GNO Inc President and CEO Michael Hecht returned today for his weekly segment with Newell to discuss the state of business and industry in the metro area, as Phase 3.2 of reopening is around the corner and demands for Mayor Cantrell to reopen more of the city increase in volume and urgency.
“You guys at GNO have restarted a program you had before that you’ve re-engineered, re-tuned and brought back - I think it’s an exciting program! Tell us about it,” Newell began.
“We just launched DestinationGNO,” Hecht said. “It’s kind of like TurboTax combined with a moving guide, it’s for people considering moving their families and businesses to the region. It tells them about all the different options for places to live, places to work.. It even has a quiz where you can put in what you want in terms of nightlife, an urban vs rural setting, shopping, amenities for kids - and it will tell you which of dozens of different neighborhoods in the ten parishes you should consider, everywhere from Abita Springs to Belle Chasse.”
“We have talked for a couple of weeks about the special session in Baton Rouge,” Newell said. “One of the primary motivations for it was to re-tool the Unemployment Compensation Fund, but they put that on hold and they’re waiting to see what the Federal government is going to do. I’ve been critical of the city administration for taking that approach - I’m curious what your thoughts are - why would we take that approach and not try to come up with some remedial measures to save the fund at the present time?”
“Our unemployment fund before coronavirus was one of the best-run and best-financed in the country,” Hecht said. “We didn’t get ourselves into this predicament because of anything we did or did not do. But the fund is going to fall below it’s $100 million threshold, and that triggers a solvency tax on employers. It’s going to cost our businesses $53 million next year, which we can ill afford right now. We’re proposing to at least suspend that tax until next year until we figure out how we’re going to support the fund going forward. We don’t have an answer to it right now, but the worst thing you can do to a business that’s suffering tremendously through no fault of their own is impose another tax.”
“But wouldn’t this be an opportunity to tap the rainy day fund, in order to make sure we have the necessary dollars in the short term?” Newell continued. “This is an extraordinary, unprecedented event. I know they were considering legislation to do so, but is that not going to be fleshed out?”
“I think it needs to be - it’s not just raining, it’s raining frogs - it’s Biblical!” Hecht agreed. “This seems like a perfect opportunity to do that.”
“We’ve talked a lot about PPP, and a number of folks in the Trump administration have stated they think we should go down that path if we can’t come to some agreement on a stimulus package,” Newell said. “But Democrats, Republicans and the Administration all seem to be at an impasse.”
“I think I owe you a beer on this,” Hecht said. “Because when we talked about this, I told you there was no way they are going to let $130 billion left in the program just sit there while our businesses die on the vine, but that’s exactly what’s happened and nobody thinks that’s going to get taken care of before the election. The only good news is that the SBA did issue a new simplified form for forgiveness, for something like 70% percent of all the PPP loans in the GNO region. It’s going to help a lot of businesses and banks. But that $130 billion should be out on the street and it’s a real mistake not to get that money into Main Street America.”
Hear the entire interview on the audio player below.
