciate, Mr. Leader, first of all, you have got a cool name. 

I was just thinking if you were to come into Congress and get on 

the majority side your name would be Leader Leader. So that 

would be kind of cool. 

Mr. LEADER. I have a new career goal. 

Mr. HERN. Yeah. Yeah. There you go. So put that on your bucket list; right? 

But, no, it is great to see you all here. And, you know, one of the 

things, you know, I have never run for office before and so when 

I got here it was sort of amazing to me the lack of, people agree 

with your stories, they like your stories, people who have never 

been in business before. But I have also found it interesting when 

business people come here that they think the Federal Government 

has an unlimited amount of money and that somehow they can do 

it better than you can as individuals. I applaud you, and each of 

you individually that have done things for sustainability. I could 

talk about many, many things we all need to do and have done to 

protect our environment. And like you said, you have to still watch 

out for the bottom line. The Federal Government, quite frankly, is 

part of the problem that many people who have ideas cannot get 

into business because of the regulatory processes. In fact, you had 

mentioned that healthcare costs, and I think, Mr. Hoffman, you 

mentioned it also. Prior to 2010—I saw where you had 200 employees—prior to 2010, did you offer health insurance? 

Mr. HOFFMAN. I joined the family business in 2012, and I 

would be stepping a little bit out of my comfort zone talking about 

what we were doing prior to 2010 and earlier. 

Mr. HERN. Sure. Sure. 

Just quite frankly, the cost went up dramatically. I offered insurance for years, and the cost went up dramatically when we centralized the healthcare to the United States Government as opposed to 

individual markets. Just a fact. We can disagree all day long. It is 

just not the truth to say it did not happen. 

But when we talk about these things, you mentioned, and I want 

to make sure to give everybody a chance here, thoughts because 

you have varying levels of employment base, which puts you, sort 

of divides you even in this group up here, the Federal Government 

has done a great job of dividing you up as small business people 

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to pit you one against the other, or two or three of you care about 

what the other person said, it is just based upon your employee 

base. And I think if we truly cared about all employees, all people, 

we would take all regulations down to the smallest employee base 

of one. And that way everybody is in lockstep in really, truly caring 

about the individual worker. 

So with that said, let us just start here on this end. What are 

some of the regulatory processes that you have seen in your business life so far that you would like to see maybe the government 

get out of your hair? 

Ms. GIASULLO. Well, there is always the health department 

that I think in New York City is a bit outrageous. I mean, I think 

that we just sort of budget in for it but—— 

Mr. HERN. I am sorry; if we could, let us keep it on the Federal 

level because I agree with you, we could get rid of the health departments. 

Ms. GIASULLO. I am going to yield actually for that. 

Mr. HERN. Okay. 

Ms. GIASULLO. Because I feel like we are small and I do not 

feel like we, you know, besides the loans that we have taken, we 

do not have a lot of regulatory—— 

Mr. HERN. So tax issues? I mean, tax affects you obviously a lot. 

Ms. GIASULLO. I mean, taxes. I mean, I would love to be able 

to offer my employees health insurance. I mean, I think I can agree 

and say that this is a point that I cannot afford to do and I would 

very much like to. But I am going to yield. I am going to yield. 

Mr. HERN. Okay. 

Ms. Fox? 

Ms. FOX. I know one of the biggest areas for us has to do with 

the Federal excise tax. And I would encourage all of you to support 

keeping that low, but also consider support for an even lower 

bracket. Right now, the lowest possible bracket ranges in producing 

between zero and 60,000 barrels of beer a year, and we, in our first 

year, are going to be at about 1,000. So it really would help equal 

the playing field for those new, small microbreweries to be able to 

compete. 

Mr. HERN. Thank you. 

And Mr. Leader, I want to, because I am going to run out of time 

here, I would love to talk to you all day, all of you all. But you 

mentioned 179. I am very familiar with that. QIP obviously affects 

if you have a storefront and retail and certainly would affect you 

dramatically as well. I want you to know this, that it is actually 

a technical issue in the Tax Code. It is actually available if we 

could just get it signed off on. And while this is a very, you know, 

bipartisan Committee, I also want to tell you that it is being sort 

of held hostage right now to be traded off for something else, and 

it affects small businesses in a real, real way, to be able to write 

off stuff this year so you can employ more people, put more capital 

to work. So, I would encourage us all to take what you all have 

talked about here today, go back and talk to our fellow constituents, our fellow congressmen and women, and ask them to support 

the change on the QIP and the section 179 bonus depreciation, accelerated depreciation tactics we have out there. 

Mr. LEADER. Do I have a moment to respond? 

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Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Time has expired. I could give you 

10 seconds. 

Mr. LEADER. Okay, thank you. 

I mean, I would just thank you for the question, Congressman 

Hern, and comments. You know, the section 179 to me is such a 

great example of where government and business can work together. So I know you initially asked about places where I would 

like to see less regulation, but I love to focus on victories and areas 

of alignment, and that is one great example. And I know there are 

a lot more. 

Mr. HERN. Thank you. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

And now I recognize the gentlelady from Minnesota, Ms. Craig, 

for 5 minutes. 

Ms. CRAIG. Thank you so much. 

My question is for Amy Fox. You noted in your testimony that 

you are a woman-owned business. A woman-owned business. I 

would like to hear more about and ask you to describe some of the 

unique challenges, but also opportunities that have presented 

themselves as a woman-owned business. 

Ms. FOX. Sure, I would be happy to speak on that. 

I know I have heard Representative Craig say many times that 

beer is bipartisan, and it is, but really, the craft beer industry is 

still a man’s game. And it is pretty rare to have a majority womanowned and operated brewery, at least I know in Minnesota, and I 

would imagine it would be nationally as well. And so, you know, 

it does come with challenges being woman-owned. In the process of 

opening Spiral Brewery, we did a lot of meetings that my husband 

and I would take. We did experience some sexism and different 

things where all of the people we were meeting with would always 

address my husband first, even though I was the one with the 

numbers and the information. He would kindly then defer to me. 

So there was some of that. But beyond that there also just I find 

that Jen and I both have to work a little harder to prove ourselves, 

especially like in sales. You know, liquor store owners and bar and 

restaurant managers or buyers are really used to talking to a 

bearded man, and so when we come in and try to sell, we have to 

work that much harder to prove that we are knowledgeable and 

that we have a good product. 

And then there is also physical challenges. Despite how strong 

I may look, I cannot lift a full keg into the back of a car, for example. So Jen and I do most of the delivering, so there are some challenges with that. 

But we are really happy and proud to be joining the downtown 

Hastings district where well over half are also majority womanowned, and we look forward to, you know, working to change those 

perceptions. 

Ms. CRAIG. You know, the Hastings community is just one of 

those just beautiful river towns that we have across my congressional district, but across America. Not too long ago though, some 

of those river towns did not have a ton of development in them. 

One of the most unique parts of going to Spiral Brewery is just the 

equity ownership from people inside the community. You can literally see just partial ownership by neighbors. Tell me a little bit 

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about how building and maintaining those community relationships 

has impacted your business, and what has it done for your town 

as well? 

Ms. FOX. Well, we definitely would not be here today without 

the support of our community, both financially and in many other 

ways. But we were luckily able to secure 34 different individual equity investors on a minimum level and they all had a connection 

to our community, most of which live in our community. And so it 

is really important, and they feel that ownership, and they come 

to the tap room all the time. And we would not be here without 

their support. 

Ms. CRAIG. That is great. 

And then my final question is really about expansion opportunities. I know that you are now distributing to liquor stores and 

other areas around the community. Are there any barriers that you 

have in sort of just breaking into that broader market with so 

many microbreweries and big breweries in Minnesota? And how 

can we make it easier for a small business like yours to expand? 

Ms. FOX. I did just already speak on the Federal excise tax. That 

is definitely something that would help a small and microbrewery 

help to level the playing field and compete. And then other than 

that it is really, you know, we are in our first year of business and 

money is tight, and you need money to spend money. And you need 

money to grow. So it has been interesting trying to figure out how 

to do that. You know, and little things like mobile canning lines 

that have now popped up, we do not have the space or the money 

to invest in equipment ourselves so, you know, we are able to use 

companies like that to come in and can for us and it opens up a 

whole another industry and area for us to sell to. 

Ms. CRAIG. Thank you so much, and thank you all for your incredible success. 

Ms. FOX. Thanks for having us. 

Ms. CRAIG. And Madam Chairwoman, I yield back. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. The gentlewoman yields back. 

And now we recognize Mr. Stauber from Minnesota, Ranking 

Member of the Subcommittee on Contracting and Infrastructure for 

5 minutes. 

Mr. STAUBER. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Ms. Fox, I obviously came in here late, and my question for you 

was going to be on the per barrel tax from $15 to $7.50. Because 

you have only been in business for a year you have not experienced 

that yet? 

Ms. FOX. No, we only opened in 2018, so we luckily were able 

to jump in right at that lower level. 

Mr. STAUBER. Okay. I could share with you another brewery in 

the district that I serve in Two Harbors, Minnesota, saved $60,000 

from that change from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. That was real 

money for that hometown brewery. I just wanted to share that with 

you. So good luck. 

Ms. FOX. Thank you. 

Mr. STAUBER. And Madam Chair, I yield back. 

Chairwoman VELA ́ ZQUEZ. Thank you. The gentleman yields 

back. 

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And let me take this opportunity to once again thank our distinguished panel for taking time to be with us. You are excused and 

we will now take a moment to get our next panel set up. Thank 

you. 

[Recess] 

Mr. GOLDEN. [Presiding] All right. Welcome to our witnesses on 

today’s second panel. And I will take a minute to introduce you before turning it over for your testimony. 

It is my privilege to introduce our first witness, Mr. Jason 

Brochu, the president and co-owner of Pleasant River Lumber in 

my district, in the 2nd Congressional District of the State of Maine. 

Pleasant River Lumber is 100 percent U.S. family-owned Maine 

business with 4 generations of experience in the forest products industry. Over the years, they have built their reputation on quality, 

service, and attention to detail. In fact, an example of that detail 

is stamping an American flag on pieces of lumber that come out of 

their mill. Perhaps Jason will talk a little bit about that. I anticipate that we are going to hear a little bit from Mr. Brochu about 

unfair trade practices today that at times put American businesses 

at a disadvantage, and I think that many people would agree that 

there are many good American businesses out there that can compete globally with any business in the world, but tough for them 

to compete with the government. And that is something that Jason 

is going to go into a little bit of detail about today, whether it be 

dumping of steel or dumping of lumber at times. We have to make 

sure that we are putting in place the proper policies to protect our 

businesses from unfair trade practices of other countries’ governments. 

I will say very quickly to you all here, this is a great hearing I 

am going to enjoy very much. The Small Business Committee, I 

think, is a special place in Washington. Many people I have heard 

come from other Committees talking about how the discussion and 

the debate had their blood temperature running hot and then they 

come in here and things cool down because we have a pretty bipartisan focus and reputation on how we can help small businesses. 

Not a lot of party politics in here, instead focusing on how we can 

work together to help small businesses, like Pleasant River. So 

with that, I would like to just say thank you for coming to Jason, 

and also his brother, Chris, is here. 

And next, I would like to turn it over to Ms. Houlahan from 

Pennsylvania, to introduce our next witness. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you very 

much to all of the panel for joining us today. 

And it is my privilege to introduce Mr. Bill Skalish from my community, from the beautiful Pennsylvania 6th Congressional District. I think he will also have a similar conversation regarding 

trade practices and tariffs as well, which are seminal to the disadvantage that his business experienced. 

But Mr. Skalish, for background, has offered products and services to the hospitality industry for over 35 years. During his career, 

he became a top performing, independent sales rep for Vermax in 

Salt Lake City and in the early ‘90s accepted the position of national sales marketing director. At that time, Vermax was the largest cultured marble manufacturer of vanity tops and tub surrounds 

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serving the hospitality industry. After leaving that organization, he 

moved back to Pennsylvania in 1999 to once again become an independent factory rep for several manufacturers. Prior to that, and 

right out of high school, Mr. Skalish served a 4-year apprenticeship 

with the IBEW and became an inside journeyman wireman for the 

IBEW 654. Currently, Mr. Skalish owns two companies, the Benchmark Group, as well as Granite Tech, Inc., and Benchmark is an 

independent rep organization that performs the sales and marketing functions, and Granite Tech is structured solely as an import company. Granite Tech and Benchmark Group, LLC’s current 

customer base includes the hospitality, multifamily and senior living, and student housing industries. In addition to Mr. Skalish’s 

professional career, he has also had the privilege of serving on the 

Board of Supervisors for the Franklin Township located in Chester 

County, Pennsylvania. Thank you so much for joining us today, sir, 

and for sharing your stories with us. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you, Ms. Houlahan. 

Finally, I would like to yield to my colleague from Minnesota, 

and the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Contracting and 

Infrastructure, Mr. Stauber, to introduce our last witness. 

And I just want to say to Mr. Kortesmaki very quickly, later this 

month, Mr. Stauber has invited me to come out to your community 

to take part in a field hearing that I look forward to very much to 

see your state, and you have got a great representative here in 

Congress. So thank you. 

Mr. STAUBER. Thank you for those kind words, Chairman Golden. It is a pleasure to work with you on this Committee and the 

rest of our colleagues. 

Today, I would like to introduce a very good friend of mine from 

Duluth, Minnesota. Hard worker, great family, and just a really 

good friend of mine, Mr. Jerry Kortesmaki. He owns London Road 

Rental Center in Duluth, Minnesota. Mr. Kortesmaki is the owner 

of London Road Rental Center in Duluth, Minnesota. Jerry is an 

expert in the field. London Road Rental offers tools and equipment 

rentals in its Duluth, Minnesota location, and party, wedding, and 

event rentals and supplies in its Superior, Wisconsin location. 

Thanks to Mr. Kortesmaki’s hard work, he now runs a business 

that spans northern Minnesota and Wisconsin. Mr. Kortesmaki is 

also active in the American Rental Association, advocating the 

rental industry’s growth, and he is also an active member in the 

NFIB community. Welcome, Jerry. 

Mr. GOLDEN. All right. Thank you, Mr. Stauber. 

With this, I will turn it over to our panel, and we will start with 

Mr. Brochu, who is recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF JASON BROCHU 

Mr. BROCHU. Congressman Golden, members of the Committee, 

thank you for having me here today. I am here to provide testimony regarding issues that affect my business in Maine, Pleasant 

River Lumber Company. 

Pleasant River owns and operates four sawmills and a trucking 

company in the state of Maine. Our current employment is about 

300 people, and we are in the middle of a capital expansion project 

that will increase our capacity by 50 percent, increase our employSBD026 with DISTILLER

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ment by close to 20 percent, and we are spending about $25 million 

throughout our operations. We are primarily a producer of softwood 

lumber that is used for housing construction throughout the United 

States. I will touch on four issues today briefly—trade, taxes, labor, 

and infrastructure. 

A critical part of the business environment for our company is 

the ability to operate our business free of foreign unfair trade practices. For our company that means addressing Canada’s unfair 

trade practices through the U.S. trade laws or by implementing an 

effective quantitative restraint agreement against subsidized and 

dumped Canadian lumber imports. 

The U.S. industry successfully launched trade cases against Canada in November of 2016, resulting in anti-dumping and countervailing duty rates which have forced Canada to adjust their unfair 

trade and market behavior and allowed our industry to expand. For 

my company specifically, leveling the playing field against Canadian unfair trade practices is allowing us to make the necessary investments to increase our capacity by 50 percent and add a lot of 

jobs. This means not only adding jobs but making more lumber in 

the state of Maine and more lumber for the U.S. housing market 

produced in the U.S. 

Today, the U.S. lumber industry, through its association with the 

U.S. Lumber Coalition, is working tirelessly to maintain and defend this trade case against Canada’s unfair trade practices by 

working with the administration on NAFTA and WTO appeals, as 

well as litigating the first administrative reviews of the anti-dumping and countervailing duty orders before the Commerce Department, under which importers’ actual duty liability is assessed. This 

is a rigorous administrative process that we are very involved in. 

Taxes. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, and listening to some of the 

testimony earlier people have touched on this already, you know, 

has been very helpful to our business in a couple of different ways. 

Reducing the corporate tax rate allows us to be much more competitive in a global market and the continuance of bonus depreciation are two areas—the tax rate and the bonus depreciation are 

two areas that allow us to grow and add good paying jobs to our 

mills in Maine. The 100 percent bonus depreciation has been a big 

part of our capital expansion in allowing us and enabling us to do 

that project where we are going to add, you know, a lot of jobs and 

a lot of economic activity to the state of Maine. 

One negative of the bonus depreciation is that it will gradually 

be phased out starting in 2023, you know, and it has been so important to our business we would like to see that continue. 

Another negative of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is the elimination 

of the net operating loss deduction carryback. Our industry is extremely competitive and has incurred losses in nearly as many 

years as we have turned a profit. So prior to the Jobs Act, the Tax 

Cuts and Jobs Act, losses incurred in one year could be carried 

back to affect profits from the prior 2 years, and thus, recoup some 

of the taxes paid in the prior 2 years. These losses now must be 

carried forward to partially reduce taxes to be paid in the future. 

That is another aspect of that act that we would like to see 

changed going forward. Besides those two, the act has been very 

beneficial to us and allowed us to grow and expand. 

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Infrastructure is an essential component of the forest products 

industry operations. We need massive investment in infrastructure. 

Our place in Maine has a lot of issues on infrastructure. We need 

Federal support for that. We transport all of our lumber by truck 

or rail and it is very difficult. We access a big part of the U.S. housing market, and we have a hard time getting product there because 

of the crumbling infrastructure. 

We also need safe, secure, and abundant broadband. We had a 

ransomware attack last year that cost our company around 

$100,000 between outside vendors and internal work to fix that 

issue. So for a company our size, it is not devastating, but for a 

smaller business that cost would have been about the same, and 

that is a big, big issue going forward. 

The last thing I will touch on is labor. Labor is one of the biggest 

issues we are facing. Unemployment in our state is very close to 

zero effectively because anybody who wants a job can find one right 

now. We need to train people in the trades. We need to train people 

to do things and make things and we have got a lot of jobs available. Good paying jobs and we need to also allow anyone who is 

honest and willing to work hard legally into our country to help fill 

these jobs and fuel our economy. We have the work. 

So I have on time left. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you, Mr. Brochu. Impressive in 5 minutes—trade, taxes, infrastructure, broadband, cybersecurity, labor, 

education, and immigration. It is not bad. I am impressed. 

With that, I will go ahead and recognize Mr. Skalish for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF BILL SKALISH 

Mr. SKALISH. Thank you, Congresswoman Vela ́zquez, Ranking 

Member Chabot, and Congresswoman Chrissy Houlahan, and 

members of the House Small Business Committee for the invitation. I am honored to testify before you today. 

My name is Bill Skalish. I am the owner of Granite Tech, Inc. 

My business, Granite Tech, Inc., referred to as GTI, is a small import business located in the small town of Landenberg, Pennsylvania, and was started in 2005. Our business includes the importation of cut-to-fit fabricated granite, marble, and quartz countertops 

from China to end-users throughout the U.S. Our customer base 

consist of the hospitality industry, including Marriot International, 

where we are one of four endorsed suppliers; Hilton, IHG, 

Wyndham, multifamily housing, senior living facilities, and student 

housing across the country. We currently have seven employees on 

salary. 

In April 2018, Cambria filed a petition with the International 

Trade Commission and Department of Commerce alleging that imported quartz surface products from China caused Cambria injury. 

In September 2018, granite and quartz countertops were added to 

List 3 of the Section 301 tariffs and 10 percent was imposed. My 

business has been devastated by these tariffs and the Departments 

of Commerce’s initial decision on the anti-dumping and countervailing Cases in association with the Cambria petition. While the 

Cambria petition primarily pertains to slabs, we are being tariffed 

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on not only the cost of the materials but also the labor to fabricate 

the cut-to-fit countertops. 

Our customers, including local general contractors, developers, 

hotel owners, and hotel franchises, have also felt these impacts. 

Numerous hotel projects have been placed on hold and some cancelled because they were over budget not only because of the extremely high proposed tariffs levied as cash deposits on quartz surface products from China, but other materials facing tariffs as well. 

Furthermore, the current CVD/AD cash deposits, proposed duties, affect numerous other companies throughout the country with 

similar business models. 

GTI’s collective tariff rate on quartz surface products is currently 

at 308.05 percent, again, 308.05 percent, which includes the Section 301 tariffs. There is no way my small company can survive 

this and could end up owing Customs and Border Patrol in excess 

of $1.5 million in additional tariffs alone. 

