Feedback sought for business program

Business owners in the Santa Clarita Valley and other unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County have a final opportunity to submit their feedback about the county’s proposed business registration program.

To provide feedback, those interested can attend a scheduled business roundtable discussion, offered by the county’s Department of Consumer and Business Affairs, from 6 to 7 p.m. on Tuesday at Stevenson Ranch Library, 25950 The Old Road.

The program is for businesses in unincorporated areas that do not have a business license, since the county does not have any record of businesses in those locations, according to Kimberly Briggs, a spokeswoman with the Consumer and Business Affairs Department.

The county licenses more than 7,000 businesses across 110 individual license categories, but the treasurer and tax collector’s office estimates there may be more than 8,000 additional businesses in the county’s unincorporated areas, according to a motion advocating the program by Supervisors Sheila Kuehl and Janice Hahn.

Briggs added that the program would capture information about those businesses for economic development purposes and to match services best suited for a business.

Participants can expect to offer feedback on questions like, “How could this program maximize benefits and services to you?” and “Who should register and who should be exempt?”

Feedback, collected from business owners and stakeholders, is compiled by a partnered consultant that facilitates the roundtables and presented to the L.A. County Board of Supervisors to consider adopting the program.

If approved, implementation of the program would take place in spring 2019, Briggs said.

Those who are unable to attend the roundtables can submit their comments online at bit.ly/ lacountyBRP and in Spanish at bit.ly/lacountyBRPspanish.

For more information about the business registration program, visit dcba.lacounty.gov/businessregistration.