Provides for the promotion of local small businesses listed on the registry of historic businesses as part of the "I Love NY" brand.
This bill amends the Economic Development Law to explicitly include the promotion of local small businesses listed on the state registry of historic businesses within the Department of Economic Development’s tourism and marketing responsibilities. It builds on the existing “I Love NY” branding framework by authorizing a niche “I Love NY Historic Small Business” brand and directing the department to develop guidelines that allow the brand to be used in targeted promotional efforts highlighting historic small businesses.
The bill also expands reporting requirements so the department must annually report not only on general “I Love NY” branding activities, but also on the historic small business niche brand. Those reports must include marketing plans, licensing activity, contractual services, sponsorships, an analysis of the effectiveness of brand-based tourism promotion, and a list of historic small businesses featured in the promotions. In addition, the bill amends the state’s tourism matching grant program to allow eligible entities to use state matching funds for themed marketing campaigns that include the historic small business brand.
In practical terms, the bill affects the Department of Economic Development, tourism promotion entities, local governments, and nonprofit or public benefit organizations that may use the brand at no cost. It does not create a new regulatory program for businesses themselves, but it does expand state marketing and reporting obligations and gives historic small businesses a formal place in state tourism promotion efforts. The bill also ties its effective date to the companion 2024 law creating the niche brand, indicating it is intended to operate alongside that earlier enactment.
The overall sentiment reflected in the bill’s legislative history is strongly favorable. The measure advanced unanimously through the Assembly Small Business Committee, Assembly Rules Committee, and both chambers’ floor votes, with no recorded opposition in the provided history. That suggests broad bipartisan support for using state tourism branding to support historic small businesses and local economic development.
There is little visible contention in the available materials. The main policy choice is whether the state should devote branding, reporting, and matching-grant resources to a specialized historic small business promotion effort, but the unanimous votes indicate that any concerns were not significant enough to generate recorded dissent. The bill appears to be viewed as a low-conflict economic development and tourism measure that leverages an existing state brand rather than creating a new standalone program.
The bill amends sections 100, 152, and 153 of the Economic Development Law to add historic small business promotion to the Department of Economic Development’s statutory tourism and marketing duties, expand annual reporting on “I Love NY” niche branding, and allow themed tourism grant funding to support campaigns that include the “I Love NY Historic Small Business” brand. It also reinforces the connection to the registry of historic businesses maintained under the Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation Law, thereby linking tourism promotion policy with the state’s historic business registry.
The legislative history shows uniformly favorable sentiment. The Assembly Small Business Committee, Assembly Rules Committee, Assembly floor, and Senate floor all approved the bill unanimously, with no recorded nay votes. That pattern suggests broad support for promoting historic small businesses through state tourism branding and for using the existing “I Love NY” platform to do so.
No major contention is evident in the provided record. The only potentially debatable issues are the scope of the Department of Economic Development’s branding responsibilities, the added reporting burden, and the use of state matching funds for themed marketing campaigns. However, the unanimous committee and floor votes indicate that these issues did not produce visible opposition in the available legislative history.