Additionally, by collecting the antidumping and countervailing 

duties in advance, coupled with the extremely exorbitant percentage, Granite Tech is unable to operate as our profit margin is nowhere near 300 percent. 

In addition, during bond renewal in January, our collateral dollar amount was so high at $200,000, money that Granite Tech did 

not have due to the astronomical deposits we had to pay on the last 

shipments that were in transit when the AD rate was published in 

November, Granite Tech can no longer import without a customs 

bond. 

The impact of this case on us is particularly troubling because 

GTI is currently in hibernation. Due to the high tariffs, we lost two 

employees out of seven, who were on salary and received substantial bonuses on GTI sales that are now nonexistent. Granite Tech 

is in hibernation until the next International Trade Commission 

hearing scheduled for tomorrow, May 9, 2019, at 9:30am, and subsequent ruling, which should happen in June. I will attend the ITC 

hearing as an audience member as GTI can no longer afford legal 

fees pertaining to this case. It is unclear whether GTI’s import 

bond will be reactivated due to nonpayment of cash deposits regardless of whether they are refunded should the case be dismissed 

or the percentages lowered. 

I am hopeful that the ITC and DOC will be more realistic in 

their findings and remedy the percentages, in addition to rejecting 

critical circumstances, which are 90-day retroactive, on both the 

countervailing case not currently proposed, and the anti-dumping 

case proposed and cash deposits in collection. It brings me great 

concern that the current administration already seems to overlook 

the impact high tariffs have on small businesses like mine in Pennsylvania and across the Nation. 

I would like to thank you for your time and consideration, and 

will be happy to answer any questions. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you, Mr. Skalish. 

And finally, Mr. Kortesmaki, you are recognized for 5 minutes as 

well. 

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STATEMENT OF JERRY KORTESMAKI 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. Well, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to come here and speak my part. 

Hello, I am Jerry Kortesmaki. I am the owner of London Road 

Rental Center in Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin. I 

started my business new. I did not buy an existing business. I 

started February 1st of 2002. My business has 10 full-time employees and 20 seasonal employees. We have grown from nothing to 

about a $2 million volume with a $2.5 million inventory in 17 

years. 

The Bush era tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 had a huge impact on 

how I depreciate my equipment. I use section 179 and bonus depreciation every year. This is one of the tax laws that is really working 

for me and for all small businesses. I have come to D.C. many 

times and lobbied hard to make this permanent. I have been able 

to grow my business, my company faster because of it and also, our 

economy has grown continually because when I buy equipment, 

like excavators and skid steers, it creates a lot of jobs in the U.S. 

Thousands of other small businesses use it just like I do. I am kind 

of addicted to it. I either spend the money or have to pay a lot more 

taxes because I do not have the depreciation built up to write it off. 

This has really helped me grow my business faster and contin- ually. The Job Cuts Act of 2017 saved me about $7,200 last year. 

With health insurance going up another 10 percent this year and 

the commercial auto insurance going up 30 percent, the money was 

used up fast. We really needed that tax cut to help cover and maintain things. We are an S corp, so the pass-through tax cut that 

came through is very important to small businesses like mine. 

The rising cost of health care, and in fact, the Affordable 

Healthcare Act took the health insurance away from most of my 

employees. We used to have a $1000 deductible and the employees 

could afford that. Now that the premiums have doubled and the 

deductibles went to $6,000, the employees do not have the ability 

to cover that $6,000 deductible. So basically, they do not use their 

healthcare plans. Simply put, the Affordable Care Act has been a 

disaster for small business. We chase the insurance changes every 

year and it is a real hassle to keep up with it. It takes a lot of time 

and energy trying to do the best for our employees balancing cost 

with benefits. 

I feel I have been successful despite the government, not because 

of it. Things like the Salary Employee Pay issue a few years ago 

caused a lot of issues. I had to change my pay structure for my 

management people because of the threats of fines and such, and 

then it was defeated or went away. That issue cost me a lot of time 

and money. 

The amount of regulation we have to deal with is huge. We have 

three pickup trucks we use for deliveries. Most of our deliveries are 

within 100 miles, and almost all of them are within 25 miles. We 

are in two states. The businesses are about 8 miles apart. All of 

our drivers have to be 21 because 18 year olds cannot cross that 

state line. They can drive 200 miles in either state but they cannot 

drive across that imaginary line between the two. Just a point of 

interest, an 18-year-old can vote and he can go to war, but he cannot drive across a state line. It is insanity at work. 

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There are so many regulations. Just the DOT as an example. 

With drivers’ records, drug tests, truck inspections daily and annually, it is a huge cost to keep up on and to track. And then there 

is the trailers. You have to do the same thing to them. 

We rent a lot of different types of equipment and there is ANSI 

standards, OSHA requirements on scaffolds, ladders, lifts. Very few 

people understand that ladders are almost outlawed now in this 

country by OSHA. Then there is the new OSHA and silica and dust 

regulations. The reason I bring this up is we just do not need to 

know them for us; we are supposed to educate our customers about 

them. 

The Tier 4 diesel regulations that went into effect for emissions, 

they are driving up the costs and making it really tough to maintain our trucks and equipment and very expensive, too. Our new 

diesel trucks are on longer reliable like diesels were known for. 

They are continually in for repairs, emissions repairs. And in Duluth, we have winter, not Tier 4 friendly at all. The one from Maine 

probably runs into that same issue. 

I have lived the American dream. My wife and I have worked 

hard for many years to get there. We have jumped through hoops 

and learned things I thought I would never know. We collect sales 

tax for 14 different municipalities, and we collect Federal taxes 

also. We collect child support and court judgments for our employees. My wife works full time to keep up with the taxes and the 

human resource training and records for our little business. Keeping up with the changes in HR and the taxes is a job in itself. 

Something else to think about. Remember, small businesses are 

tax collectors. We do not get paid to do it. We do not get trained 

to do it. But if we make a mistake we sure get punished for it. 

In my time as a business owner, I think I have heard there is 

137 different Federal agencies making rules for us to follow. Then 

you have Congress and the courts. We need to simplify this complicated system and stop any nonelected border agency from passing any rule or law. We elected you to make the decision, not the 

bureaucrats. If it does not have enough support for Congress to 

pass it, it should not be a law or a rule. 

I spend a lot of time working to keep these unelected bureaucrats 

and these agencies happy. This is one of the largest burdens on my 

small business. And all small businesses. They touch every part of 

what I do every day, and I do not even have enough time to touch 

on the employee issues and problems that we are currently having. 

Thank you very much. I will answer any questions. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you very much, sir. 

And with that, I am going to start by recognizing the Ranking 

Member, Mr. Stauber, who has a constituent who is going to be 

carrying out the opening prayers on the House floor, so we are 

going to let him ask questions first. 

Mr. STAUBER. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Jerry, that was well stated. You and I have talked about those 

unelected, which you refer to as bureaucrats, putting legislation 

that affects small businesses, and what you and I have talked 

about and which this Committee understands, 99 percent of our 

economy is small business. And we, as a small business owner myself for 29 years, there are ups and downs, there are struggles. But 

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what we need to do is make sure that when we put legislation forward that we understand the consequences, and it has to be a positive, a net positive for our small businesses. 

So I have got just two questions. Actually, three. And the first 

one, you alluded to it in your statement, but did the Tax Cuts and 

Jobs Act have a positive effect on your business? 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. Yes, it did. A very positive effect. 

Mr. STAUBER. And what did you say your savings were? 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. Seventy-two hundred dollars. 

Mr. STAUBER. And then the second question is, what would you 

say if you had to pick your number one roadblock to be successful 

in relation to the Federal Government. What would be the number 

one roadblock? 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. That is a gigantic thing. I know currently, 

and it goes back to what we are battling with with the employee 

issues is this 18 versus 21 on the Department of Transportation 

rules. And it is a huge hindrance. We have a young gentleman that 

is 19 years old now. He has been driving trucks in Wisconsin, or 

he has to start in Minnesota to do it because he cannot cross that 

line. And this young guy can drive a trailer as fast backwards as 

he can forward after doing this for years. But he cannot drive 

across that crazy line. And finding people—— 

Mr. STAUBER. And that crazy line for the listeners here is the 

bridge between Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin. 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. It is two bridges. Yeah. 

Mr. STAUBER. The Blatnik and the Bong Bridges. 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. You know, so that, and again, taxes is the 

other big thing. The amount of money that we spend every year 

with depreciation, with accountants, and with planning for the tax. 

You know, and it goes back to that 179 has been great, but I am 

addicted to the spending because I have to, or I have to give the 

money to the government. So that is a choice I make, which granted, has been great for the economy. It has been fantastic because 

every year now I spend more money every year. I project what I 

am going to grow. I project how much I spent last year. And John 

Deere out of Moline, Illinois, they love me. We have got a lot of yellow big steel out there. 

Mr. STAUBER. And then the last question, Jerry, you know, you 

commented that you have come out to Washington and testified 

several times. From your perspective, what can we, as a Committee, work on to make sure that small businesses like yours 

thrive? 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. Balancing all these regulations against cost. 

Every time these regulations come up there has to be a formula in 

there to understand the fact that it costs us so much money, and 

somehow as they go forward in all of these other, Department of 

Transportation, OSHA, all these, they are having their meetings 

outside of you. Again, if there is a way to regulate them to make 

it that they have to bring stuff to you to get it passed instead of 

just them making the rules and making the changes and, you 

know, even their ability to tax is totally wrong because you are my 

congressman. I elected you to make these decisions and to make 

these things. I did not elect them, so. 

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Mr. STAUBER. Thank you, Mr. Kortesmaki. I can say that we 

have been here several months here as a freshman, and I really appreciate this Committee talking about some of the exact same 

things you had mentioned about the repercussions of legislation or 

the repercussions of legislation by unelected folks. 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. It is rulemaking that really kills us. It is not 

just legislation; it is rulemaking. 

Mr. STAUBER. Agreed. And we have talked about that as well. 

So I would just want in closing, Jerry, I want to just congratulate 

you and Kathy on that American dream. You are living it. You are 

employing people, and I want to say from our perspective of Minnesota’s 8th Congressional District, you have been a steward of 

small business and you understand it. And of course, your affiliation with the National Federation of Independent Business, they 

understand small business, too, and we appreciate that. So I want 

to thank—— 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. A couple of seconds left. 

Mr. STAUBER. Yeah, go ahead. 

Mr. KORTESMAKI. The thing on the healthcare issue, what it 

did to taking it away from my employees, the sad story of when 

my mechanic crushed his ATV and we had the $1,000 deductible, 

he was able to take care of that in one year. With the $6,000 deductible, and this guy makes close to $50,000 a year—he is not 

super poor, he is not wealthy—that would devastate him. We need 

to figure out how to fix this healthcare issue that for small business to offer it has become such a burden, and I do not want to 

just turn my employees over to government-controlled health care. 

It is something that I do not see working. 

Mr. STAUBER. Thank you, Mr. Kortesmaki, and I appreciate 

your attendance. 

Back to you, Mr. Chair. Thank you. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you very much. 

At this point, I am going to recognize myself for 5 minutes. 

I just want to point out very quickly, Mr. Kortesmaki, that you 

were talking about the rulemaking aspect of all this and you elected your member of Congress to come here and make decisions and 

not folks at agencies and departments. And Mr. Stauber and I actually worked together on an instance to fix something just like 

this. It was the Runway Extension Act that the last Congress 

passed. Mr. Stauber sponsored the bill to fix the issue and I am 

the cosponsor, and it is the same thing. We have got an agency 

that is trying to ignore the intent of Congress and we are here to 

try and make sure that we are going to hold them to the original 

intent of the legislation. 

I also wanted to point out, I am sure Mr. Stauber has cosponsoring, as I am, a bill, the trucking issue you talked about with 

truck drivers under 21. I have got you beat. In Maine, Fort Kent 

to Kittery, a truck driver can drive 362 miles under the age of 21 

and then to go from Kittery to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 2.3 

miles, they cannot do it. So I am with you on that as well as a common sense reform. 

I want to take a couple of minutes to talk a little bit about trade, 

and I think we have a good opportunity to talk about the imporSBD026 with DISTILLER

31 

tance of having a process and consistency as best we can as a government. 

I thought, Mr. Brochu, you might, having listened to Mr. Skalish 

talk a little bit about the softwood lumber duties and the process 

behind it and how it is more of a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer approach to dealing with unfair trade practices with another government. 

Mr. BROCHU. Yeah, thank you. 

You know, for the softwood lumber industry, the trade issue with 

Canada, the unfair trade issue goes back to the early ‘80s. It has 

been a long, long process, and there have been periods of duties 

and periods of agreements and, you know, so the last agreement 

ran out a few years ago. And at that point, shortly after, there was 

the 1-year standstill period as part of the agreement, and then the 

industry triggered another investigation and filed a trade case 

against Canada. And throughout that process what we as an industry need is enforcement of the trade laws, and that is what we are 

asking for. And it is a very long process to get to where we are 

now, and it is a long process going forward. But the investigations 

have shown an unfair situation that hurts the U.S. industry and 

it hurts U.S. jobs and costs U.S. jobs and prevents our industry 

from growing and adding the jobs and investing in the mills to get 

us to the size that we should be or could be. So the proof is in the 

pudding in the lumber anyway, and this is a very long, drawn out 

process, but the lumber industry in the United States is investing 

like crazy, growing like crazy. We are adding big, big, big billions 

of dollars of investment into mills, into jobs all throughout the 

country. We are a little part of that up in Maine and we are happy 

to do it, and the confidence that we have going forward that we 

have a level playing field plays into that big time. 

Mr. GOLDEN. And am I correct, and this is my understanding 

of it, is that the process is so detailed and the investigations there 

are actually identifying specific companies who are carrying out, 

taking part, or benefitting from some of these unfair trade practices, and there is almost a scale in terms of what people have to 

pay, can you talk a little bit about that? 

Mr. BROCHU. Yeah, there are certain companies that have different rates applied to them, and then there is a general rate. And 

that is all part of the existing trade laws, how they get to that 

point. So this is all a process, and it started under the Obama administration, this current iteration of it. You know, my first meetings down here on this current case were with Ambassador Froman 

of USTR under President Obama. So it takes a long time to do this 

properly and to enforce the U.S. trade laws. 

Mr. GOLDEN. I appreciate you taking a little bit of time to talk 

about it, and I am sure that Mr. Skalish, you are going to have 

more time to talk about it from a different perspective but I think 

what you see here is a long, drawn out, thoughtful process that is 

very detailed in going after some specific issues here, and I think 

it is a good example of how we can enact good trade policies when 

we see an unfair practice. 

Real quick. You have got about 30 seconds left here. But you 

talked a little bit about the labor stuff. Anything specific come to 

mind that you think we could focus on that would help you out? 

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Mr. BROCHU. We need people. I know immigration is obviously 

a big issue, but we do not have enough people to fill the jobs that 

we have right now. And I think we need to have more of an emphasis as a country on trades versus the different types of jobs. We are 

going to have plenty of computer programmers in a few years. We 

need people to run equipment. We need people to program. You 

know, there are plenty of computer jobs in our mills as well but 

we need electricians, we need mechanical people, we need millwrights. We need those types of skills that are going to fuel the 

economy, and that is what we need. 

Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you very much. I could not agree more. I 

think you mentioned $60,000, $70,000 salary in Jackman, that is 

doing real good in rural America. 

With that, I am out of time. Nothing to yield back, and next we 

will recognize representative Chrissy Houlahan. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

I have questions, two questions, one for Mr. Skalish. And thank 

you so much again for coming today and sharing your story with 

us and our Committee. And in your testimony you spoke about 

Cambria, which is the leading producer of quartz surface product 

in our country, and them petitioning the Department of Commerce 

and International Trade Commission and alleging that the imported quartz surface products that were coming in from China 

were causing injury to Cambria. 

Can you talk a little bit more about the Department of Commerce and International Trade Commission’s response to that, and 

possibly ways that we can be helpful to alleviate the unintended 

consequences and the problem that you are experiencing? 

Mr. SKALISH. Well, number one, I am not sure Cambria is, in 

fact, the leading domestic manufacturer of quartz surface products 

in the U.S. 

The Trade Commission, or the ITC, and then the final decision 

by the Department of Commerce, made three rulings, or actually 

two rulings. September 21st, after the hearing, they initiated a 

countervailing duty of 34.38 percent and did not find critical circumstances, which means that they will not go back 90 days retroactive. On September 24, 2018, granite and quartz were placed on 

the List 3 of the Section 301 tariffs at 10 percent currently, possibly 25 percent here in the very near future. On November 20, 

2018, the Department of Commerce published an industry-wide 

antidumping cash deposit duty rate of 290 percent. And they did 

find critical circumstances, which go back 90 days retroactive. 

What happens is that we are under contract with our customers. 

When they went retroactive, we had shipments already on the 

order to land that same day or days after the retroactive duty period. So we are being tariffed on those duties. Currently, we have 

paid over $1 million in tariffs with a proposed $1.5 million in additional tariffs when they start to go after the antidumping 90 day 

retroactive tariffs. So our company is devastated. I mean, we are 

basically done because of those tariffs. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. And is there anything that you can think of 

in terms of reversing the retroactiveness of it that would be helpful 

so that we can be surgical rather than sledgehammer? 

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Mr. SKALISH. Exactly. But yeah. Eliminating the retroactive 

tariff, finding critical circumstances on the antidumping would be 

extremely helpful. That would reduce my liability from that $1.5 

million or more to go away, which would be very beneficial. Again, 

we already paid almost $1 million. We had contracts with customers and they are not willing to go back and say, okay, we have 

been tariffed now. We would like to add those tariffs to the invoice. 

Well, they come back and say, well, we have a contract with you. 

The contract is for $50,000. We are not paying any more money for 

tariffs. So who has to absorb it? We do. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. Yeah. 

Mr. SKALISH. And that is what we have done. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. Thank you. I understand. And thank you very 

much for your compelling testimony. 

With the remainder of my time I would love to ask Mr. Brochu 

a question regarding your testimony that had to do with cybersecurity and the fact that you were kind of hijacked in a way. I would 

love to understand a little bit more about the story of the hack and 

also if you could speak more in depth about how you were prepared? Did you know that you were vulnerable? Did you have any 

assistance? And what can we do to help small businesses like yours 

to be less vulnerable to cyberattack and to be more able to withstand them once they happen? 

Mr. BROCHU. Yes. Thank you for the question. 

Our particular instance, it was a ransomware attack and it 

locked up a lot of data. And we recovered what we could. We had 

to rebuild everything, and it all started with somebody opening an 

attachment. It was a very innocent thing. It was disguised to look 

just like an internal email. So it is so sophisticated now and so 

complex that it is becoming a major expense to our business. And 

we, through that process, exposed some gaps that we had in security that we spend a lot of money now to fix. So it is becoming one 

of those costs of doing business that you do not talk a lot about but 

it is becoming very significant. 

So what can the government do to help, I think whatever emphasis needs to be put on this from a research level and all the way 

down to an implementation, I think the security issues that the 

government faces is the same as what we are facing now. And if 

it is unaddressed, it is going to be a competitive disadvantage to 

businesses going forward, and I think the role the government can 

play in that is to work on it on a level where it does not become 

a competitive disadvantage to us. 

Ms. HOULAHAN. Thank you very much. And you should know 

that this Committee passed through three different bills last week 

that went to the floor last week and have now passed the House 

that have to do with cybersecurity in the small business space, and 

now obviously the challenge is to get it through the Senate as well. 

So thank you so much for your time, and I yield back. 

Mr. BROCHU. Thank you. 

Mr. GOLDEN. With that, I want to thank everyone for coming 

and providing some very compelling testimony about your businesses. I want to say congratulations to all of you on the work that 

you do and jobs that you create in your communities. And just the 

breadth of the conversation is impressive and I think it gives you 

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a sense of everything that we deal with in this Committee, so 

thank you for sharing your thoughts. And we will be using that as 

best we can to help you moving forward in this Committee. 

With that, we are going to shut down this panel and move on to 

a third. So thank you very much. 

[Recess] 

Ms. FINKENAUER. [Presiding] This hearing will come to order. 

I would like to first welcome our witnesses today on our final 

panel. I will take a minute to introduce each one of you, but before 

that, I am going to first yield to Congressman Crow, who is going 

to introduce his witness and ask the appropriate questions as well. 

Thank you all again so much, and I yield now to Congressman 

Crow. 

