U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud will tour several small businesses in the 2nd Congressional District starting today to hear directly from their owners and workers, he said Tuesday.
A member of the House Small Business Committee, the four-term Democratic incumbent from East Millinocket plans to visit at least eight towns within the district, the largest east of the Mississippi River, by Friday.
Wednesday
Department of Veterans Affairs clinic, 1072 Minot Ave., Auburn, 9 a.m.
Maine Organic Milling Inc., 84 Goldthwaite Road, Auburn, 12:30 p.m.
Boxes & Bags, Unlimited, 765 Webster St., Lewiston, 2:30 p.m.
Baxter Brewing Co., Bates Mill Complex, Lewiston, 4 p.m.
Thursday
Wallace Brothers-Sperry Nets, Inc., 90 Goulds Ridge Road, Passadumkeag, 11:15 a.m.
KB Corp., 122 Penny Road, Old Town, 1 p.m.
Friday
Millinocket Fabrication and Machine, 432 Katahdin Ave., Millinocket, 9 a.m.
Wood Prairie Farms, 49 Kinney Road, Bridgewater, 12:30 p.m.
CNL Auto, 581 Main St., Presque Isle, 2:45 p.m.
Northern Prosthetics, 40 North St., Presque Isle, 4 p.m.
Perhaps underscoring the importance of the economy as an issue in this year’s elections, Michaud and his opponent, Republican Jason Levesque of Auburn, have toured downtowns and businesses within the district several times already.
“The economy is issue No. 1 and the congressman wants to hear what’s working and what isn’t,” Michaud’s spokesman, Ed Gilman, said Tuesday. “He wants to know what things in Washington we can do to make their ability to create jobs easier — and he wants to hear directly from them.
“He also wants to make sure that Mainers know there are valuable programs out there that can help them,” Gilman added.
In mid-August, Levesque blamed Michaud and other Democratic policymakers for a slight increase in the state unemployment rate and national weekly jobless claims rising to 500,000 — the highest point since November 2009.
Levesque called the numbers “yet another round of unemployment statistics and another round of disappointment for families in Maine and across the country.”
Michaud’s tour will highlight how he has been able to marshal federal resources to aid small Maine businesses. A number of the businesses Michaud will visit have worked with Maine’s Small Business Development Center, a cooperative effort involving the private sector, the educational community and federal, state and local governments that offers one-stop assistance to individuals and small businesses, the congressman said in a statement.
Others have received guidance from the Knowledge Transfer Alliance, an initiative for which Michaud helped support funding. It connects Maine businesses and communities with the tools they need to recover from economic and natural disasters. The alliance also helps develop solutions to prevent future hardships and create sustainable frameworks so that businesses may thrive in the future.
Michaud also will visit the temporary Department of Veterans Affairs clinic at 1072 Minot Ave. in Auburn at 9 a.m. today.
Not all of Michaud’s efforts have met with success, he said. In June the House passed a bill that would leverage up to $300 billion in loans for small businesses through a $30 billion lending fund for small and medium-sized community banks that focus on lending to small firms.
The House also passed a bill that would increase the capital gains tax cut for those who invest in small businesses and increase to $20,000 — from $5,000 in current law — the deduction for startup expenditures in connection with investigating the creation of a business.
But both bills have stalled in the Senate.
“We are hoping that we will see some movement on them in the fall,” Gilman said.