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Lieutenant governor's office unveils push for employee‑ownership succession, seeks town support
Summary
Jacob de Belcourt of the lieutenant governor's office described a statewide Business Enterprise Succession Task Force that will promote employee ownership as a succession strategy for retiring small-business owners, propose a center for employee ownership and launch a business succession survey.
Jacob de Belcourt, deputy director for policy and communications in Lieutenant Governor Sabina Matos’s office, presented the state office’s employee-ownership advocacy roadmap to the Westerly Town Council on March 17.
De Belcourt said more than half of Rhode Island small-business owners are over age 55 and the state is seeing closures when owners retire rather than sell to successors. He described two employee-ownership models already in Rhode Island—employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) and worker cooperatives—and cited research that employee ownership is associated with longer employee tenure and better wages and benefits.
The lieutenant governor’s office has formed a Business Enterprise Succession Task Force (the “BEST” team) that includes business advocates, the Rhode Island Worker Cooperative Alliance, the Small Business Administration, the Small Business Development Center and RI Commerce. De Belcourt said the office plans a public launch and a succession survey to identify businesses at risk of closure because owners have not made succession plans.
De Belcourt outlined the office’s near-term goals: technical assistance and programming, outreach to business networks, and budgetary requests to establish a center for employee ownership that would provide legal, accounting and permitting assistance to owners seeking to transfer their firms to employees. He described Colorado as a model the office is reviewing and said the state task force will explore multiple delivery models—including stand‑alone centers, university partnerships, or smaller start-up arrangements scaled to Rhode Island.
Councilors asked how local governments and the council could help. De Belcourt requested help promoting the forthcoming succession survey, suggested the council consider letters of support for state budget requests, and offered to provide resource materials and follow‑up contacts to the town clerk. He left his contact information for local follow up.