Mr. CROW. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate you yielding 

to me and going a little bit out of order here this morning. It is 

nice to be with all of you today and to welcome you and to listen 

to just a few of the Nation’s small business heroes’ stories. 

It is an honor to introduce a small business hero from Colorado’s 

6th Congressional District which I represent. Brittney Rae Reese 

is the cofounder of FIT & NU, Colorado’s first fitness and nutrition 

club for women of color and proudly located in Aurora, Colorado. 

Brittney has a strong entrepreneurial spirit which has weaved 

itself through everything she has done in her 32 years. She has accomplished a lot in her professional life, but what inspires me is 

the saying she lives by, ‘‘If you lead with good and purposeful intent, then great things will come out.’’ Which I wholeheartedly 

agree. 

Brittney started her college career at Colorado State University 

studying apparel design and construction and was very active in 

the Black Student Alliance. She began to learn about business by 

studying at the Art Institute of Colorado and by creating an event, 

production, and design company called Chocolate Piece Productions 

at the age of 21. She then relocated to Los Angeles to continue her 

studies at the Art Institute of LA, while working as a publicist assistant for a number of Hollywood influences and lifestyle brands. 

She kept pushing herself to grow, which led her to move across the 

country to Brooklyn, New York, and it was there that she found 

her love for fitness. While living in New York, she began to train 

and learn more about fitness, continued to build her passion to inspire others, and it eventually took her to Central America. It was 

upon her return where she and her sister Joslyn decided to dedicate their life’s work to help women of color reach their optimal fitness and wellness through FIT & NU, their habit-based fitness and 

nutrition company. And I am so glad that they decided to launch 

and run this business in their hometown of Aurora. Since launching in 2015, Brittney has worked to touch hundreds of women’s 

lives in her hometown, and even more online. She has led women 

to achieve physical wellness, but also goes further to work on selfactualization, esteem, love, belonging, safety, and security. I am 

proud to have Brittney Reese representing my district as a small 

business hero, and I know she will achieve a great amount of success through her good and purposeful living. 

Now I will do something that I never do, and I have to apologize 

and excuse myself from this hearing. As many of you know, my disSBD026 with DISTILLER

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trict had our third mass shooting just yesterday with a mass shooting at a school in the southwest part of my district, so I am going 

to leave now and head to the airport to be with the families during 

this time. So I apologize for having to excuse myself, but I welcome 

you again and I thank you for your leadership. 

Madam Chair, I yield back. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Congressman Crow. I appreciate 

your time today. Thinking of you, wishing you well on your journey, and thinking of your district. 

Now, it is my pleasure to welcome our next witness here from 

my home state of Iowa, Mr. Dave Walton, a local farmer and executive director on the Board of Directors at the Iowa Soybean Association. Happy to have you here. Mr. Walton farms with his wife 

and two sons. In addition to growing soybeans and corn, they also 

raise beef, cattle, and sheep, and own a small seed company in 

their hometown. Mr. Walton and his wife also have a new trucking 

company that they started up with their two sons to make sure 

that there were opportunities for their sons to come back to the 

farm. Right now, folks across Iowa know that things are tough, 

particularly in rural Iowa, given the ongoing trade war and retaliatory tariffs, and there is plenty to do. Mr. Walton, you give me 

hope every day. It is folks like you that I go back to Iowa and chat 

with that always give me hope, even when things are tough. I am 

very grateful for you to be here today and tell your story. Thank 

you very much, Mr. Walton. 

I would now like to yield to Mr. Burchett from Tennessee to introduce our next witness. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Thank you, Chairlady, and thank you for this 

opportunity to be here. I guess I should have said Madam Chair 

which would have been more appropriate. I am just from Tennessee. That is what we always used to say in the legislature, so 

I apologize, Madam Chair. 

I am honored to be here today to talk to you about a small business that is in East Tennessee. Tennessee is a proud small business state and 99 percent of the businesses in my state are considered small businesses. These are job creators who employ more 

than half of Tennessee. These are the people who put their blood, 

sweat, and tears into their passions, and I want to get the government off their backs like a lot of you all do. I ran a couple of small 

businesses myself, and I understand what it takes in that community. 

My guest at the Committee today is no different. Colleen Cruze 

Bhatti—did I get that right Colleen? Pretty close? All right. Owner 

of Cruze Farm in Knoxville, Tennessee, is a fixture in our community. Cruze Farm is a family dairy farm in East Tennessee. Colleen 

and her staff actually milk Jersey cows and bottle their own whole, 

pasteurized Jersey milk which I guess I should say for the record 

there are a couple of gallons of the whole variety and the chocolate 

variety in my refrigerator, and I would say there are a couple of 

tubs of their ice cream but it never gets to the freezer usually. 

When my wife gets it out of the bag, it is already getting eaten by 

myself or my daughter, Isabelle, or my wife. They also have their 

milk in the mom and pop grocery stores and the food cooperatives 

throughout East Tennessee, and most importantly though, Cruze 

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Farm has some of the best ice cream you will ever have, which I 

noted. I was out there eating, and they also sell pizza, if you can 

believe that with, I guess, the cheese that they make themselves. 

I was out there one Sunday after church with my wife and daughter, and there was another guy there, and he was telling me about 

their marketing skills, and the trendy word that I guess you young 

folks use a lot is ‘‘branding’’. And their branding is excellent, and 

he said to me, ‘‘Burchett,’’ he said, ‘‘this is like being at the early 

days of Chick-fil-A.’’ And I thought that was some pretty high 

standards. 

I do not want you all to take all this from me, but I want you 

to know I am very happy to introduce my good friend, Colleen, for 

you all to hear her story. Colleen, thank you for being here. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Mr. Burchett. 

Finally, I would like to yield to my colleague from Pennsylvania, 

who also sits as the Ranking Member of what I think is the best 

Subcommittee—Rural Development, Agriculture, Trade, and Entrepreneurship—along with me. Dr. Joyce, I would be happy to have 

you introduce our last witness. 

Mr. JOYCE. Madam Chairwoman, thank you very much. And 

you are right, this is the best Subcommittee. 

Today I welcome Mr. Shawn Pulford, the CEO of LB Water Services of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Mr. Pulford is in his fourth 

year as the CEO of LB Water Service. LB Water has been providing quality water and wastewater solutions for decades, and 

over that time, LB Water Services has grown from one sales office 

in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, to eight full-service locations covering 

Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. Their large inventory and 

proprietary fleet of delivery vehicles ensures that LB Water Services can supply the products, the services, and support that their 

customers need the most. Shawn has lived in various places 

throughout the United States in his career, but he considers Elmira, New York to be his home. He is a graduate of PMC Widener 

University where he received his degree in business administration. Shawn is the proud father of three grown children, hopefully 

one watching as it streams live. In his spare time, Shawn enjoys 

being with his family and friends, playing golf, watching baseball, 

and most important for this Subcommittee, being the CEO of LB 

Water Services. Welcome, and thank you. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Dr. Joyce. 

Now I want to just take a minute to explain how the timing rules 

work. Each witness will get 5 minutes to testify and then members 

get 5 minutes to ask questions. There is a lighting system that you 

will see right in front of you to assist you. The green light comes 

on when you begin, and then the yellow light means that there is 

just 1 minute remaining. The red light then comes on when you are 

out of time, and we ask that you stay within the timeframe to the 

best of your ability. 

Thank you all again for being here today, and I cannot wait to 

hear from you all. 

With that, we will start with Mr. Walton, who I would like to 

recognize for 5 minutes. 

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STATEMENT OF DAVE WALTON 

Mr. WALTON. Good morning, Ms. Chairwoman, and members of 

the Committee. I am honored to address you here today. Thank you 

for inviting me to speak as we recognize the positive impact of entrepreneurs and small business owners. It is truly an honor to 

speak on behalf of millions of hard-working farm families who are 

an important segment of the small businesses of America. 

Once upon a time, the thought of testifying before the U.S. House 

of Representatives would have struck fear into my heart. Turns 

out, it is a walk in the park compared to farming and operating a 

business that sustains my family and provides employment and 

economic opportunity for Iowa, a state built on agriculture. 

For more than 100 years, the Walton family has farmed the land 

I call home near Wilton, Iowa. But in 1835, we were the first European settlers to establish a farm, plant and harvest a crop in the 

area now known as Cedar County. But that is not where our story 

begins. Centuries ago, after a dispute with the King of England, 

my ancestors were given a choice. They left England and arrived 

in the Colonies during the early 1600s, settling on Staten Island 

first, and then began their migration to Iowa, first to Long Island, 

New Jersey, Ohio, and Indiana, before setting down roots in 

I come before you today as an eastern Iowa farmer who has a 

passion for providing food, fiber, and fuel for a growing and more 

demanding world population. My wife Paula, sons Brad, Alex, and 

I grow soybeans and corn, raise beef cattle and sheep, and operate 

a seed company in our hometown of Wilton. Recently, we established a trucking company to transport sand, gravel, and fertilizer 

to help provide additional revenue and an opportunity for our sons 

to join the operation as partners. 

For the past year, farm families like mine have not been in a 

celebratory mood. Regardless of running a diversified enterprise, 

managing cash flow responsibly and doing things the right way and 

for the right reasons, I can tell you firsthand these are difficult 

times, perhaps the most difficult I have faced as a farmer. This 

may come as a surprise given the Nation’s historically low unemployment and solid gains in most financial indices, but make no 

mistake, farmers, the communities in which they live, and the businesses they patronize, are hurting. Soybean prices, a major source 

of revenue for my operation, are at 10-year lows, down almost $2 

per bushel from this time last year. 

While I would like to say all is well in rural America, it is not. 

There is no one reason why prices farmers are receiving for their 

products are well below the cost of production. Rather, it is a multitude of challenges, some placed upon us by government’s action 

or inaction, and some by our own making. 

Combined, inaction on these critical issues are creating the kind 

of financial headwinds the likes we have not seen since the 1980s. 

If action is not taken immediately by Congress and the administration, the crops some farmers are currently planting may be their 

last. 

While America’s farmers are astute at producing, what we need 

are markets. Many of you gathered here today understand the direct correlation between action you take and the livelihoods of 

those who farm and operate small businesses. When access to marSBD026 with DISTILLER

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kets is blocked, farm prices fall. Conversely, prices react positively 

when demand increases. And I can think of few better examples of 

that demand increase than promoting and enhancing consumption 

of homegrown, renewable fuels like biodiesel. 

I want to recognize Congresswoman Finkenauer for leading a bipartisan effort in the House to retroactively extend the biodiesel 

tax credit. This action helped shine a light on the need for boosting 

prices and demand. This issue resonates with her as Iowa is the 

number one biodiesel producing state, producing nearly 365 million 

gallons last year, supporting nearly 4,700 full-time jobs in Iowa, 

and given most renewal fuel production facilities are in rural communities, the biodiesel tax credit and renewable fuels industry are 

a major boost to communities often most in need of good-paying, 

blue-collar jobs and economic vitality. 

For our farm, biodiesel production adds 63 cents to the market 

value of every bushel of soybeans, or about $40 an acre by generating greater demand for the oil found in each soybean. That is an 

additional $40 across my farm that would enable us to reinvest an 

extra $12,000 this year into an operation to update machinery, like 

a 20-year-old tractor that is wearing out or invest in technology to 

continue to improve our efficiency. 

Biodiesel not only diversifies our fuel supply so we are less dependent on foreign oil, it saves every U.S. consumer at least 17 

cents on every gallon of diesel. It improves the environmental quality by reducing greenhouse gas emissions by up to 86 percent. In 

a climate where everyone is looking for a win, this is a win, win, 

win. It lowers the cost of food and fuel and improves the air we all 

breathe. This should be a slam dunk. 

Continued inaction on this topic is unacceptable. If Congress does 

not extend the biodiesel and renewable diesel tax incentive, small 

businesses like mine and the biodiesel producers in our small 

towns will continue to suffer. 

The same can be said for trade. Continued disputes and disruptions with our trading partners have created tremendous financial 

strain for America’s farmers and small businesses. China is America’s number one market for soybean exports. Nearly one of every 

three rows of soybeans grown in the U.S. is exported to a country 

of 1.4 billion people. That is no longer true today. As a result, the 

downward pressure on soybean prices has been dramatic since the 

U.S. and China became embroiled in an escalating trade war almost 1 year ago. China’s retaliatory duties primarily targeted agricultural products, including an extra 25 percent tax on U.S. soybeans. 

Any trade war involving food hits states like Iowa, and small 

businesses like mine, particularly hard. Adding to the complexity 

and pessimism is that no one knows when the anxiety and pain 

will ease. This makes planning for the future nearly impossible. 

Until the trade issues are resolved, we are stuck in limbo, unable 

to move forward with any clear direction. I can tell you this is not 

an enviable position for any business owner. We thrive when the 

future is clear and barriers are removed. 

It is my sincere hope is that these issues will be resolved quickly 

so many more generations of Waltons can continue this 400 year 

journey of farming in this great country. I look forward to conSBD026 with DISTILLER

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tinuing the conversation and stand ready to assist you and your 

colleagues in crafting solutions and moving these issues across the 

finish line. 

Thank you again for allowing me to share my story on behalf of 

Iowa’s soybean farmers. I am happy answer any questions you may 

have. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Mr. Walton. And again, I’m just 

very grateful to have you here today making sure Iowans are heard 

in Washington. 

Next, I would like to recognize Ms. Reese for 5 minutes to hear 

her testimony as well. 

STATEMENT OF BRITTNEY REESE 

Ms. REESE. Thank you. Chairwoman and members of the Small 

Business Committee, thank you for hosting this hearing to honor 

small business heroes and for inviting me to speak today. I would 

also want to thank my representative, Congressman Jason Crow, 

for giving FIT & NU the opportunity to speak here about the work 

we are doing as small business owners in his district. 

My name is Brittney Rae Reese, cofounder of FIT & NU, Colorado’s first fitness and nutrition club for busy women of color, located in Colorado’s 6th Congressional District in the city of Aurora. 

My sister Joslyn and I started FIT & NU in 2015 with the mission to help busy women of color improve their health, ease their 

minds and influence their communities and families to live well. 

We do this through functional fitness training and habit-based nutrition coaching. When asked why we were selected as a Small 

Business Hero, we were told because we ‘‘take advantage of our resources, we work hard, and bring passion.’’ My sister and I work 

well together and maintain a family relationship that extends to 

the women we serve. 

FIT & NU celebrated its official grand opening as a fully staffed 

and equipped boutique fitness and nutrition club in March of 2019, 

not only positively impacting health and wellness for women in the 

community we grew up in, but employing, collaborating, and contracting with other small businesses and entrepreneurs as well. 

Hard work and determination alone did not get us here. The success my sister and I have enjoyed so far is due largely to the support of local nonprofits, like the Women’s Business Center at Mi 

Casa Resource Center and Community Enterprise Development, 

also known as CEDS. These are two Colorado organizations that 

equip women and minority business owners in our pursuit of impact, longevity, and profitability. I highlight these organizations because of the work they do to propel low-income entrepreneurs like 

myself through glass ceilings, out of cycles of poverty, and beyond 

gender wage gaps. 

Between 2014 and 2018, Mi Casa created 721 jobs, launched 35 

new businesses and hosted countless workshops on topics ranging 

from finance and HR to strategic planning and social media marketing. CEDS has financed 213 businesses and placed a total of 

$4.05 million in investments with the help of the Small Business 

Administration. 

So when I think of what Congress can do to help small businesses, it would be to continue programs in the Small Business AdSBD026 with DISTILLER

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ministration that fund organizations like Mi Casa and CEDS that 

support disadvantaged businesses, such as minority-owned and 

women-owned businesses. This will afford us to grow beyond the 

uphill battle as startups, and give us the resources to hire team 

members, implement marketing campaigns beyond grass root efforts, and to become more sound business operators and owners. 

Also, as Congress passes legislation that allocates capital funding 

in support of small businesses, the focus should be on helping businesses develop and sustain internal operations. 

As low-income business owners, we are our main human resource. We would like to help ourselves and other disinvested people and communities join the economic mainstream. Wage subsidy 

programs and debt relief are amongst those of interest to us. 

Furthermore, if Women’s Business Centers and Community Development Financial Institutions did not exist, we, the disadvantaged black women visionaries, low-income entrepreneurs, change 

agents of global health, refugees and minorities would not have access to low cost developmental services and capital to grow. 

In closing, we are thankful for the contributions Congress has 

made thus far to bridge the social and economic gap for women like 

me. However, many of the available resources are still directed at 

larger companies, yet businesses that are small to the Federal Government need these partnerships with organizations that see them 

as large. 

I hope my testimony affirms that women and minority-focused 

organizations do make a difference and that they are the lifeline 

to making the American dream work. Thank you again for the opportunity to share our story on behalf of all women-owned and minority-owned businesses. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you so much, Ms. Reese. And again, 

I’m grateful to have you here today. 

I would now like to recognize Ms. Bhatti for 5 minutes for her 

testimony. 

STATEMENT OF COLLEEN CRUZE BHATTI 

Ms. BHATTI. Thank you all. And thank you, Mr. Burchett. 

I met Mr. Burchett about 6 years ago I would say. I was scooping 

ice cream at a farmers market. And I do not know if you remember 

this, but he was teasing me about how expensive my ice cream 

was. And I said—do you remember what I said? 

Mr. BURCHETT. My wife will pay for it? 

Ms. BHATTI. No. I said, ‘‘Mr. Burchett, if you had to milk the 

cows you would charge twice as much.’’ I am happy to say I have 

not gone down in prices or quality, and 6 years later we are selling 

more ice cream than I could have ever dreamed of. And that is due 

to our community in Knoxville, Tennessee has completely supported our business, and because of them we are really thriving. 

I am here today with my husband, Manjit Bhatti. He is a first 

generation American. His parents are from India, and I met him 

actually trying to sell milk at a restaurant. He was cooking. He 

was about to go to law school. I talked him out of law school, and 

now he is a full-time dairy farmer with me. We are living the 

dream together and making good quality milk in Tennessee. 

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So I am here today to tell you about who my small business heroes are, and that is my parents. They started the farm in 1980. 

They got married when my dad was 38, my mom was 29. They met 

ice skating. They married 3 months later and my dad told my 

mom, I have this dream. I want to bottle milk. And he is a fourth 

generation dairy farmer. Everyone in the family sold milk but they 

never learned how to put it in a bottle and sell it directly to a customer. And my dad was determined to figure out how to do that. 

But he could not have done it without my mom. My mom is the 

brains. She is so smart, and she supported him completely. And 

within 1 year they were bottling milk, pasteurizing and bottling 

milk. They got their permit, and they would not have gotten the 

permit if it was not for my mom. And they started selling milk directly to customers. 

So I went off to college, not totally sure I would come back to the 

farm, but I really did miss the farm. And I really just appreciated 

what my parents had built and how much work and love they put 

into that dairy farm. I do not know if you know much about dairy 

farms but it is a completely different culture. The cows come first 

before anything in life. So on Sunday mornings, instead of church 

we are milking cows together. It is a unique culture and I am really happy to carry that on. 

So my mom encouraged me after college to come back to the 

farm. And I came back and my goal was to sell the milk surplus 

that the farm had. We had quite a bit of extra milk that we were 

not selling, and I also wanted to make ice cream. So the way I 

started selling it was giving it away. You know, if you cannot sell 

something you give it away and you make customers. Oh, my goodness. And that is how I really built the business was by giving milk 

away and meeting our community. And I was kind of like a politician in a way really just out there giving milk away and trying to 

tell everyone about what we were doing at our farm. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Except we give other people’s stuff away, not 

our own. 

Ms. BHATTI. And I started marketing the farm through social 

media, which has been really successful for us. We use Instagram 

and Facebook, and it is free. And so we meet our customers just 

through social media. 

In 9 years, the business has really grown. We have three storefronts and about 70 employees. And what really motivates me to 

run a great business are the people. I love people and I love my 

employees. And I do not offer health insurance yet but that is a 

goal. And as a small business owner, I realize the responsibility I 

have in employing America’s future. And I take it seriously. Employment is much more than merely providing a service in exchange for an hourly rate. I believe that small business owners in 

America have a unique opportunity to help define what employment can be in this century. And I believe that a job has to be 

something that one takes pride in. It can be fulfilling. It must be 

nourishing, not draining, and it has to facilitate physical and mental health. It must provide a forum for community and friendship, 

because at the end of the day we, Americans, we spend all our time 

at work. 

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So at Cruze Farm, our motto is to work hard and to love harder. 

And through my business I am building the America that I dream 

of. 

Thank you so much for your time today. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Ms. Bhatti. And I wish you 

would have brought some of the ice cream with you. Oh, my goodness. 

