If you’ve ever run a small business or know someone who has, particularly a retail business, you know there are plenty of reasons not to—staff who show up when it suits them, ever-shifting consumer demands that make last season’s sure thing passé, and inventory that chews up your net worth; a portion of which will have to be marked down below cost just to get it off the shelf.

Yet none of these challenges compare to the mind-numbing volume of government regulation and paperwork that a retailer must wade through each month: collecting and administering taxes for one level of government (soon to be two); and remitting contributions to Employment Insurance, Canada Pension Plan and income taxes on behalf of employees.

Retailers must also wade through the swamp of municipal red tape that tells them when they can open, the signs they use to attract customers to their store, as well as when, if and how they entice folks through sidewalk displays.

In previous forays into regulating the local marketplace, council has from time to time attempted to invoke unenforceable protectionist policies aimed at stacking the deck in favour local businesses. Meanwhile most businesses would prefer the County simply focused on minding its own business rather than theirs.

Consider the plight of Jamie Yeo. He runs a food store in Picton. Good Friday is his busiest day of the year. Many summer residents and cottagers arrive on Easter weekend. They prefer to buy supplies here. On a regular day, Yeo might have 30 staff on the floor—on Good Friday he has 45. Every one of them wants to be there. His employees earn time-and-a-half on Good Friday and other statutory holidays and he must typically turn down requests to work that day. Yeo also sells more fish on Good Friday than all but one other day in the year.

A few years ago the provincial government allowed that certain tourist areas, including Prince Edward County, would be permitted, subject to municipal say-so, to open on statutory holidays.

In 2008 the County declared that on Easter Sunday, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day and Thanksgiving Day it would permit retail stores to open, if that was their choice. Only Christmas, New Year’s Day and Family Day would retailers be compelled to stay closed. Good Friday was inexplicably left on the closed list. Easter Sunday open. Good Friday closed?

Imagine the confusion when municipal bylaw enforcement officers appeared at his store last Good Friday telling him to shut his doors or risk a $2,000 fine. Staring at a steep fine, Yeo signed an agreement with municipal officials that he would not reopen on Good Friday, unless the bylaw was changed. Chief Bylaw Enforcement Officer Garry Davis described it as a “conciliatory process.”

Last week a committee of council decided it would indeed allow Yeo and other County retailers to open on Good Friday—but not this year. The request came too late and the bureaucratic hoops too many to get the bylaw in place in time.

The discussion around the issue provided plenty of arguments why County council should focus more of its energies on promoting business and less on regulating matters it doesn’t really understand.

One councillor wanted to haggle with Main Street business owners—insinuating that he would support opening on Good Friday if the retail stores, shops and restaurants on Main Street would stay open later on Friday nights.

“I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch mine,” offered Sophiasburgh Councillor Kevin Gale helpfully.

Another councillor insisted that the business association consult with church groups to take their pulse on the issue of opening on Good Friday. Hillier Councillor Peggy Burris seemed to suggest that her vote on retail business policy hinged on the thumbs up or thumbs down of these church groups.

Ameliasburgh Councillor Lori Slik, too, pronounced her conviction that it is important to recognize this religious holiday— but offered no reason why Good Friday should be treated differently than another religious holidays, in particular Easter Sunday, on which retailers are permitted to open.

Mayor Leo Finnegan said he wasn’t prepared to inflict his religious beliefs upon others, but “as a good Catholic I buy my fish before Good Friday, not on Good Friday.”

It was left to Peter Mertens and a few others to observe how difficult it is to run a retail business in Prince Edward County—where the winters are long and the selling season short. He also took issue with those councillors trying to extort concessions of longer business hours from retailers— many of whom are one- or two-person shops.

“They should be allowed to do business when the business is there,” said Mertens.

Seems reasonable.

rick@wellingtontimes.ca