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Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Published by the San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce |
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Historic Chamber meeting with the Governor
For the first time in the 103-year history of the San Luis Obispo Chamber, a sitting California governor met earlier today in SLO with top Chamber leaders. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is traveling the state talking with key business leaders about his efforts to reform California’s dysfunctional budget process. Schwarzenegger believes the key to fiscal responsibility is to hold state spending growth to 5 percent and use any excess in good years to create a “rainy day fund” to avoid cuts in programs. The governor will likely face an uphill battle convincing legislators to restrain their out-of-control spending. Right now, according to the governor, the state is spending $600 million more a month than it is bringing in. Leaders from our Chamber will be traveling to Sacramento May 20-21 to advocate for our small business agenda with key staff and elected officials. Click here if you’d like to join us. Watch the video from this morning's meeting.
Gov. Schwarzenegger explained that the 10 percent across-the-board proposed cuts are intended to stimulate a bipartisan compromise.
Central Coast media turned out in full force to question the governor.
Schwarzenegger fielded questions from the audience for almost 30 minutes.
Huge response to Chamber survey says “the economy here is still pretty good.”
More than 500 of our members responded to the Chamber’s recent business sentiment survey. And contrary to what you might expect from reading national media reports, a majority told us that SLO’s economy is doing pretty well. (See graphs below.) The same survey will be conducted again in early May to see if there are any important trends. The results will be part of the Chamber’s State of the City’s Economy Lunch May 30 featuring a city-specific economic forecast by nationally known economist Mark Schniepp. Click here to reserve a space.
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Over 50% of respondents believe business conditions in SLO County are good to great, while one-third describe conditions as average. Just 15% report that business conditions are weak locally. |
Nearly one-third of respondents believe business conditions will improve over the next six months, while over 40% percent think conditions will remain steady. |
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| Nearly 60% of respondents said that sales are modestly to substantially growing. |
Over 40% of our respondents are hiring right now and another 49% plan to make no changes. |
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Upcoming Important Events
Mixer at Shore Cliff Lodge- Wednesday, April 16th from 5:30pm to 7:30pm.
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While information in the e-Insider comes from sources we believe to be reliable, we recommend not taking any action on this information without independent corroboration. | | |