Ms. BURCHETT. She did. It was already eaten. I am sorry. I 

confiscated it. It is in the office. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thanks for not sharing! 

Thank you again. 

Now I would like to recognize Mr. Pulford for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF SHAWN PULFORD 

Mr. PULFORD. Thank you, and good morning. And thank you, 

Chairwoman. And I would like to recognize the other distinguished 

members of the House of Representatives Committee on Small 

Business, and specifically, Congressman Joyce for inviting us 

today. 

I am honored to testify before the Committee in recognition of 

National Small Business Week, representing one of our Nation’s 

small business heroes, LB Water Service, Inc. 

My name is Shawn Pulford, and I am the CEO of LB Water. Our 

company was born in 1970, when our founder, Lehman B. Mengel 

capitalized on a market need for readily needed infrastructure materials in the central and south central region of Pennsylvania. In 

a timespan of nearly 50 years, we have grown from three employees in one location to 225 employees in eight locations. 

LB Water is now the leading provider of innovative solutions for 

water, wastewater, and stormwater throughout the mid-Atlantic 

region. We serve cities, counties, municipalities, contractors, engineering firms and development companies. And many of our manufacturers, as well as our customers, are also small businesses. We 

also now operate two affiliated companies, Stormwater Solution 

Source and 540 Technologies. 

Stormwater Solution Source provides stormwater and environmental solutions that help state and local governments, contractors, and companies meet increasing regulations governing the 

management of stormwater and erosion and sediment control. 540 

Technologies serves an expanded region of 21 states, offering smart 

city solutions for water-loss management, street lighting, electric 

metering, data acquisition and management to both public and private entities. 

In 2002, LB Water’s owners sold the company’s assets to the employees, and LB Water has operated as a 100 percent Employee 

Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) company ever since. Our company 

is one of more than 6,600 ESOPs in the United States that, combined, employ 14.3 million workers. It is because of the provision 

for ESOPs in The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 

1974 (ERISA) that LB Water has been able to attract and retain 

its high-caliber workforce, invest in top-notch training and equipment, and provide exceptional benefits to our employee-owners. In 

addition, LB Water’s status as an ESOP has provided the foundation for our company’s success. 

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I am pleased to say that LB Water has experienced tremendous 

growth in the last 5 years. This is due, in part, to increases in both 

public and private investment. We are benefiting from relief provided by the Federal tax cuts as well. As we consider the south 

central region of Pennsylvania, which includes Congressman 

Joyce’s district as well as our Chambersburg location, we can see 

economic development at work. The region is becoming home to 

manufacturing and distribution operations for many companies. We 

have witnessed the construction of 15 new warehouses, each exceeding 1 million square feet, along the I-81 corridor from the 

Maryland line to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. We and other businesses in this region have experienced a positive residual economic 

impact due to this increased activity. 

However, the area is quickly reaching full employment, the need 

for skilled labor is high, and concerns are mounting regarding the 

ability of I-81 to handle the increased traffic demands in the corridor. 

At LB Water and our affiliated companies, most of our solutions 

are designed to address our Nation’s aging subsurface water infrastructure, much of which is well over 100 years old and in dire 

need of replacement. This critical infrastructure remains ‘‘out of 

sight and out of mind’’ until a major failure occurs. Using advanced 

detection technologies, we can see, hear, and pinpoint even small 

water leaks and provide solutions before they become big events 

that appear on the nightly news. 

Yet, repairs alone cannot solve the state of our country’s deteriorating water infrastructure. Much of it needs to be replaced. For 

more than 2o years, Congress has discussed the need for comprehensive infrastructure legislation to address the country’s transportation and subsurface water infrastructures, both of which are 

essential for economic development and as well as quality of life. 

As LB Water and other small businesses look ahead to future opportunities and growth, it is clear that this is a critical matter 

upon which the Federal Government could act. We strongly urge 

Congress to pass a comprehensive infrastructure bill that funds 

needed improvements to our Nation’s crumbling water distribution 

systems along with our Nation’s highways, bridges and airports. 

I would like to conclude my testimony by saying that it has been 

a tremendous honor for me to appear before this Committee today 

to tell our story and to speak to some of the issues that impact the 

day-to-day operations of LB Water. We truly believe we are an 

American success story. I am proud of our 100 percent employeeowned company, what we have accomplished, and how we are positioning ourselves to continue to succeed in the future. 

This has been a great opportunity. I thank you very much, and 

I will be happy to answer any questions. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you so much, Mr. Pulford. And thank 

you again to all our witnesses here and all that you have shared 

with us. I am excited to get to learn more as we ask our questions. 

To begin, I will recognize myself for 5 minutes and start with Mr. 

Walton. I know some folks are probably wondering why I keep 

bringing farmers from Iowa to testify in front of the Small Business 

Committee, but I take every opportunity I can to remind WashSBD026 with DISTILLER

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ington that our farmers are also our small business owners. And 

again, thank you so much for being here. 

You know, we have gotten to chat over the last few days about 

quite a bit that is impacting our state right now. Obviously, the uncertainty with the trade war is one of the things that I am very 

concerned about, as are all our friends back in Iowa. One of the 

things we can be doing here in Washington is trying to help our 

farmers as much as we can with certain things like the biodiesel 

tax credit extender. I know you touched on this in your testimony 

a bit, but I am wondering if you can explain more about what it 

would mean to extend the biodiesel tax credit. It expired 16 months 

ago durig the last Congress and we need to get this done. What 

would it mean for your family farm and your businesses, but also 

as we have talked about earlier, what would it mean for the communities surrounding you and the small businesses on Main Street 

that rely on our farmers doing well for them to do well? If you 

would be able to elaborate on some of that and just how important 

it is that we do everything we can right now to support you guys, 

and again, do everything that we can for our state to be able to 

grow. 

Mr. WALTON. Sure. And thanks for the question because this is 

one that has been kind of a struggle for us. 

The biodiesel tax credit extension is one that the producers are 

looking for. They have to go throughout the year not knowing 

whether or not they are going to get a retroactive tax credit for the 

gallons that they produce. So they have to make a decision, do we 

price it in or do we not price it in? And a lot of them are pricing 

it in thinking that it is coming because it had been retroactively 

put in place. Sixteen months ago that stopped happening, so those 

producers are throttling down production. They are in some cases 

shutting down operations. And the effect of that is they are on 

longer creating demand for the soybean oil that we produce. And 

a soybean, you basically have two things once that soybean is processed. You have meal, which is used for feed purposes and then you 

have oil, that can be used for a number of things, one of which is 

the production of fuel. When we lose demand for oil, that affects 

also the price of the meal because now oil becomes a waste product 

that either has to be disposed of or has no value and that raises 

the price of meal. So when you raise the price of meal, that costs 

more to feed to an animal, whether it be a pig or a chicken or a 

dairy cow, and raises the cost of production for those livestock 

farmers, which in turn raises the cost of food. 

But what it means for the grain farmer is that we could potentially lose that 63 cents a bushel of value that the oil adds to the 

soybeans. And if I am not profitable, like I said, it is about $40 an 

acre for us. And for this year that is the difference between profit 

and loss. So if I am not making a profit, I have no money to spend. 

We have already looked at every single expense in our operation 

and we have cut out everything critical, and most of those are personal expenses. We are not buying new vehicles. We are not spending money on clothes. The grocery bill has been paired back as 

much as we can. So we are making all those kinds of cuts, and 

those are dollars that are not being spent in the community. It is 

not at the restaurant. It is not at the clothing store. It is not at 

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the supermarket. And small town America, they rely on those dollars even more critically than they probably do in urban areas because they have a smaller customer base. So it has a really widereaching effect when Ag is not doing well, and it probably is amplified in those small businesses in small towns across Iowa in the 

Midwest. So that is the thing that we are working with here is if 

the profitability of soybeans or any commodity goes away for us it 

has that effect that we do not have dollars to spend in the community. We do not have dollars to spend at the equipment dealership 

to upgrade equipment, and that in turn goes to the manufacturer 

and they cannot pay their workers or are shutting down, and I 

know right now Deere has throttled back operations on the Ag sector, and that is a direct result from the profit ability loss in Ag. 

So it is a pretty direct correlation. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Yeah. Well, thank you again, Mr. Walton, 

for uplifting these issues. We will keep doing that the best we can 

here in Washington to make sure that Iowans are heard loud and 

clear, and that we elevate the effects of everything that is going on 

here and how hard they are hitting our state. Thank you, Mr. Walton. 

I know my time has expired, so I would like to recognize Mr. 

Burchett for 5 minutes to ask his questions as well. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Thank you, Madam Chairlady. I have several 

questions. I only have 5 minutes. 

Mr. Walton, you said that the soybean, let us see, the biodiesel 

I believe is what you said, there was a cost savings associated with 

that for you all. Is that cost savings there if we do not provide the 

cash incentives to it? Is it profitable to you all? 

Mr. WALTON. That is kind of hard to say where I sit because 

the biodiesel industry is what creates that value for us. And so 

when we have a functioning biodiesel industry that profitability is 

there. If the biodiesel industry goes away, I think we have to default back to where it was before we had a robust biodiesel industry and adding that 63 cents. It may be somewhere between zero 

and 63. I do not know where that is. So that cost savings would 

be borne on the meal side. So it would raise the cost of meal. So 

it is hard to say. But I would say that it would be definitely between 63 and zero, but where that number is, I do not know. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Okay. Okay. Thank you. 

Ms. Reese, your story is very compelling, and I dig it. 

Ms. REESE. Thank you. 

Mr. BURCHETT. What hurdles do you experience as a woman 

of color in a very specialized business it seems? It seems that there 

is a—I do not know the makeup of Colorado, but when you say we 

are going to target women of color just in a specific industry, I am 

curious, what hurdles have you experienced? And are there other 

folks, maybe local chambers of commerce or what have you that 

would actually get with the other ladies that have been in similar 

situations and say here is where we are at, here is what can happen to you? 

Ms. REESE. Absolutely. We have managed to partner with a 

number of organizations in Colorado and are currently working 

with a more national organization that is located here in D.C., the 

Black Women’s Health Imperative to help span our reach. And just 

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overall, obviously in Colorado, the population of women in color is 

lower. We happen to be located in a city with the most populated 

African American women. So we were pretty strategic about that 

because we know that this is important even though we are not the 

majority in our city. However, we are looking at it from a national 

stance starting where we are from and then hoping to expand. 

Some of the biggest challenges I would say is really identifying 

where we can create these strategic partnerships that will help our 

bottom line of saving and serving the most women of color in Colorado. So we are working diligently with that, and I think that as 

we get our name out there a little bit more, Colorado is becoming 

a big hub for people to, you know, for transplants. So I think that 

we can start to ride that wave a little bit more once our name gets 

bigger. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Cool. My brother lived there and my nephew 

was born there, so. 

Ms. REESE. Oh, there you go. 

Mr. BURCHETT. But he is back home now. 

Ms. Bhatti, finally, you know, it is a family-owned business, and 

I know that in family-owned businesses, you know, especially in 

the dairy business, I remember Paul Harvey, the old radio guy said 

one time, he said that he read this letter from a guy who sent it 

to his dad, and he was going to boot camp in the military and he 

said, ‘‘you know, we are up every morning at 5:30, and we work 

all day and then we are in bed by 7:00.’’ And he said, ‘‘If I had 

known it was going to be like this, I would have left the dairy farm 

years ago and joined the Army.’’ 

And I am wondering with family, and I know your family and 

your husband is here and your boys, where it is legal, are there 

any incentives to bring family into the business to continue it? You 

know, we always talk about we would like to hand the businesses 

off to the family, but it just seems, it is just the big boys. We will 

cut a deal for the big boys. But to locally owned folks like you four, 

nobody is up here beating the drum for you all. 

Ms. BHATTI. Well—— 

Mr. BURCHETT. That might just be a no. 

Ms. BHATTI. I guess in our situation, I think we are doing all 

right. I do not know if you know, my dad put a conservation easement on the farm. So it is going to stay a farm, whoever along the 

way wants to farm it. Maybe not the next generation, maybe the 

next one. But I mean, in our situation, I think we are going to stay 

a farm forever. Maybe. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Good. 

Ms. BHATTI. That is the goal. 

Mr. BURCHETT. That is the goal. 

I am always worried with farming. You know, everybody pushes 

farming but then, if I am stepping on toes here I really do not care, 

it becomes the Walmart model. You know, they bring in gasoline 

and they sell it cheaper than everybody else can. 

Ms. BHATTI. Right. 

Mr. BURCHETT. And then all of a sudden we have replaced all 

these hardworking mechanics with minimum wage hour greeters 

and they drive everybody out of business and then they jack the 

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prices up after they get in. I see that in the dairy industry a lot, 

and that concerns me. 

Ms. BHATTI. My dad is 76 and he is pretty wise, and he really 

believes people are going to come back to quality and smaller businesses because smaller businesses are able to provide higher quality. And so if he is right then we are headed that direction. 

Mr. BURCHETT. I have never had anything bad from them. It 

is sinfully good. And I meant what I said about it being in my 

freezer. It never makes it to the freezer. It always gets eaten up. 

But thank you, and thank your husband for coming in and getting 

away from your boys. 

Ms. BHATTI. Thank you. 

Mr. BURCHETT. Thank you. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. I would like to recognize Congressman 

Schneider now for 5 minutes. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Thank you. And I want to thank the Committee for hosting this hearing on celebrating our small business 

heroes. I want to thank our panel for joining us today and sharing 

your experiences, your perspectives. This is the third of three fourpeople panels. We have had 12 companies here sharing their stories and just touching a little bit on what drives our economy, what 

makes the American economy so strong, which is small business. 

Ninety-nine percent of our business entities are small businesses. 

Two-thirds of all new jobs created in this country are created by 

companies like you. And I think it really is a testament that you 

are here. 

I talk in this Committee a lot about the four things businesses 

need. You need a business model. Each of you have defined your 

model. We cannot really help you with that. You need access to 

good talent and making sure we have a trained workforce, people 

who can do the work, bring the creativity, the ideas, the American 

work ethic that drives our economy. You need access to capital. I 

am sure all of you and the folks who have been here before talked 

about needing to get to that capital. And ultimately, we need a stable business environment. And all of us can work to provide that. 

Our rule here. I think, in Congress is trying to clear away obstacles 

and give some stability, because if we do not, it is harder for you 

to make the decisions you need to make in your investments. 

And we see that business is hard. Two-thirds of small businesses 

make it to their second year. Only half make it to their fifth year, 

and only a third make it to the tenth year. And there are lots of 

reasons for that but business is hard. 

But the flipside is small business people are the most optimistic 

people, business people we have in our country. They are the entrepreneurs. They are the ones who have faith in the future, because 

if you did not have faith in that future, you were not going to make 

the investment to do this. So again, I just want to celebrate what 

you all do, the fact that these are some of our small business heroes that drive our economy, and thank you again for being here. 

One of the things that concerns me is that, especially on 

startups, if you look at just the numbers, 25 percent of business 

startups are women, and that may be somewhat overstating it. 

Ms. Reese, you started your business a couple years ago. I know 

the area well. I actually grew up in Colorado. I grew up 3 miles 

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from your business off Monaco and Hampton, so it is close to home. 

And I know what you are trying to do. It is a great story. But from 

your perspective, what incentives, support systems are in place 

that helped you get off the ground? What more could government 

do? What could we be doing to make it easier for folks like you to 

make that decision to turn that optimism into opportunity? 

Ms. REESE. Thank you for the question. 

We really found a lot of value in the Women’s Business Centers. 

More specifically, Mi Casa Resource Center. We first sought them 

out when this was just an idea and we needed some guidance, and 

we have been with them ever since. And this is something that I 

advocate for. I am constantly bragging about the services that we 

receive from them to our clients, and I just think this is something 

that all business owners should be aware of and obviously take advantage of. I understand that the Women’s Business Centers are 

all over the Nation. However, there is a possibility that they may 

not be reauthorized. So I think if Congress were to assure that the 

reauthorization would go through, and then assisting with building 

their mission, which is to help build more of these businesses and 

support more women-owned businesses, that would just be invaluable because I do not think we would be as far as we are now if 

we did not have their support. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Great. Thank you for sharing that. 

Ms. Bhatti, I want to turn to you. I am sorry, I missed your testimony. You are in Knoxville? Are you right in the city or are you 

a little further out? 

Ms. BHATTI. So, our farm is about 15 miles, 20 miles east of 

downtown Knoxville. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Okay. So it is relatively close so this may not 

apply. But one of the things I believe is that if we can help our 

rural communities cultivate small businesses and provide opportunities for farms, farmers, but also to businesses that support them 

and other opportunities that support the economy, we have a better 

chance at keeping and attracting more young people to these communities and making a difference. 

You talked, I liked what you said that your dad made the decision to keep the farm as a farm in perpetuity. But how do we make 

sure that we are bringing more young people into these communities? What programs might make a difference? And you have 21 

seconds. 

Ms. BHATTI. Well, I was not in FFA, but that is a great program. Are you familiar with the FFA? 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I am. I am. 

Ms. BHATTI. Okay, great. You know, that is a good question. I 

think that what we are doing on a small scale is, well, we have actually mostly female employees, and so we have brought a lot of 

young women to the farm to work who would have never thought 

they wanted to farm. So it is exposure to something new, and I 

think on a small scale is what you should focus on rather than 

large scale. 

Mr. SCHNEIDER. I am guessing close enough to Knoxville you 

have access to broadband where you are. 

Ms. BHATTI. Well, not at the farm but close by. Yeah. 

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Mr. SCHNEIDER. We need to make sure that we have it everywhere and I think that is one of the things, I know that I had the 

chance to install an accounting system in 1985, ‘85-’86, at a farm 

in western Washington, just at the cutting edge of trying to bring 

up that technology. We need to make sure that our farmers have 

the technology they need and I think broadband is a piece of that. 

I am over my time so I want to thank the Chairwoman, and I 

yield back. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Congressman. 

Now I would like to recognize Dr. Joyce for 5 minutes. 

Mr. JOYCE. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. 

I will not speak for Chairwoman Finkenauer, but I will tell you 

that I feel that we all have great admiration for what you bring 

to the table and what you do. You truly are the heroes. Look at 

this Subcommittee which Chairman Finkenauer leads as a bipartisan support of what you do. 

I want to address one issue with Mr. Pulford which he mentioned, and I think distinguishes him from the other panelists. And 

I again applaud you for being here today. 

Your business, LB Water Services is an ESOP. An ESOP is an 

employee-owned business. Would you please address for us as Committee and for the entirety here today how ESOPs specifically 

allow you to progress in the business world and how that allows 

you to truly be one of the heroes that presents today? 

Mr. PULFORD. I would be glad to. Thank you for asking me that 

question. 

Oops, yeah, that is even more important. 

You know, due to the tax advantages that we get as an ESOP 

from the Federal Government, we are able to provide superior benefits to all 225 people. We are one of only 3 percent of the companies in America that provide employee benefits at no cost to the 

employee, and that includes their families, which is if anybody is 

in business and knows what it costs per person today, it is a huge, 

huge expense. And it enables us to provide the kind of training, 

both professionally as well as personally to help people grow and 

prosper in their jobs. It helps us to solve problems with our customers, whether it is providing leak detection or leak monitoring 

advice to a city or it is providing the infrastructure that they need. 

I agree with the person, we are trying to create value in everything we do, and the benefits of the ESOP really give us the fuel 

that we need every day to provide that kind of success for our employees, all of our employees. I think one of the things we are really proud of is that the last time there was a recession we grow. So 

again, we are looking at the ESOP as the foundation. 

The other thing that it really does for us, and I will not take a 

lot of time, is it helps us to create a culture, and the culture is not 

of I, it is more of we and us. And again, it provides us to provide 

superior benefits, provides us to put in better training, and the result is that we get employees that do not leave. Once people are 

vested into the ESOP, we rarely lose an employee that we want to 

lose. Some people we let go for other reasons maybe but we are 

really proud of the record that we have with the employees that we 

have and the growth that we have enjoyed, I look at how much we 

have grown in the last 5 years and it is about 50 percent. And it 

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is all due to the homegrown talent that we provide. And ESOP is 

the foundation for all that. 

Mr. JOYCE. Thank you for that answer. 

I would like you to address another issue that you briefly discussed in your presentation with us, Mr. Pulford. You talked about 

how your industry, how your company, how the heroes that you 

work with would provide for us additional work in the crumbling 

infrastructure system. Our responsibility in the 116th Congress is 

to work and provide an infrastructure solution. Tell us how that 

impacts your business, please. 

