Throughout Rochester’s history, entrepreneurship and business growth have been a cornerstone of our city’s identity. Companies like Kodak, Bausch and Lomb, and Xerox were born in Rochester and helped drive innovation across the globe. However, the prosperity and wealth created by these businesses was not equally distributed. People of color were denied the opportunity to build wealth through business ownership due to a web of discriminatory policies and practices. As Rochester works to reinvent itself and become a town of companies rather than a company town, it is imperative that everyone is given the chance to take part in our economic renaissance.

Last week, Mayor Lovely Warren announced that the City of Rochester was chosen as a member of the Living Cities and Citi Foundation City Accelerator for Local Job Growth. The initiative, set to kick off in early September in Detroit, is a joint effort between the Offices of Community Wealth Building, Innovation, and the Business Development team here at the City. We will be working in partnership with Living Cities, Governing Magazine, and the Citi Foundation to research, develop, and implement strategies to support the growth of local business in Rochester, particularly among women and people of color. The grant provides $100,000 and one year of consulting services from Ascendant Global, an international economic development firm, to support several different initiatives.

Through the City Accelerator project, the City will work to build a stronger and more coordinated network of services available to entrepreneurs and existing small business owners. As anyone who has ever started a business will tell you, the process is extremely complicated – there are dozens of steps that need to be taken, and not everyone has the training needed to do so. There are many organizations in Rochester that offer assistance to entrepreneurs and small business owners. However, there is not yet a defined network of organizations that works collaboratively, makes referrals, and helps entrepreneurs navigate the process of starting their business.

In addition to building a stronger entrepreneurial ecosystem, the City will also take a hard look at how our internal practices and policies can be adjusted to better support local businesses. In recent months we have taken significant steps to strengthen our goals related to Minority and Women Owned Business procurement, enacting the highest standards of any municipality in New York. As part of the City Accelerator process, we will explore how we can further leverage our purchasing power and regulatory authority to ensure that local businesses owned by people of color and women are supported and able to thrive.

We are very excited to work alongside the other cohort members to build a more inclusive local economy here in Rochester. The time has come for us to make sure that Rochester is a safe, vibrant, and prosperous city that works for all, and not just some.