Mr. PULFORD. Oh, man. Well, it provides a trickledown to every 

individual, whether they are homegrown. I mean, if you look at cities, when they go to open up a fire hydrant to fight a fire, the hydrant does not work, okay, it is broken and it has been there for 

months. We need to address these problems. The quality of the 

drinking water. The fact that pipes are crumbling and it is draining out. So maybe you lose 30 percent of your treated pure water 

goes out through leaks in the system. And I am not saying it is 

across the board but these are the big issues that are facing us. 

And if we do not address them, we are not going to be able to attract people to come into our communities, and quality of life, we 

are going to lose people out of our jurisdictions and our states and 

everything else. And that is why the whole infrastructure bill is 

vital right now. We see it. We are in the rust belt so we see it just 

more than probably everybody else in the country right now. 

Mr. JOYCE. Mr. Pulford, thank you. Thank the other small business heroes for being here with us today. And I yield my time. 

Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Dr. Joyce. 

Again, I just want to say thank you on behalf of the Committee 

and how grateful we are that you all are here today telling us your 

stories. They are all such different stories from all over the country, but I appreciate you coming to Washington and taking the 

time out of your very busy schedules. I know you all are very, very 

busy right now, especially back in Iowa where we are planting 

right now—or trying to at least. It means a great deal to have 

these stories uplifted and told, and you all really are small business heroes. That is not hyperbole. You all are contributing so 

much to your local communities but also to the future of our country, and we are all very grateful to hear your perspectives. 

Mr. Walton, I appreciate the fact that you are here uplifting 

what is happening on the ground in Iowa when it can often be lost 

in the numbers versus the actual stories of what folks are living 

and going through every day. You highlighted what we can be 

doing to move forward and keep our family farmers afloat when 

they are facing a great deal. Thank you so much for being here. 

Ms. Reese, you are an inspiration, and it is an honor to get to 

meet you here today. You were able to uplift issues that you face 

but also talk about what has worked and give us ideas of what we 

should be investing in and creating more of. That is our job here— 

hear what has worked and how we do it better, and also hear what 

has not worked and how we fix it. That is one of the things that 

actually does happen here in Washington, and very specifically on 

this Committee. Thank you so much for helping us do our job better with your testimony here today. 

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Ms. Bhatti, the hope that you shared today is infectious. It is exactly the type of hope that gets folks to have those ideas to start 

a business and take it to the next level. Your story is exactly what 

we need to be seeing more of in our country right now—how you 

not just grew up on a farm but then also decided to expand, have 

creative ideas, and run with it. That is how our country continues 

to grow. Thank you so much for all that you have done, and I look 

forward to hearing more about the success and hopefully, somebody 

is going to bring the ice cream to the Small Business Committee. 

Mr. Pulford, thank you for being here today as well. Your dedication to your employees and their success and their growth is palpable, and we could all feel that here today. I’m grateful for your 

expertise, especially when it comes to water infrastructure and how 

incredibly important it is that we make investments in it. I also sit 

on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, serving as 

Vice Chair of the Highways and Transit Subcommittee, so I know 

how important it is that we uplift these issues. Thank you for 

bringing that perspective here today. 

Again, you all have done so much, and I look forward to seeing 

hopefully a bright future here. We will do our jobs here in Washington, continuing to listen to folks back in our district and across 

the country. We hope to make you proud here. Thank you so much 

and happy National Small Business Week. 

With that, I want to make sure that I ask unanimous consent 

that members have 5 legislative days to submit statements and 

supporting materials for the record. 

Great. Thank you all again and have a good rest of the afternoon. 

Without objection, so ordered. 

Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 1:00 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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A P P E N D I X 

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FINAL TESTIMONY 

Gia Giasullo 

Owner, Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain I 513 Henry Street, Brooklyn NY 11231 

Hello, I am Gia Giasullo, and I am the co-owner, along with my brother Peter Freeman, of the 

Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain. 

Thank you to the committee and to Nydia Velaquez for inviting me to participate in this 

testimony. It is my honor to be here. It is my honor to speak on behalf of small businesses. 

There are a million faces of small business, and I am just one. I am here to give a face to one 

small business. 

I am also here in solidarity with other small business across america, who, like me are committed 

to making my street, my state, and my country a better place to live. 

I am also here to express my gratitude to the NYBDC who invested in us, and who continue to 

support our small business. We received a 504 loan through the SBDC, and we were graciously 

awarded the Small Business Family Business of the Year. The NYBDC has offered us invaluable 

support and I can tell you that I would not be here speaking to you today without their 

commitment to our small business. 

Finally, and most importantly, I am here today because I strongly believe that small business 

provide a priceless contribution towards the overall wealth and health of a community, and 

therefore we deserve your special attention and support. We, like you, serve our community. Visit 

us. Talk to us. 

The Brooklyn Farmacy is located on the comer of Henry and Sackett streets in Carroll Gardens, 

Brooklyn. Housed in a historic apothecary, the original interior boasts a 100 year old penny tile 

floor, wooden drawers and a tin ceiling. There are nine red twirling bar stools, and a Bastian 

Blessing soda fountain made in Chicago. We opened in the summer of 2010, and we are a full 
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service soda fountain with a staff of fifteen. We are best known for our creative ice cream 

sundaes with names like the Affugazi Affogato and the Sundae of Broken Dreams made with 

vanilla ice cream, warm caramel, broken pretzel rods and fresh whipped cream. 

In the late 1940s before drive-throughs and bottled sodas, the number of soda fountains in 

America reached 125 thousand at its height. Practically a fountain on every main street USA. 

Today the Brooklyn Farmacy is one of a handful of full service soda fountains in America, but 

we proudly serve the same purpose: as a gathering spot for young and old alike. The soda 

fountain is everybody's place. We are a slam dunk for visiting grandparents, and we have several 

regulars that are just hitting the ripe age of four. We have book groups that meet up regularly, and 

friends that meet weekly. It's been nine years since we opened our doors in 2010, and since then 

we have watched gapped tooth kids turn into college bound kids. Several of them, we've hired. 

We've hosted birthdays, anniversaries, and showers. We've made hundreds of egg creams at 

local fundraisers. We've hosted senators and assembly members for civic talk, and even a 

wedding was officiated at our fountain. For sure the pink bench outside has seen more than one 

bent knee proposal. We donate year round to schools, and class visits are regular thing. We have 

been featured on numerous cooking shows, and media outlets. We are visited by tour groups 

from all over the world, and we offer free egg creams at the fountain on election days, noted 

most recently in an editorial in the New York Times on how business can encourage citizens to 

vote. 

Though we are a tourist attraction, we know our regulars and we are committed to our 

neighborhood. With weekly events like a tot sing-a-longs, a knitting group, and civics night, we 

have the opportunity to be a part of our community and in the end, serve them more than 

something to eat. We have rotary phones, typewriters, and adding machines, in fact our 

collection is getting out of hand. We have comic books, piles of them, that we gently place on the 

table if the cell phones come out. We have candles and songs for binhdays. We make treats 

before your eyes and sometimes we invent things on the spot, because "hey kid, that's a good 

idea!" 

We source locally, and pride ourselves on working with vendors some of whom, deliver items on 
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their bike. Our staff is offered flexible schedules, and many have worked with us for years as we 

employ them through schooling, travel, sports and performance schedules. We strive to foster 

community amongst our staff, and we value their voices. We know that we are not the last train 

stop for them, so to speak, but we encourage them to embrace the philosophy of "How you do 

anything is how you do everything". We value hard work, and by example, teach them. For 

many, we are a first job, after school and weekends. We also value the transitional time for youth 

gaining independence, and we provide a safe place in a big city for those that are away from 

home from the first time. 

This isn't to say that it isn't a hard game to play. As business owners, we often wear all the hats. 

If you gave us an eighth day of the week, we'd probably work it. The costs associated with doing 

business can be almost prohibitive, from insurances to payroll taxes to credit cards swipe fees, 

all before we've even bought a tub of ice cream! A big company has the resources to hire for all 

positions, yet a small business person often needs to juggle many positions at once. Look at me, 

this one face of a small business owner. Me. A designer, marketer, copywriter, photographer, 

event planner, social media producer, window designer, chef, waitress, soda jerk, and on some 

occasions, a dish washer who trains, schedules, hires and fires. 

As I said at the start, I believe that small business provide immeasurable value to neighborhoods 

and communities. In our case, memories created before our eyes. First birthdays, first egg 

creams, first jobs. We are the spot tourists plan to visit, or find by luck. We are the spot you bring 

your visiting sister. We are the spot you come alone, to sit at the counter and read the paper. We 

are a real place. We are that place. 

We value our customers, and by extension, we value our community. 

We are not just the corner store soda fountain, a business without a face. 

I am my customer's neighbors, and I am the face of a small business in America. 

Thank you for your time today, and for inviting me to speak on behalf of Brooklyn Farrnacy & 

Soda Fountain. 
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Testimony of Amy Fox 

President/Operations, Spiral Brewery 

House Committee on Small Business Hearing on 

"Honoring the Nation's Small Business Heroes" 

May 8, 2019 

Spiral Brewery 

111 2nd Street East 

Hastings, MN 55033 

spiralbrewery.com 
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Thank you, Chairman Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot, and the other members of 

the House Small Business Committee for the opportunity to speak with you about Spiral 

Brewery and our experience as a small business in Hastings, Minnesota. 

Thank you also to Representative Craig for inviting Nick, Jen and I here today to testify 

and represent Minnesota's Second Congressional District and our hometown. 

Spiral is proud to be "brewing community" through quality beer and rich history, and we 

are thrilled to be able to tell you all about the Spiral Story today. 

The Spiral Story 

About six years ago, we started dreaming of beer. Jen Fox, Nick Fox, and Amy Fox 

were drinking Minnesota craft beer and discussing our deep love for our hometown, 

Hastings, MN. In that moment, we saw Spiral Brewery. After a few months of dreaming, 

we started transforming our big ideas into a plan. With countless and tiring hours of 

industry research and informational interviews with the generous craft beer community 

in Minnesota we had the beginning of a business plan. After being reconnected with our 

friends Luke McGuire and Claire Sandahl, we had the beer and we had our team. 

At this time, 2015, the craft beer market was beginning to boom in Minnesota, but our 

region was completely void of a taproom and distribution brewery. Hastings is a unique 

town on the Mississippi River that was in a time of transition and growth. The 

combination of this geographical brewery void, the town's continued growth and our 

desire to contribute to our beloved hometown made it the perfect time to bring Spiral 

Brewery to fruition in Hastings' historic downtown riverfront district. 

After releasing our business plan in 2015 in order to publicly announce Spiral Brewery, 

we began working with the City of Hastings to amend brewing ordinances and 

regulations. Since Hastings' had not had a beer manufacturing facility since prohibition, 

there was a fair amount of learning that took place on both sides in order to successfully 

complete the various processes and paperwork required on the city, state and federal 

level. Luckily the city, both staff and elected officials, and our local Chamber of 

Commerce is supportive of new business and was yearning for creative entrepreneurs. 

Spiral Brewery was always going to be located in Historic Downtown Hastings. Now we 

needed to find the right building and the appropriate financing. 

Financing Story 

Opening a brewery is an extremely expensive small business endeavor. Spiral Brewery 

needed to raise $1 ,200,000 for the initial construction and upfront costs to cover 

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brewing equipment and materials, taproom renovation, branding and marketing, and 

professional expenses. 

Through consultation and advice from the brewing community, industry research, and 

valued business consultants, we knew we would like to solicit over half of our funds 

from an SBA Loan to support our business. Finding a financial institution to back a 

brewery is a complex process and quickly became one of our biggest challenges. Our 

team met with and discussed possible loans with about ten different financial institutions 

locally and statewide. 

As stated above, breweries are expensive upfront, with the renovation of the 

manufacturing space being very different than your average construction project. That is 

a tough conversation to have with a financial institution who is unfamiliar with the 

financing of a distribution brewery. Despite our efforts to keep our financing local, we 

ended up securing funds through Pioneer Bank out of Mankato, Minnesota in 

Congressional District 1. The team at Pioneer Bank continues to be involved and 

dedicated to the success of our business. A benefit of our relationship with Pioneer 

Bank is our connection to Prairieland Economic Development Corporation (Prairie land 

EDC), our SBA 504 Loan financier. 

Pioneer Bank makes it their business to support brewing and distilling in Minnesota. 

They understand the beer and liquor industry and are willing to learn and grow with their 

customers. Spiral Brewery is fortunate to work with them to support the pricey up front 

cost of starting Spiral Brewery. This was most apparent in their creative structuring of 

our financing. Pioneer Bank's intimate knowledge of the SBA 504 Loan Program, along 

with the expertise of Prairieland EDC, allowed for the appropriate budgetary line items 

to be covered under the SBA 504 Loan, while the other items were financed by a loan 

direct from the bank. Spiral Brewery would not have been able to open without the 

financial assistance from our lender and the SBA 504 Loan Program. 

The remaining financing of Spiral Brewery came through individual equity investors. 

With community being in the forefront of our business model, a community-based 

funding model was developed with nearly 100% of our equity investors coming directly 

from the Hastings community. And continuing with this fundraising model, we created a 

Kickstarter campaign to raise community investment, both financial and personal. We 

ended up surpassing our original goal of raising $25,000 in 30 days by raising over 

$48,000 from 452 unique backers. It has been this community support that has been 

one of our biggest joys and kept us going through the countless challenges of opening 

Spiral Brewery. They continue to be a pillar of support in our ongoing progress. 

Everyday our Spiral Team are manufacturers, custodians, event planners, servers, 

apparel designers, saleswomen, delivery drivers, and cicerones. Running a small 

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business comes with daily joys and challenges, as we often face unexpected hurdles. 

When challenges present themselves, we think creatively, we research, and we rack our 

brains to make sure we are brewing the best beer possible. We would not be where we 

are today without each one of our backgrounds and experiences. 

Hastings' Story 

Spiral Brewery has been open for just over a year now, and in that time, it has proven 

itself to be a destination brewery and taproom that excels at sharing its craft with its 

patrons. Beyond the product line, we provide the community with a unique destination to 

socialize and experience the craft brewery culture. Over the past year, Spiral Brewery 

has become a destination for beer lovers from across Minnesota's metropolitan area 

and a beer to seek out at liquor stores, bars, and restaurants in our region. 

Hastings is well known for its rich history, which in turn draws tourists to our riverfront 

and historic downtown area. The addition of Spiral Brewery adds to the vitality of 

established businesses along our main street, where over half are also women owned 

and operated. Spiral builds and encourages our local business, and helps our city 

prosper with new people to experience our community. Our taproom provides a 

destination for Hastings community members to spend time and money in our Historic 

Downtown District. 

The story of Spiral Brewery encourages our community to believe in people with a 

dream and supports people who work hard for things they are passionate about. 

Hastings was a brewing community before Prohibition and Spiral Brewery brought it 

back to its brewing roots. Our work is based in history and built on the bright future of 

our town on the Mississippi River and the economic strength of Minnesota. 

Thank you again for allowing me to testify today before the Small Business Committee. I 

am happy to answer any questions you may have. 

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Nels Leader Testimony 

House Committee on Small Business 

May8, 2019 

Good morning and thank you for having me, I appreciate your time very much. My name is Nels Leader. 

My family and I own and operate Bread Alone Bakery, a Certified Organic bakery in Kingston, NY. We 

have about 200 employees, and everyday ship about 15,000 loaves of bread to our customers around the 

Northeast. 

I'm here today to share with you the story of Bread Alone and a lesson that I've learned from the 

business. 

There wasn't an exact plan when my father started the bakery, in 1983. He was a philosophy major who 

went on to cooking school. A classmate of Anthony Bourdain, he and his cohort were more guided by 

their souls than business plans. In reflecting on the decision to start a bakery, he said "Sometimes you 

have to lose your mind, to come to your senses." 

Growing up, I can remember my Dad showing me the newspaper, pointing out the challenges and 

complications that people faced around the world. Though we were never a particularly political family, 

there was a civic and universal ingredient to our breads. Through the work of baking simple, honest food, 

my father contributed to our community. Through his example of how to build a simple but moral life, my 

father always aspired to touch more people than he could feed. 

We use a quote from Nelson Mandela to capture this spirit of the business, "Let There Be Work, Bread, 

Water, and Salt for AIL" 

I joined the business 7 years ago, following a career in consulting, and then a few years back at business 

schooL I strive to honor the history of my family's business, while also leading it into the future. 

I've found that my deepest passion is building a business that sustains both our people and our planet 

First just a few words about our people. 

Unemployment in our area is as low as 3.6%, but the poverty rate is as high as 20%. 

The fact of the matter is that the economics of hourly work are untenable for too many of our employees 

and community members. Though Bread Alone's average hourly wage is 50% above NY minimum wage 

(and more than double the federal minimum wage), support services are not enough, 

Too many of our employees lack affordable childcare. Healthcare is too expensive. Employees don't have 

access to transportation to and from work. What would be a basic life interruption to many -- a car 

breakdown, a sick child -- becomes an obstacle to economic freedom and well-being. 

Some of our employees have been spent time in the criminal justice system, often from a young age. 

These employees sometimes know little else. Adaptation to the workplace is a struggle. As a small 

business, we struggle to provide the resources necessary to change years of alternate habits. 

We live a contradiction. Building and maintaining a quality team is the biggest challenge for our business, 

yet we are surrounded by underemployed individuals. 

And now some words about our planet 
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Nels Leader Testimony 

House Committee on Small Business 

May8, 2019 

This generation, right now, is the first to know both the science of climate change, and to experience its 

dramatic effects. 

In NY, winter temperatures are 4.5 degrees higher than just 50 years ago. Very heavy precipitation events 

are up 70%, Sea level in NY Harbor is likely to increase by 2.5 feet by 2050, and 6 feet by 2100. 

!lived on East 7th street in New York City when Hurricane Sandy brought flood waters to within a few 

blocks. This past April was 6 degrees warmer in DC than the historic average. Upstate New York just 

experienced one of the longest stretches of rainy days since we began keeping records in 1874. 

Globally, climate change is fueling natural disasters of unprecedented frequency and consequence. It is 

causing human conflict and mass migrations. Climate change is compromising opportunity for, and 

affecting most, the least fortunate among us. 

We feel these effects at our bakery in upstate NY. Historic flooding in the midwest this past April flooded 

over a million acres of farmland. Farmers are struggling to get crops in the ground for the harvest, and 

prices will likely increase this fall. 

I hope that for us and for all the hardworking farmers across the world, these dramatic conditions subside. 

But hope is not a plan. To the contrary, scientists predict with certainty that extreme weather events will 

only continue to increase. 

One of the farmers, Marshall Kargall, that my father visited in the early days said, "If we don't take care of 

our land, and take care of it now, who will? 

To this end, our business has rolled up our sleeves and gotten to work. On Earth Day 2017 we 

announced our intention to build a solar array on the roof of our bakery. On Earth Day 2018 we officially 

commissioned our 196kW solar array, which now provides up to 30% of our energy needs. We have 

committed to getting to 100% renewable energy by 2030, and we plan to get there much faster than that 

This means more solar energy, adoption of battery-electric delivery vehicles, energy-efficiency retrofits to 

our buildings, and more. 

These projects and commitments are critically important We must de-carbonize our economy to avoid the 

worst effects of climate change. This will require big changes to the bones of how we do business every 

day. 

At the same time, we have to change many easily overlooked, daily actions. Many are convenient, 

long-practiced habits that will be difficult to break. 

For example, as a society we simply throw away too much food. As much as 30-40% of our collective 

food is wasted, and most of it ends up in landfills. In addition to all the wasted resources used to produce 

this food, rotting food that ends up in landfills releases methane, an incredibly powerful greenhouse gas. If 

food waste and loss were its own country, it would be the 3rd biggest greenhouse gas emitter, behind 

China and the U.S. Think of all the land, energy, materials, and resources that goes into producing our 

food, and imagine that over 30% of it is simply wasted. We must do better. 

The good news is that consumers want to see changes like never before. 83% of millennials indicate that 

they want companies to implement sustainability programs. A record high 72% of Americans indicate that 

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Nets Leader Testimony 

House Committee on Small Business 

MayB, 2019 

global warming is personally important to them. This means that small business has an incredible 

opportunity to at once take care of customers and the natural world. 

Decision-making is one of the constant challenges of running a business. From the daily, operational 

decisions, to the larger, strategic decisions. Decisions never feel perfect Most require slight adjustments 

overtime. 

We always remind the team at the bakery: Progress -- not perfection. The only bad decision is not making 

one at aiL The world will pass you by. 

This is the attitude that has pushed Bread Alone through the tough moments and decisions for 36 years, 

and that fuels our activities today, 

I'm not a policy-maker, but I imagine that your work is extremely difficult So many competing interests 

and constituents to address, not to mention different views of the world within yourselves. 

Decisions must truly never be perfect But taking care of our people and our planet requires constant 

progress. 

During your time of public service, I urge you to embrace the moment, each other, and the opportunity to 

serve your constituents and the natural world that sustains us all. Like the small businesses in front of 

you, seek progress every day. Thank you. 

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Introduction 

RHR 

----ROBERT HOFFMAN REAL TV INC.----

Here to help 

Testimony to the Honse of Representatives 

Committee on Small Business 

May 8, 2019 

c/o Robert Hoffman, Albert Lea MN 

I own a small business everyone has heard of. There is a Robert Hoffman Realty in almost every city in 

every state. They are not all named Robert Hoffman Realty and most of them are not real estate 

brokerages: but they are in every city in America. 

We are all familiar with Jensen Excavating. We have all heard of a Mrs. Gerry's Salads. We have all 

driven by the new Shipps's Pro Power Wash building, had our hair cut at JC Salon, been saved by Jim 

Kelley at Kelley Plumbing, bought flowers from Addie's floral, bought our watch from Fishers Jewelers 

and we've all eaten at Grandma's Cafe. You see all of these, like my small business, are in every town. 

There is a Robert Hoffman Realty in almost every city. 

It tums out we are not very creative with the names of our company's, I think we're too busy running 

them to hire a proper creative team. Each of the businesses I just mentioned are actually from my home 

town of Albert Lea and each of them could impress you with their stories today as well. 

My name is a Robert Hoffman and I just run a small real estate brokerage and property management firm 

in Albert Lea Minnesota, so small of a Brokerage its name is just Robert Hoffman Realty, but I don't 

even own it. My wife Angie actually owns the 51% controlling share of our S-Corp so yes; my wife 

Angie owns Robert Hoffman and Robert Hoffman Realty too. 

Our Story 

Right after college I got a real estate license in 2004 and have 15 years of real estate experience. Angie 

recently left her job as the Advertising Director at the Albert Lea Tribune to work at our Brokerage full 

time as our CFO (which includes painting, rent collections and many other various glorified duties of any 

small business CFO.) Angie worked at the Tribune for 11 years but these last few years have been good 

for our small business and we work together now building what is shaping out to be a very fair small 

business for us. 

We have been married 514 weeks today and will celebrate our 10-year wedding anniversary on July !". 

We met II years ago during the first day of a local Leadership Class when we were sitting next to one 

another and in small talk Angie accidently gave away my surprise 30'h birthday party coming up that 

Saturday night. She had no idea it was my surprise party; and I just figured out I fell in love. (Surprise!) 

We are each licensed in real estate now and licensed in Minnesota and Iowa. We currently own and 

manage 80 residential & commercial units and specialize in Residential, Rental & Commercial Real 

Estate Sales and Management in Southern Minnesota. Primarily in Albert Lea Minnesota where we are 

each from. 
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RHR 

----ROBERT HOFFMAN REALTY INC.----

Hererohdp 

We actually also manage a former Wal Mart building in Jim Hagedorn's hometown of Blue Earth, 

Minnesota that we leased to the farm supply and department store company Bomgaars after Wal Mart 

decided to close its Blue Earth Location. We actually did the same in our hometown of Albert Lea; a 

former, vacant, Wal Mart sat empty waiting for its lease to run out and as soon as it did Bomgaars moved 

into that location and breathe a very needed fresh new breath back into our small town. 

Our Wal Mart in Albert Lea actually sat empty tor over 10 years before we were hired to first manage the 

building then to market it for lease. It took many calls to fill it, but we found an amazing fit for our 

community with a new Bomgaars store. In Blue Earth it was a different story! It took only one phone call 

and just a few weeks in Jim's Blue Em1h. You start to feel pretty good about moving vacant Wal Mart 

buildings after you get your one first one under your belt. The problem is you've sold most of them in 

your region after 1 or 2. 

Our Small Towns are the Home Town of Small Business 

Robert Hoffman Realty is just a small business in a small town like many others, but 1 think I can help tell 

the story of many small businesses by just turning the spot light on my home town of Albert Lea in 

Southern Miimesota for a moment. Our small town of Albert Lea has less than 20,000 people in it but has 

many of the same small business stories as anywhere in the US. 

I cannot overemphasize how every little bit helps. Renovations downtown led to many successful new 

businesses, including my own, and our Water Shed taking a shot at cleaning up a lake is bringing all eyes 

on Albert Lea's lakes this weekend, as we host our State Governor's Fishing Opener and have many new 

people visiting our community and the new tax cuts have greatly helped our small business. Our small 

business has benefited greatly from the tax cuts and our employees benefited from our company's breaks. 

There have been burdens; and every little bit hurts too. The Affordable Care Act caused insurance prices 

to skyrocket in our area and, being small business owners, we were no longer able to afford health 

insurance. Fortunately, we've been able to find alternative coverage through a Health Share program, but 

we are one on-site accident away from losing a lot of what we've built. 

Conclusion 

Many have given their all to see their small business succeed. We never chose to have kids, work came 

first. This is only the second time we've traveled in the 10 years we've been married traveled. We are 

doing fair but not without a hell of a lot of effort. Again, every little bit helps. Our Robe11 Hoffman 

Realty company mota is actually; "here to help." It's actually from lsiah 6:8. 

To close, I'd like to share a story. It's not my own, but it has stuck with my since I heard it. A small 

business owner is stuck down in a hole yelling for help. A Government Regulator walks up to the hole 

and tells him he'll pass a new law to help and walks away. The small business owner is still stuck in the 

hole yelling for help and an Inspector walks up. The Inspector says he'll put in new processes so this 

never happens again and walks away. Ready to give up the small business owner all of a sudden has 

another small business owner jump in the hole with him. He says; "you're crazy, now we're both down 

here together!" The other small business owner says "yes, but I've been down before. I know the way out. 

I'm here to help." 

-Robert Hoffman, Albert Lea Minnesota 
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Madam Chairwoman, Members of the Committee we are here today to provide testimony 

regarding issues that impact small businesses such as our company, Pleasant River Lumber 

Company. Pleasant River lumber owns and operates four sawmills and a trucking company in 

the State of Maine. Our cunent employment is 300 people and we are in !he middle of a $25 

million capital expansion that will increase our employment by close to 50 people and expand 

our production capacity by 50%. We are primarily a producer of softwood lumber that is used for 

housing construction throughout the United States. Our testimony today will briefly address four 

areas of concern for our small business: trade, taxes, labor, and infrastructure. 

Pleasant River Lumber Company employs 300 and supports an additional250 well-paying jobs 

in our communities. Small businesses throughout the United States face many challenges. Some 

companies, such as our company, face the additional disastrously harmful challenge of foreign 

unfair trade practices. Left unchecked, Canada's unfair trade practices in the softwood lumber 

and forestry products industries is a U.S. jobs killer, period. The softwood lumber trade issue 

between the United States and Canada may appear complicated. I will provide an explanation in 

my testimony. But at the heart of it, this issue is very simple. Canadian provincial govemments 

provide billions of dollars in subsidies to prop up their softwood lumber industries and safeguard 

Canadian jobs. Those companies in turn ship their subsidized and dumped products into the 

United States where severe market disruptions result. These market disruptions kill U.S. jobs. 

In effect, Canada's subsidies preserve Canadian jobs at the expense of U.S. jobs and their 

communities. 

Canada's government aid allows Canadian producers higher profits during normal market 

environments -with increased ability to make capital investments and build cash reserves. 

Canadian producers gain market share in the U.S. -especially during down markets- and 

maintain employment while operating longer, driving the market down further. 

Meanwhile, here in the United States, market down cycles are accelerated and deepened for U.S. 

producers while Canadian producers are protected from normal market fluctuations. The 

resulting extreme low lumber pricing forces U.S. mill closures-- in effect, Canada exports its 

mill closures to the United States. Additionally, U.S. private timberland values are depressed as 

the manufacturing sector declines. 

To sum it up, left unchecked, Canadian trade practices would yield ever increasing market share 

for Canadian product and producers displacing and harming U.S. producers, private timberland 

owners, mill workers, loggers, and many other local U.S. businesses and jobs and their 

communities. 

The United States always has been, and will remain, Canadian producers' primary target market 

and the Canadian subsidy system relies on the ability to unload subsidized finished product into 

the U.S. market. About half of Canadian lumber production is shipped to the U.S. market. In 

contrast, virtually no U.S. lumber is sold into Canada's protected market. When Canada's unfair 
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trade practices allows its industry to gain market share in the United States, those gains in market 

share come at the direct expense of U.S. producers, workers, and their communities. 

The differences between Canada's government controlled system and the U.S. private timber 

system must be proactively managed through the application of the U.S. trade laws, or through 

an effective bilateral quantitative restraint agreement. 

With the failure by Canada to engage in constructive bilateral softwood lumber negotiations with 

both the Obama and Trump Administrations, the U.S. industry initiated a set of AD and CVD 

trade cases against unfairly traded lumber imports in November of 2016. It is important to 

understand that AD and CVD trade cases under the U.S. trade laws involve a complex, 

exhaustive, and detailed oriented administrative adjudication process before any duties are 

imposed. 

The imposition of the AD and CVD duties against unfairly traded Canadian imports has helped 

level the playing field. With the full benefit of their massive subsidies offset by these duties, 

Canadian companies decreased their shipments of lumber into the United States by an estimated 

1.4 billion board feet of lumber. Meanwhile, with a level playing field, U.S. producers have 

increased their shipments by an estimated 2 billion boarP. feet. 

With an adequate offset against unfairly traded imports, U.S. companies such as Pleasant River 

Lumber company are able to make the investments to make more U.S. lumber, produced by more 

U.S. workers, to more than adequately supply the U.S. housing market. This is a win, win, win 

for U.S. industry, workers, their communities, and U.S. home buyers. 

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, TCJA, passed last year has been very helpful to our industry and our 

business. Reducing the corporate tax rate allows us to be much more competitive in a global 

market. The reduction in the corporate tax rate and continuance of bonus depreciation are two 

areas that allow us to grow and add good paying jobs to our mills in rural Maine. In particular, the 

100% bonus depreciation has allowed us to enter into a $25,000,000 expansion program which 

will add nearly 50 jobs at our mills and countless indirect jobs to benefit our communities. 

We are in an extremely competitive industry and must continually upgrade our facilities in order 

to be a low cost producer and keep good paying jobs in Maine. On average, we reinvest nearly 

$4,000,000 each year to keep our mills competitive. 

One negative of the 100% bonus depreciation is that it will be gradually phased out starting in 

2023 and be completely gone in2027. 

Another negative of TCJA is the elimination of the net operating loss deduction carryback. As 

mentioned, our industry is extremely competitive and has incurred losses in nearly as many years 

as we have turned a profit. Prior to TCJA, losses incurred in one year could be carried back to 
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affect profits from the prior two years and thus recoup some of the taxes paid in the prior 2 years. 

These losses now must be canied forward to partially reduce taxes to be paid in the future. 

Addressing these few issues would be beneficial to businesses like ours but overall the TCIA has 

helped us and other small businesses invest and grow. 

Infrastructure 

rnt!·astructure is an essential component of forest products industry operations. From securing 

raw materials to delivering finished products our industry relies on all aspects of infrastructure, 

including our nation's roads, rails, and bridges, broadband and the power grid. 

The need for repairing and upgrading the nation's roads, rails and btidges is well documented. 

Our roads in Maine are in desperate need of repair and their condition is a major hindrance on 

our business. The majority of our raw material is delivered by truck and rail as is our finished 

products. The inefficiency created by sub par roads, bridges, and rail are a major competitive 

burden on our business. Our Country is in need of massive infrastructure investment in order to 

be efficient and competitive going forward. 

Safe, secure and abundant broadband and the power grid are also vital to our industry and our 

nation. 

Sawmill operations require enonnous amounts of electric power. Our concerns include the safety 

and security of our power grid and the clear and present danger of the vulnerability from bad 

actors, including domestic and foreign terrorists. 

Similarly, adequate, safe and secure data processing and management are indispensable. In fact 

our company, as well as many others, has first-hand experience with computer hacking and we 

can attest to the high cost in time and treasure caused by such activity. 

That these needs have not been adequately addressed is perplexing inasmuch as investment in 

infrastructure will actually create good jobs for many years to come and enhance the value of our 

nation's assets making them attractive to entrepreneurs globally. 

These matters are in the best interest of our industry as well as our nation. 

Labor is one of the biggest issues facing our mills cunently. The unemployment in our State is 

effectively zero as anyone who wants to work can easily find a good paying job. As the 

economy has improved and grown, we are faced with a shortage of people willing to work with 

their hands in manufacturing and a shortage of trades people in areas such as electrical, 

mechanical and truck drivers. Our education system is geared up to produce lawyers, 

accountants, and computer programmers but is not preparing enough people to do the work 

necessary to actually make things. Making lumber is a highly automated process in our mills 

and we need good lawyers, accountants, and computer savvy people but we are severely lacking 
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in people willing to do the other jobs necessary to operate a manufacturing facility and transport 

product to customers. We believe that this problem will greatly affect our company's ability to 

grow going forward and needs to be addressed through our education system and our 

immigration policies. We need our kids to be trained and encouraged to work with their hands 

and learn a valuable trade. We also need to allow anyone who is honest and willing to work hard 

legally into our Country to help fill these jobs and fuel our economy. 

Thank you for allowing us to provide this testimony and thank for your service to our Country. 

Jas;f;;oy 

/llt~f'Y/ 

Pleasant River Lumber Company 
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House Committee on Small Business 

Testimony of William A. Skalish, President 

Granite Tech, Inc. 

104landenberg Rd. Suite 3 

landenberg,PA 19350 

MayS, 2019 

Thank you, Chairwoman Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot, my Congresswoman Chrissy Houlahan and 

members of the House Small Business Committees for the invitation. I'm honored to testify before you 

today. 

My name is Bill Skalish and I am the owner of Granite Tech. My business Granite Tech Inc., referred to as 

GTI is a small import business located in landenberg, PA that started in 2005. Our business included the 

importation of cut to fit and fabricated Granite, Marble and Quartz countertops from China to end users 

throughout the United States. Our customer base consists of the Hospitality Industry including Marriott 

International (One of four endorsed suppliers), Hilton, IHG, Wyndham, multifamily housing, senior living 

facilities and student housing. We have 7 employees on salary. 

In April2018, Cambria filed a petition with the International Trade Commission and Department of 

Commerce alleging that imported quartz surface products from China caused Cambria injury. In 

September 2018, Granite and Quartz countertops were added to list 3 of Section 301 tariffs at 10% 

imposed. My business has been devasted by these tariffs and the Departments of Commerce's initial 

decision on the Anti-dumping and Countervailing Cases in association with the Cambria Petition. 

While the Cambria petition primarily pertains to slabs, we are being tariffed not only on the cost of 

materials but also the labor to fabricate the cut to fit countertops. 

Our customers including local general contractors, developers, hotel owners and hotel franchises have 

also felt these impacts. Numerous hotel projects have been placed on hold and some cancelled as they 

are now over budget not only because of the extremely high proposed tariffs levied as cash deposits on 

quartz surface products from China, but other materials facing tariffs as well. Furthermore, the current 

CVD/ AD cash deposits (proposed duties) effect numerous other companies throughout the country with 

similar business models. 

GTI's collective tariff rate on quartz surface products is currently at 308.05% which includes the Section 

301 tariffs. There is no way my small company cannot survive this and could end up owing Customs and 

Border Patrol (CBP) in excess of $1.5M in additional tariffs alone. Additionally, by collecting the antidumping and countervailing duties in advance, coupled with the extremely exorbitant percentage, 

Granite Tech is unable to operate as the profit margin was nowhere near 300%. During Bond renewal in 

January the collateral dollar amount was so high at $200,000, money that Granite Tech didn't have due 

to the astronomical "deposits" we had to pay on the last shipments that were in transit when the AD 

rate was published in November. Granite Tech can no longer import without a Customs bond. 

The impact of this case on us is particularly troubling because GTI is currently in hibernation. Due to the 

high tariffs, we lost two employees out of seven who were on salary and received substantial bonuses 

on GTI sales which are now nonexistent. Granite Tech is in hibernation until the next International Trade 

Commission hearing scheduled on May 9, 2019 at 9:30am and subsequent ruling. I will attend the lTC 

hearing as an audience member as GTI cannot buy legal fees pertaining to the case. It is unclear whether 

GTI's import bond would be re-activated due to non-payment of cash deposits regardless of whether 

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they are refunded should the case be dismissed, or the percentages lowered. I'm hopeful the lTC and 

DOC will be more realistic with their findings and remedy the percentages in addition to rejecting critical 

circumstances (90-day retroactive) on both the Countervailing case {not currently proposed) and the 

Anti-Dumping case (proposed and cash deposits in collection). 

It brings me great concern that the current administration already seems to overlook the impact high 

tariffs have on small businesses like mine in Pennsylvania and across the nation. 

Thank you for your time and consideration. I am happy to answer any questions. 

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Jerry Kortesmaki 

London Road Rental Center 

Duluth MN 55812 

Madam Chair Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot, and esteemed members of the Committee, 

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. 

On September 11, 2001, I was working at a nation chain rental location in Duluth MN. I remember 

clearly where I was standing when I heard a radio in a vehicle tell about what happened that day. The 

next day was my day off and I was planning on traveling around MN looking at rental franchises to open 

my own rental store. That evening, we went to church and prayed with the rest of the country that 

everything would be ok and that we would continue on as normal as we could. So with that, !left at 6 

am September 12, 2001 to meet with 5 other rental store owners and begin my journey into the small 

business world. 

On February 01, 2002, I opened London Road Rental Center. My wife and I borrowed all we could 

against our house and put our life savings at risk to follow my dream. As the sole employee and a very 

tiny inventory, one that I spread around the store in an attempt to make it look just a touch bigger, it 

was a very nerve-racking but exciting time. In March, I hired my first employee and began to learn how 

complicated taxes and regulations were. I did not expect it would be so hard to get workers 

compensation and figure out how to do deductions, all while operating the actual functionality of a 

business. In June, we hired our second employee and that brought even more complications. I just 

wanted to rent things and help people. 

The first year did way better than our business plan, but my wife kept her job to provide for our own 

benefits. We didn't want to take any unnecessary funds from the business in order to allow it to grow as 

quickly as possible. 

Well that is how we started. We continued to put all the money back in the business for a couple of 

years. Eventually, my wife came to work for us too. We have not taken much money from the business 

over the years, choosing to instead to grow the business. Since we started the business, the tax laws 

have change dramatically. Specifically, the 179 and the bonus depreciation have allowed us to invest in 

our business aggressively. 

We currently have 10 full time employees, including my wife and I, and we employ about 20 seasonal 

personal. Our business volume has grown to$$$$. Our inventory value is$$$$$. 

Most rental store owners buy iron and manufactured equipment, which is good for our economy. When 

I buy excavators, trucks, tents and many things of that nature, it creates a lot of manufacturing jobs. It 

multiplies my business over and over. 

It has not been easy with the constant change in laws and rules, both from the state and federal level. 

An example of how messed up things are- the salaried employee issue we had a couple of years ago. 

The federal government said we could not have our managers on salary for under so many dollars a year 

and set a dead line. We put everyone back on an hourly wage, but then they changed the rule, costing 

me thousands of dollars. 
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Another example is the giant cost of health care- the Affordable Healthcare Act took health care away 

from most of my employees. We used to have a $1000 deductible and the employees could afford that. 

Now the cost has over doubled, and the deductible is $6000. They do not have $6000 to cover their 

deductible, and while we offer a health savings plan, they do not use it. 

Employees are a challenge- finding them, teaching them. With the education system telling everyone 

that they need a degree to get a job, no one wants to do equipment cleaning, maintenance or other 

entry level jobs, many of which are offered at my store. Additionally, the college system is set up so 

people cannot have part time jobs, continuing to prevent them from learning real life skills and gaining 

meaningful work experience. It feels like no one even mows their lawn anymore. You hand a kid a screw 

driver and he does not know which end to hold. 

I have lived the American dream. My wife and I have worked hard and been wise with our money. We 

try hard to stay educated on the tax laws and regulations that we need to follow as business owners, but 

we collect 14 different sales taxes for our area alone! I have been to Capitol Hill many times to lobby for 

tax laws, such as making 179 permanent. I am happy to report that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act saved me 

$7200 last year with the 20% pass thru deduction that we were able to use. Most of that money, I am 

sure, will go back into my business. 

We do have to spend a lot of time and money to keep up with the taxes and regulations. The 

complexity of running a business is challenging in a great way, but the complexity of the tax codes are a 

huge burden. It would be great if a businesses and entrepreneurs were more aware of any government 

programs that were available to them to learn about what they need to get started and properly comply 

with all the regulations and taxes- one spot to learn what they need to. 

The Department of Transportation, that is a mouthful. The rules that I must follow are a major burden 

on my business. We have two businesses about eight miles apart in two states. With one in Minnesota 

and one in Wisconsin, all my drivers must be 21 since they cross state lines. The inspections of the 

trucks, the training and record keeping is huge expense and time consumer. We use pickup trucks with 

trailers and must follow the same rules as the tractor trailer trucks. Additionally, I have a vision issue 

that has been stable my whole life. I have driven a few million miles over the years, yet I continue to 

need to prove my vision has not changed every few months. Then, on top of it, DOT will not allow me to 

use my eye doctor who has seen me for years. These are just a few examples from yet another agency 

that make it extremely difficult to own a small business. 

In my time as a business owner, I think I have heard there are over 137 federal agencies making "rules" 

for us to follow. Then you have congress, the courts- we need to simplify this complicated system and 

stop any non-elected board or agency from passing any rule or law. We elected you to make the 

decisions, not bureaucrats. If it doesn't have enough support for congress to pass it, it shouldn't be a 

rule or law. 

Thank you 

Jerry Kortesmaki 

Duluth MN 
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Owner of london Road Rental Center. 

A list of some of the government agencies that we must deal with 

ANSI OSHA 

DOT IRS 

DOL SBA 

EPA FDA 

SEC FTC 

FCC CPSC 

EEO NHTSA 

MNDOT 

NLRB MNDNR 
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WRITTEN TESTIMONY OF DAVE WALTON 

FARMER AND SMALL BUSINESS OWNER 

WILTON,IA 

BEFORE THE 

UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

HEARING ENTITLED 

"HONORING THE NATION'S SMALL 

BUSINESS HEROES" 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 8, 2019 AT !O:OOAM 

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Good morning, Chairwoman Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot, and Members of the 

Committee. I am honored to address you here today. Thank you, Congresswoman Finkenauer, 

for inviting me to speak as we recognize the positive impact of entrepreneurs and small business 

owners. It's truly an honor to speak on behalf of millions of hard-working farm families who are 

an important segment of the small businesses of America. 

Once upon a time, the thought of testifying before the U.S. House of Representatives would have 

struck fear into my heart. 

Turns out, it's a walk in the park compared to farming and owning and operating a business that 

sustains my family and provides employment and economic opportunity for a state built on 

agriculture. 

For more than I 00 years, the Walton family has farmed the land I call home near Wilton, Iowa. 

In 1835, we were the first European settlers to establish a farm, plant and harvest a crop in the 

area now known as Cedar County. But that's not where our story begins. Centuries ago, after a 

dispute with the King of England, my ancestors were given a choice. They left England and 

arrived in the Colonies during the early 1600s, settling on Staten Island first, and then began their 

migration to Iowa- first to Long Island, on to New Jersey, Ohio, and Indiana before arriving and 

putting down roots in eastern Iowa. 

As my mother often likes to say, members of the Walton family may not have sailed on the 

Mayflower, but I'm quite sure they were aboard the second boat to make landfall. 

I come before you today as an eastern Iowa farmer who has a passion tor providing food, fiber 

and fuel for a growing and more demanding world population. My wife Paula, sons Brad, Alex, 

and I grow soybeans and corn, raise beef cattle and sheep, and operate a seed company in our 

hometown of Wilton. Recently, we established a trucking company to transport sand, gravel and 

fertilizer to provide additional revenue and an opportunity for our sons to join the operation as 

partners. 

As with every business, some days are better than others. That said, there's nothing more 

rewarding than owning a business and succeeding at it. It takes passion, dedication, sacrifice and 

yes, some luck. Success in business is truly something to celebrate- not just during Small 

Business Week, but every week. While there's no single definition of a small business, they are 

the backbone of our nation- the meat and potatoes of our economy. It's an honor to be here 

today and speak on behalf of millions of hard-working farm families and small businesses. 

For the past year- farm families like mine- the epitome of small business- haven't been in a 

celebratory mood. Regardless of running a diversified enterprise, managing cash flow 

responsibly and doing things the right way and for the right reasons- I can tell you firsthand 

these arc difficult times, perhaps the most difficult I've faced as a farmer. 

That may come as a surprise given the nation's historically low unemployment and solid gains 

across most financial indices and tor the vast majority of personal pensions, mutual funds and 

401(K)s. 

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But make no mistake- farmers, the communities in which they live and the businesses they 

sustain- are hurting. Soybean prices- a major source of revenue for my operation -are at 10-

year lows- down almost $2 per bushel from this time last year. Corn prices are also languishing. 

Dairy prices are at historical lows and beef prices aren't much better. Even pork prices were 

below the cost of production, increasing only recently due to the outbreak of African Swine 

Fever in China. 

While I'd like to say all is well in rural America, it's not. Why? Well, you could say it's akin to 

death by a thousand cuts. 

There's no one reason why prices farmers are receiving for their products are well below the cost 

of production. Rather, it's a multitude of challenges- some placed upon us by government's 

action or inaction, and some by our own making. 

Complicating factors include: 

• Record, global supplies of corn and protein, including soybeans; 

• Trade disputes and disruptions with key export markets including Mexico, Canada, 

China, Japan, the European Union and the UK; 

• China's lack of fair play within the World Trade Organization; this includes subsidization 

of domestic production while slow-walking the import approval of oilseeds with specific 

traits; 

• Historic delays in the extension of the biodiesel tax incentive; 

• Retroactive small refinery exemptions that have destroyed demand for more than 360 

million gallons ofbiodiesel and renewable diesel; and 

• Decaying infrastructure leading to catastrophic flooding along the Mississippi and 

Missouri Rivers and delays in getting bulk commodities transported from farms to 

market. 

Combined, inaction on these and other critical issues are creating the kind of financial headwinds 

the likes we haven't felt since the 1980s farm recession. 

!faction isn't taken immediately by Congress and the Administration, the crop some farmers are 

currently planting may be their last. 

As we celebrate Small Business Week, there's tremendous anxiety in places like Wilton, 

Wellsburg, Webb, Woodbine and West Bend, Iowa and locations throughout the Midwest. These 

communities may not ring a bell with most Americans, but they are the home towns whose 

inhabitants draw most of their income from agricu lturc. 

America's farmers are astute at producing. What we need are markets. Many of you gathered 

here today understand the direct correlation between action you take and the livelihoods of those 

who farm and operate small businesses. 

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When access to markets is blocked, farm prices fall. Conversely, prices react positively when 

demand increases. I can think of few better examples than promoting and enhancing 

consumption of homegrown, renewable fuels like biodiesel. 

I want to recognize Congresswoman Finkenauer for leading a bipartisan effort in the House to 

retroactively extend the biodiesel tax credit. To help shine the light on the need for boosting 

prices and demand, the Congresswoman has already held two hearings this year in her 

subcommittee related trade, the last featuring two corn and soybean farmers and a pork producer 

from Iowa. 

This issue resonates with her as Iowa is the nation's leading biodiesel-producing state, producing 

nearly 365 million gallons last year. The production ofbiodiesel supports nearly 4,690 full-time 

equivalent jobs in Iowa. 

Promoting energy made in the USA courtesy of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) has a 

positive and far-reaching impact. For our farm, biodiesel production adds 63 cents to the market 

value of every bushel of soybeans- or about $40 per acre by generating greater demand for the 

oil found in each soybean. Now that's real money. 

An additional $40 per acre across my farm would mean that we could re-invest an extra twelve 

thousand dollars this year alone, into our operation to update machinery like a 20-year-old tractor 

that is wearing out or invest in technology to continue to improve our efficiency. Those dollars 

don't stop at the farm gate, they are spent at the local equipment dealership to help pay for the 

sales staff, the mechanics, the manufacturer and all their suppliers, those dollars in turn are spent 

in the local area boosting the bottom lines of other small businesses as well. A dollar spent by a 

small business, in my case a farm, at another small business is the economic driver that this 

country was built on. 

The added value to the soybean oil makes the protein within the soybean more cost-competitive. 

This benefits livestock farmers by reducing feed costs by as much as $40/ton. And, given most 

renewable fuels production facilities are in rural communities, the biodiesel tax credit and 

renewable fuels industry are a major boost to communities most in need of good-paying, bluecollar jobs and economic vitality. 

Since 2005, when the biodiesel tax credit was first implemented, the U.S. biodiesel market has 

grown from about 100 million gallons to more than 2.6 billion gallons annually. This tax credit 

has now been expired for almost 16 months -the longest our country has ever gone without it. 

Continued inaction is unacceptable. Biodiesel producers are suffering. Without the tax incentive, 

biodiesel producers will have to make difficult decisions. Already, facilities are beginning to idle 

production, resulting in reduced productivity and layoffs. 

When Congress established the RFS and implemented the biodiesel tax incentive, it sent a signal 

that growth of the biodiesel industry was vital to achieving energy security, improving 

environmental health, and boosting rural economies. We continue to implore the Environmental 

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Protection Agency and members of Congress to fulfill the goals of the RFS by ensuring it's 

implemented as Congress intended. 

America and small businesses like mine benefit directly from the biodiesel tax incentive. 

Biodiesel not only diversifies our fuel supplies so that we are less dependent on global oil 

markets saving U.S. consumers at least 17 centers on every gallon of diesel- but it also 

improves environmental quality by reducing greenhouse gas emission by 57-86 percent. 

The biodiesel industry is ready and willing to expand into the future by making capital 

investment, but it and the small businesses it sustains cannot do that with the continued 

uncertainty, particularly with inaction on the tax incentive and the open spigot of small refinery 

waivers granted by the EPA. To add insult to injury, the small refinery exemptions destroy 

demand for biodiesel and renewable diesel, creating even more uncertainty and market 

instability. 

Bottom line, without congressional action to extend the biodiesel and renewable diesel tax 

incentive for 2018 and 2019, small businesses like mine will continue to suffer. 

The same can be said for trade. 

Continued disputes and disruptions with our trading partners have created tremendous financial 

strain for America's farmers and small businesses. 

China is America's number-one market for soybean exports. Nearly one of every three rows of 

soybeans grown in the United States are exported to the country of 1.4 billion people. But that's 

no longer true. As a result, the downward pressure on soybean prices has been dramatic since the 

U.S. and China became embroiled in an escalating trade war almost one year ago. This included 

the implementation of tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of each other's imports. China's 

retaliatory duties primarily targeted agricultural products, including an extra 25-perccnt tax on 

U.S. soybeans. 

The U.S. Soybean Export Council estimates that year-to-date U.S. soybean exports to China are 

down almost 90 percent. Despite our best efforts to open new markets and increase market share 

to other destinations including Europe and Southeast Asia, global U.S. soybean exports are down 

almost 25 percent this year. Soybean prices have plummeted about $2 per bushel as a result, 

costing farmers billions of dollars. 

Adding insult to injury is the spread of African Swine Fever in China. The disease is decimating 

the nation's pig herds resulting in steep declines in feed consumption. This directly and 

negatively impacts soybean meal demand, thus reducing Chinese soybean imports. Any and 

every reduction in soybean demand, whether here at home or abroad, negatively impacts the 

price of soybeans I have ready to sell and the value of the soybeans I'm getting ready to plant. 

Any trade war involving food hits states like Iowa and small businesses like mine particularly 

hard. Adding to the complexity and pessimism is that no one knows when the anxiety and pain 

will ease. 

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The next one to three years is forecast to be very difficult for farmers to find profit opportunities. 

We excel at producing soybeans and other commodities in Iowa- far more than we can consume 

domestically. Therefore, export markets are critical. This is especially true for soybeans. 

While farm families like mine support efforts to ensure the business that we do with China is 

fair, reciprocal and equitable, we need trade, not aid. We need markets and the opportunity to sell 

the quality products we grow to the countries and people who need and want them. That's 

currently not happening. 

Government should work for and not against America's farmers. Small businesses like mine are 

hurting. We must end the gridlock and go to work advancing important ag policy. This includes 

extending the biodiesel tax incentive, approving the U.S. Mexico Canada Trade Agreement, 

resolving the trade war with China, and advancing much-needed funding for repairing and 

building our farm-to-market infrastructure. Doing so would be the best and most effective way to 

truly celebrate America's small businesses. My sincere hope is that these issues will be resolved 

quickly so many more generations ofWaltons can continue this 400-year journey of farming in 

this great country. 

I look forward to continuing the conversation and stand ready to assist you and your colleagues 

in crafting solutions and moving these issues across the finish line. Thank you again for allowing 

me to share my story on behalf of Iowa's soybean farmers. I am happy answer any questions you 

may have. 

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Brittney Reese of FIT & NU (Aurora, CO) 

Testimony for Congressional Hearing titled, "Honoring National Small Business Heros" 

May 8, 2019 

Chairwomen Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot, and Members of the Small Business 

Committee: 

Thank you for hosting this hearing to honor small business heroes and for inviting me to speak 

today. I also want to thank my representative, Congressman Jason Crow, for giving FIT & NU 

the opportunity to speak here about the work we are doing as a small business in the district he 

represents. 

My name is Brittney Rae Reese, Co-Founder of FIT & NU- Colorado's first FITness & NUtrition 

club for busy women of color located in Colorado's 6th Congressional District in the city of 

Aurora. My sister, Joslyn, and I started FIT & NU in 2015 with the mission to help busy women 

of color improve their health, ease their minds and influence their communities and families to 

LIVE WELL We do this through Functional FITness training and habit-based NUtrition 

coaching. When asked, why we were selected as a Small Business Hero, we were told because 

we "take advantage of our resources, work hard, and bring passion". My sister and I work well 

together and maintain a family relationship that extends to the women we serve. 

There's Tammy: a mother of 3 who has been buried under unhealthy weight for years and is 

determined to break free. She has shared her appreciation for us "birthing the vision to 

transform the lives of busy women of color". She states, "we so often put everyone above 

ourselves- husband, kids, careers, etc. So to have a place where women who look like me are 

winning with weight loss and creating healthy habits, just to name a few, is nourishment to my 

soul". 

Client, Fran ita Ware, Ph.D - educator, consultant and creator of Radical Self Care shared that 

for the past nine years she had been searching for a place that is big enough and yet small 

enough to meet her needs. She stated, "I am grateful to have found a place where I can be 

myself, feel welcome and included. I have not had this experience anywhere else, and I love 

that it's women of color supporting women of color. I truly feel like I'm fulfilling a purpose that not 

only serves me but serves a great (small) business." 

FIT & NU celebrated its official grand opening as a fully staffed and equipped boutique wellness 

club in March of 2019, not only positively impacting health and wellness for women in the 

community we grew up in, but employing, collaborating and contracting with other small 

businesses and entrepreneurs as well. Hard work and determination alone did not get us here. 

The success that my sister and I have enjoyed so far is due largely to the support of local non 

profits like the Women's Business Center at Mi Casa Resource Center and Community 

Enterprise Development Services (also known as "CEDS Finance") - two Colorado 
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organizations that equip women and minority business owners in our pursuit of impact, longevity 

and profitability. 

I highlight these organizations because of the work they do to propel low income entrepreneurs 

like myself through glass ceilings, out of cycles of poverty, and beyond gender wage gaps. 

Between 2014 and 2018, Mi Casa created 721 jobs, launched 35 new businesses and hosted 

countless workshops on topics ranging from finance and HR to strategic planning and social 

media marketing. CEDS has financed 213 businesses and placed a total of $4.05 million in 

investments with the help of the Small Business Administration. 

So when I think of what Congress can do to help small businesses, it would be to continue 

programs in the Small Business Administration that fund organizations like Mi Casa and CEDS 

that support disadvantaged businesses, such as minority-owned and women-owned 

businesses. This will afford us to grow beyond the uphill battle as start-ups, and give us the 

resources to hire team members, implement marketing campaigns beyond grass root efforts, 

and to become more sound business operators and owners. Also, as Congress passes 

legislation that allocates capital funding in support of small businesses, the focus should be on 

helping businesses develop and sustain internal operations. As low income business owners, 

we are our main human resource. We would like to help ourselves and other disinvested people 

and communities join the economic mainstream. Wage subsidy programs and debt relief are 

amongst those of interest to us. 

Congress should also be giving funding and incentivizing small businesses to partner and 

collaborate with their community members to help expand their reach. 

We sought out community health organizations that share the same mission and we proposed a 

partnership to help both bottom lines. The Colorado Black Health Collaborative, The Stapleton 

Foundation - Be Well Initiative, American Diabetes Association and soon the Black Women's 

Health Imperative are a few of the organizations that have helped expand our reach. Because of 

these partnerships our network, our visibility and trust within our communitY has grown. 

Furthermore, if Women's Business Centers (WBC) and Community Development Financial 

Institutions (CDFis) did not exist, we, the disadvantaged black women visionaries, low-income 

entrepreneurs, change-agents of global health, refugees and minorities would not have access 

to low cost developmental services and capital to grow. 

In closing, we are thankful for the contributions Congress has made, thus far, to bridge the 

social and economic gap for women like me; however, many of the available resources are still 

directed at larger companies, yet businesses that are "small" to the federal government need 

these partnerships with organizations that see them as large. I hope my testimony affirms that 

women and minority-focused organizations do make a difference and that they are the lifeline to 

making the "American Dream" work. 

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Thank you again for the opportunity to share our story on behalf of all women-owned and 

minority-owned small businesses in the district and the country. 

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Honoring the Nation's Small Business Heroes 

Hello everyone. My name is Colleen Cruze Bhatti, and 1 am from Knoxville, Tennessee. I'd like 

to talk to you today about my dairy farm and ice cream business. We've been selling milk and 

ice cream now for just under I 0 years. And though I am not an expert on small businesses, I 

hope that by relating my personal experience with small business, I can share what I believe are 

the challenges and opportunities facing small businesses more broadly in America today. 

First I'll give a little bit of background: My husband and I milk around 83 jersey cows twice a 

day, just east ofKnoxville, and we process that milk into pasteurized non-homogenized milk and 

ice cream mix, which we sell in and around the Knoxville area. We also have a couple of ice 

cream shops of our own as well as a pizza place. We love farming, we have a passion for turning 

our milk into delicious food, and we love making people happy. 

Manjit and I got our start in 20 I 0 when we had just fallen in love, I had just graduated college, 

and my parents were starting to look for someone else to manage and grow the fledgling dairy 

farm they had started 30 years earlier. Our dream, initially, was simply to run a successful dairy 

farm. Many of you perhaps are not aware that the American commodity dairy farming industry is 

at a crossroads. Family dairy farms are closing at a faster rate than they have in any previous 

decade since the 1920's. Milk is simply not worth as much as it costs to produce. In the dairy 

industry, the conventional wisdom for the last several years has been, "Go Big, Go niche, or get 

out". Many, of course, are choosing the last option. Most of the remaining dairy herds have 

expanded to milk 50 to 100 times as many cows as their grandparents milked. My mom and dad 

have always "gone niche". Unlike the vast majority of dairy farms, we do not sell our milk to a 

third-party shipper who then sells it to a processing plant. We process the milk ourselves and sell 

it ar.ound town, and we choose the quality and we choose the price. Selling milk and ice cream 

directly to consumers has helped us keep the farm afloat. It lets us get the income that it takes to 

care for cattle and soil the right way. I wish every farmer in America could earn a decent living 

farming, because it is the oldest and most noble profession for men and women, and yet it is also 

often one of the most thankless. 

Since 20 I 0 we have worked hard to grow our dairy farm and little processing plant into a robust 

direct-to-consumer business that employs around 70 men and women and serves pasteurized 

milk, ice cream and artisan pizza to Knoxville's downtown and' east side communities and along 

the way, we have learned that there are downsides and upsides to running a small business. Some 

of the downsides arc that you'll never be able to offer a cheaper product than your corporate 

competitors, you won't have their startup capital, their industry connections, their supply chain 

stability, and you won't be able to offer your employees the same benefits and pensions that keep 

many of our fellow citizens hanging on to their jobs in the corporate world. But let's take a 

second to consider the upsides: First and foremost, small businesses can and should offer high 

quality products. My dad is a 76-ycar old 4th generation dairy farmer; he's full of wise oneliners. One thing he always told me growing up is, "you can't compromise on your quality". It's 

a saying that is so often repeated that it borders on banal, but for small businesses in particular, 

quality has to be THE mantra. 

When you farm on a small scale, you have the opportunity to be good to your soil and to give a 

high quality of life to your animals. You can keep them on pasture, you can grow crops 
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sustainably, and in turn, you get rich, nutritious, delicious milk. I'm not an economist. I don't 

know why small farms produce better milk. But I drink milk everywhere I go, and small dairy 

farms who process their own milk, always have the best tasting milk. I often find that the same is 

true for small businesses in other sectors of the economy as well. The best experiences, products, 

and services I've had have always come from small businesses. For whatever reason, small 

businesses just are able to offer better quality. 

I mentioned earlier that Manjit and my initial goal in starting a small business was simply to 

keep my parents' dairy alive. However, we've adapted our goals as we've added employees to 

our business. In two years we've added around 70 employees. We never knew we would have 

this many employees. We didn't take classes to know how to have employees. We are farmers. 

Farmers usually only have one employee, if that. 

We often pay lip service to the fact that small businesses employ the vast majority of Americans, 

99.7% in fact. However, many of us also think that a job in corporate America or with the federal 

government is the only path to job security and a stable retirement. Rural America thinks very 

highly of that coveted UPS job, for example, or employment with the local utilities district. As 

small business owners, most of us can't offer health insurance, and certainly we can't afford 

pensions. But what we as small business owners need to realize is that we employ America, and 

we employ America's future, and we should view this as our unique opportunity to help build the 

America that we dream of. Employment is much more than merely providing a service in 

exchange for an hourly wage. Employment defines us as Americans. We are known around the 

world as "workaholics". We don't take vacations. Many of us work two jobs. And as a result, I 

believe that small business owners in America have a unique opportunity to help define what 

employment can be in this upcoming century. I believe that a job has to be something that one 

takes pride in, it can be fulfilling, it must be nourishing and not draining, it has to facilitate 

physical and mental health. It must provide a forum for community and friendship. Of course a 

decent wage is at the basis of a good job but certainly a fulfilling sustainable job must have these 

other qualities as well. Because at the end of the day, we Americans spend almost all of our time 

at work. 

Fostering a great work environment starts first with realizing that your employees are the 

centerpiece of your business. Once you acknowledge that, developing a happy and healthy 

environment becomes much easier. Here are a few things we do in our business that I feel have 

had a positive impact on our employee's live: 

I pay my employees far above average, 1 make sure to showcase them individually in our social 

media postings, I provide free access to weekly exercise classes that we attend together, we have 

company wide breakfasts and meetings often, and we don't necessarily discuss work at them, we 

give prizes to employees who complete a 30-day #eatyourveggies challenge. We go on research 

trips to other farms and ice cream shops in other cities as a way to stay excited about work. We 

provide high quality nutritious farm products at a discounted rate to all of our employees. As you 

can see, it's quite a grab bag of programs and incentives; i can't say we'll be doing the same ones 

next year. The salient point, however, is that I, as a small business owner, choose to make my 

employees' lives my central priority. 

When you run a small business, it can be difficult sometimes to see the forest for the trees. 
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Paperwork consumes you. Employees get sick or injured. Sometimes lawsuits or audits 

unexpectedly arrive in the mail. There never seems to be enough time to do the bare minimum, 

let alone direct your attention to things like quality and "employee well-being". But the quality 

of what your serve and the environment that you provide for your employees are paramount if 

you want your business to survive. 
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TESTIMONY OF 

SHAWN PULFORD 

CEO OF LB WATER SERVICE INC. 

BEFORE THE 

COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

May8,2019 

Good morning. I would like to thank Chairwoman Velazquez, ranking member Chabot, other 

distinguished members of the US House of Representatives Committee on Small Business, and 

specifically Congressman Joyce for inviting us here today. I am honored to testify before the 

Committee in recognition of National Small Business Week, representing one of our nation's 

small business heroes, LB Water Service Inc. 

My name is Shawn Pulford, and I am the CEO of LB Water. Our company was born in 1970, 

when our founder, Lehman B. Mengel, capitalized on a market need for readily available 

waterworks infrastructure materials in the south central region of Pennsylvania. In the 

timespan of nearly SO years, we have grown from three employees and one location to 225 

employees and eight locations. 

LB Water is now the leading provider of innovative solutions for water, wastewater and 

stormwater throughout the mid-Atlantic region. We serve cities, counties, municipalities, 

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contractors, engineering firms and development companies. Many of our manufacturers, as 

well as our customers, are also small businesses. 

We also now operate two affiliated companies, Stormwater Solution Source and S40 

Technologies. Storm water Solution Source provides stormwater and environmental solutions 

that help state and local governments, contractors and companies meet increasing regulations 

governing the management of storm water and erosion and sediment control. 540 Technologies 

serves an expanded region of 21 states, offering smart city solutions for water-loss 

management, street lighting, electric metering, and data acquisition and management to both 

public and private entities. 

In 2002, LB Water's owners sold the company's assets to the employees, and LB Water has 

operated as a 100% Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) company ever since. Our company 

is one of more than 6,600 ESOPs in the United States that, combined, employ 14.3 million 

workers. It is because of the provision for ESOPs in The Employee Retirement Income Security 

Act of 1974 (ERISA) that LB Water has been able to attract and retain its high-caliber workforce, 

invest in top-notch training and equipment, and provide exceptional benefits to our employeeowners. In addition, LB Water's status as an ESOP has provided the foundation for our 

company's success. 

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I am pleased to say that LB Water has experienced tremendous growth in the last five years. 

This is due, in part, to increases in both public and private investment. We are benefiting from 

relief provided by federal tax cuts. As we consider the south central region of Pennsylvania, 

which includes Congressman Joyce's district as well as our Chambersburg location, we can see 

economic development at work. The region is becoming home to manufacturing and 

distribution operations for many companies. We have witnessed the construction of 15 new 

warehouses, each exceeding 1 million sq. ft., along the 1-81 corridor from the Maryland line to 

Harrisburg. We and other businesses in this region have experienced a positive residual 

economic impact due to this increased activity. However, the area is quickly reaching full 

employment, the need for skilled labor is high, and concerns are mounting regarding the ability 

of 1-81 to handle the increased traffic demands in the corridor. 

At LB Water and our affiliated companies, most of our solutions are designed to address our 

nation's aging subsurface water infrastructure, much of which is well over 100 years old and in 

dire need of replacement. This critical infrastructure remains "out of sight and out of mind" 

until a major failure occurs. Using advanced detection technologies, we can see, hear, and 

pinpoint even small water leaks and provide solutions before they become big events that 

appear on the nightly news. Yet, repairs alone cannot solve the state of our country's 

deteriorating water infrastructure. Much of it needs to be replaced. 

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For more than two years, Congress has discussed the need for comprehensive infrastructure 

legislation to address the country's transportation and subsurface water infrastructures, both 

of which are essential for economic development and as well as quality of life. As LB Water and 

other small businesses look ahead to future opportunities and growth, it is clear that this is a 

critical matter upon which the Federal government could act. We strongly urge Congress to 

pass a comprehensive infrastructure bill that funds needed improvements to our nation's 

crumbling water distribution systems along with our nation's highways, bridges and airports. 

I would like to conclude my testimony by saying that it has been a tremendous honor for me to 

appear before the committee today to tell our story and to speak to some of the issues that 

impact the day-to-day operations of LB Water. We truly believe we are an American success 

story. I am proud of our 100% employee-owned company, what we have accomplished, and 

how we are positioning ourselves to continue to succeed in the future. Thank you. I would be 

happy to answer any questions. 

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Questions and Answers for the record 

From Congressman Crow to Ms. Reese 

1. What are some of the barriers to starting or growing a small business that women, or specifically 

women of color, face and what are some helpful tools you have used to overcome them? 

Building a network of organizations (not just individual professionals) is definitely a barrier for women of 

color businesses. In Colorado, the African American and Latina population is small enough that 

connecting with others whom look like us is not the challenge. However, establishing quality 

relationships with large organizations that may share similar missions is an important key to growth. We 

have found partnerships with organizations like American Diabetes Association, Colorado Access, 

Colorado Rural Health, Mental Health Center of Denver, Mpowered Debt Consultants, has played a 

critical role in our success. There are others we have had the pleasure of working with, however; to get 

there we had to be introduced by a trusted source or given the opportunity to present ourselves in-front 

of these groups for consideration. I imagine there are times in which we submit an application and the 

individual reviewing us is impressed with what they see on paper. In our experience; however, real 

interaction and having a presence within a space in which we were invited, has presented the largest 

return. 

2. In prior hearings we have heard about the impact that student loan debt has had on small 

businesses, i.e. starting a business while in debt or recruiting clients and keeping them. Can you share 

your experience and how student debt has impacted your business and clients? 

Student loan debt presents us with a major financial barrier. Both, my sister and I pursued education in 

fields that we once worked in. Now, things are different. We are building a business using the 

knowledge acquired. However, we are a start-up and we are breaking-even. We took a risk and 

launched our business with student loan debt, with the anticipation of creating something that would 

eventually lead us out of the hole. Luckily, we've been blessed to receive financing based more on our 

character than credit score, but we haven't reached our full potential yet and student loan debt often 

threatens our business success rate. Our character based loan is small (under $30,000). Based on our 

growth projections we need more capital to market and hire staff so that we can retain our current 

client base plus attract and retain more. Our student loan debt is causing a reduction in the ability to 

create new business. We may be able to sustain ourselves now but it is going to be very difficult for us to 

grow without student debt relief. 

Our Millennia! clients are often met with the same challenges of having to choose between paying their 

student loans over investing in their health. The issue of low wages to high debt while living in a city 

where the cost of living continues to increase truly takes a toll on millennia! aged women. Many times 
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we've had to be flexible with clients, allowing them to "freeze" their membership during their financial 

hardship just so we wouldn't lose them all together. This, in turn, impacts our monthly revenue. 

Our services are now primarily marketed to 40+ year old women who aren't as impacted by student loan 

debt as our younger clientele and who is financially able to be a long-term client. 
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"Honoring the Nation's Small Business Heroes" 

Testimony before the House Committee on Small Business 

May 8'", 2019 

Submitted by 

Scott Asbjornson, Vice-President of Finance and Chief Financial Officer 

AAON,Inc. 

Tulsa, Oklahoma 
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Chairwoman Velazquez, Representative Hem and members of the House Committee on Small 

Business- my name is Scott Asbjornson and I am currently the Chief Financial Officer of 

AAON, Inc., a manufacturer of semi-custom heating ventilation and air conditioning equipment 

for commercial use. We were founded through a leveraged buyout of a corporate division with 

fewer than ninety (90) personnel and under $20 million in sales in 1988. We now employ in 

excess of2,300 people in multiple locations nationwide with revenue in excess of$430 million 

and arc publicly traded on NASDAQ. 

The Tax Cut and Jobs Act signed into law in December 2017 provided AAON- and virtually 

every American- a tremendous opportunity, and our country has made the most of that 

opportunity. 

Combined with the Trump administration's efforts at regulatory reform, the tax reform law has 

had a profound effect on the U.S. economy. 

Across the country, hundreds of companies added jobs, paid bonuses and raised workers' pay in 

direct response to the tax cut. They also invested in their communities by boosting charitable 

giving. Specifically, the lower corporate tax rate helped our company raise entry level wages by 

more than 15 percent and provide a $1,000 one-time bonus to each non-executive employee. 

In addition to improving the income of our entry-level personnel, the economic growth in the 

economy has translated into strong demand for our equipment. Therefore, AAON has also 

grown employment by adding in excess of20% to our staff over the last year and one-half. 

While many of these actions by other companies created immediate benefits which made the 

news, equally important were the changes that took place internally, usually out of the public 

eye. 

As an example, the law also gave us an incentive to accelerate capital investments through 

immediate depreciation. AAON has both replaced some sheet metal fabrication equipment with 

new equipment and added capacity. These decisions made us more productive, while creating 

jobs and profits for the companies supplying the machinery. It's that kind of ripple effect that 

multiplies the benefits of sound tax policy- and that can all too often get lost when measuring 

the effectiveness of tax and regulatory policy. 

The impact is far wider, of course, than just how the tax cuts affected any one company. 

The booming economy has tightened labor markets and pushed up wages by almost 4 percent 

over the past year. We have an historically low unemployment rate of3.8 percent, with 

unprecedentedly low rates for African Americans and Hispanics. The nation added 600,000 jobs 

in the two months at the turn of the year, even while the government was partially shut down. 

Initial jobless claims are the lowest since 1969. 

The United States has seen eight consecutive quarters of 2 percent-plus GDP growth, even while 

the Federal Reserve was raising interest rates multiple times. 

When the Global CFO Council was surveyed about the international economy last fall, they 

reported that the United States was the only major economy in the world that was improving. 

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That's not a coincidence, or an accident, or a bit of good luck. 

The U.S. economy is enjoying renewed growth- and American workers are reaping the benefits 

-because our tax and regulatory policies are making it happen. 

And while there has been much talk about how only a select few received a tax cut, the facts say 

otherwise. 

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, two-thirds of taxpayers are paying less in federal 

income tax today than they were before the law was enacted. Nearly half of all filers got a tax cut 

of $500 or more. 

And the benefits of the tax cuts are not restricted to a few geographic regions or income brackets. 

Studies by the Tax Foundation and the Heritage Foundation showed that taxpayers in every 

congressional district and at every income level got a tax cut. 

Less commented on but nearly as significant as the policy changes has been the general 

demeanor of the federal government, which now views entrepreneurialism and economic growth 

as positives. That has not always been the case in the recent past. 

The tax and regulatory policy changes are the substantive manifestations of this mindset- that 

the economy is strongest when people get to keep more of the money they earn and get to choose 

how to spend, save and invest it. 

One final issue we see as important to mention is that AAON, Inc., is a majority-minority 

corporation. We employ people from a wide variety of racial, ethnic, national, gender and 

religious backgrounds. As a participant in E-vcrify, we believe in employer accountability for 

the verification of employment-eligibility. We also see the benefit to the nation of talented 

people being able to enter through the Hl-B process as well as through well-managed refugee 

programs. We are a nation of ambitious, independent and diverse people who work together to 

build a stronger country for our mutual benefit. We hope the legislature is able to find answers 

to our immigration challenges which respect the existing citizens while incorporating 

compassion for the persecuted and allowing opportunity for the talented. 

Thank you for holding this hearing and I appreciate the opportunity to testify before this 

Committee. As manufacturers and employers, we are excited by the relative strength of the 

economy and the growth opportunities available. ·while the tight labor market presents 

challenges, we prefer to be operating in a time when shared prosperity is lifting incomes for so 

many in our society. A broad based, market driven economic expansion seems most likely to be 

resilient and robust. Thank you for hearing my perspective as you consider legislation impacting 

the businesses of our nation. 

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Kristofor Sabey 

Surf Liquors & Markel 

Seaside Heights, NJ 087 51 

Testimony to the House of Representatives 

Committee on Small Business 

May 8, 2019 

Background 

My name is Kristofor Sabey, ;md I ;un the o"'~Jer of Surf Liquors & Market in Seaside 

Heights, New Jersey. The story of a small business owner usually includes a winding path 

of sell~discovery, ;mel mine is no dillcrenl. In 2006 I graduated from Johnson & \Vales 

{ lnivcrsity with a Bachelor of Science in Business M<magement, with a concentration in 

Operations l'vf<magement.. Straight out of college, I began a successful career as a Pn~iect 

Manager with Meridian Consulting Group, working on bonded construction sites. I spent 

much of this time traveling lor my job, including almost two years in New Orlc;ms 

rebuilding schools ldlowing the destrudion of Hurricane Katrina. After four years of 

working away lrmn home, I realized that I w;mted to create a life working lor myself that 

allowed me to spend more lime with hunily. I moved back to my hometown of Toms 

River, New Jersey to pursue this new dre;un. 

In 2010 I married my now wife, Patty, who has l(mr generations of small business in her 

blood. Her f<unily founded & still owns Lucky Leos Arcade on the Seaside Heights 

Boardwalk, an iconic landmark at the .Jersey Shore. She had her own business as well; Patty 

opened Lucky Lady, a successful clothing boutique on the boardwalk in Seaside Heights, 

in 2005 when she was just a junior in college at the Fashion Institute of Technology. She 

graduated in 2006 with a BFA in Fabric Styling and an associate de;.,•rce in Fashion 

Merchandising. 

Patty and I purchased Surf Liquors & Market in 2011. It's a business that was established 

in 1982, and is a mainstay on "the island" for wine, beer and liquor, as well as snacks ;md 

other needs lin· the weekender at the Shore. We became a young couple "~th two seasonal 

businesses ;mel a growing hmily: our son, Kurt, was born later that year. 

In 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit and we were devastated. Waves crashed through Patty's 

boutique on the boardwalk, ;nul the liquor store was destroyed as well. ~Te !Cit every sort 

of emotion; thankliJl that our hunily was safe, heartbroken that our hard work was washed 

away with the storm, and terrified about what our lllture held. But small business m~11ers 

are nothing if not determined, and we knew we would come back li-mn this. 

I'm thankl'ul lor the gr<mts that kept our head above water in the wake of Sandy. I received 

an NJEDA loan that was a true li!Csaver. It allowed me to rebuild, and even though we are 

nowhere near hitting the numbers we were making prior to the storm, I am confident that 

with the right support lrmn our government our small businesses will thrive again. 
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Surf Liquors & Markel remains in its original location, although Seaside Heights has not 

yet bounced back. Uncertain of the future of the boardwalk, Patty chose to close Lucky 

Lady and instead focused her ellorts on a new business, while also growing our family with 

the addition of daughter Penelope. We opened House of Lucky in 2011. in Lwallette, New 

Jersey, just down the road. It has become one of the go-to lifestyle boutiques in the area, 

and has inspired us to open a second shop, Salt House, opening this summer right next 

door. 

We love being small business owners, and can't imagine any other lite for us. It has 

brought our bmily so much joy. Our children both have dreams of business in their liJturc, 

too; Kurt (7) wants to run the family arcade, and Penny (4) wants to be a "donut maker" 

when they gTOw up. I would love notl1ing more than to sec them follow in our footsteps, 

but can't help but worry about the fltture of small business in America. 

The State of Small Business 

The particular struggle of seasonal small businesses is a unique one; of course there arc tl1e 

usual suspects: minimum wage, limding ... the list goes on. A seasonal business also sees the 

ellccts of environmental factors and a young workforce. 

The minimum wage has been on our mind the most recently with tl1e passage of NJ Al5 

ORR), which will raise New .Jersey's minimum wage to $15 per hour over the next fCw 

years. \Ve've always paid our employees over the minimum wage, as we ICc! tl1at good 

support is one of our most important assets. It is hard to find, however; in our seasonal 

towns, tl1e pool (of mainly high school or college studenl~) demand more and more, while 

wanting to work minimal hours. W c can't raise product costs to combat the rise in wages, 

as we then could not compete with bigger stores, which is hard enough today when those 

other businesses do not play by the same rules (paying workers under the table, illegal 

moving of inventory between stores, etc). On top of tl1is, liquor licenses arc being devalued 

with the ideas ofRI & R2 bills in New Jersey, which could someday allow other types of 

businesses to sell alcohol- not to mention Amazon's acquirement of a liquor license. The 

uncertainty is stressful on a small business, and docs not seem to be going away any time 

soon. 

vVhile reg1IIations are necessary and well-meaning, they have made it increasingly diflicult 

to own and operate a liquor store. It oflen !eels as though the ABC in New Jersey is 

working against me, rather than with me. Local rules and ordinances tl1al arc intended to 

be positive have resulted in the shuttering of other businesses, and towns like mine rely on 

tl1e success of others to bring patrons to tmm. 

Of course, Hurricane Sandy has also played a huge role in the direction of our businesses, 

but it goes beyond rebuilding the shops. Infr<L>lructure became a problem in the years after 

the storm, and repairs continue today. Route B5, a m<\ior roadway on which House of 

Lucky sits, was under construction lor years, impeding customer parking and dissuading 

day trippers from visiting because it became too much of a hassle. The beach 

replenishment along the coast, which of course is necessary, h<L> alkcted tourism in ways 

previously unseen. On top of tl1is, insurance rates lor our properties have spiked. Our 
96 

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SBD026 with DISTILLER


Insert offset folio 96 here 36208.045