Creating jobs isn’t just about traditional work-with-your-hands employment on highway projects, school construction or in Puget Sound boatyards – although House Democrats are good at that. It’s also about improving the 21st-century business environment to help entrepreneurs launch successful start-ups that can hire all kinds of workers, wearing collars of various colors.
That’s the goal of House Bill 2023 , by Rep. Cyrus Habib of Kirkland, which has cleared the Legislature and awaits the governor’s signature to become law. The measure allows Washingtonians to engage in equity crowdfunding, the practice of raising money, often over the Internet, by soliciting small investments from numerous investors.
An outgrowth of crowdsourcing, crowdfunding techniques have been popularized by ventures like Kickstarter. But entrepreneurs are hampered in the use of crowdfunding by complex securities regulations that are expensive and burdensome. HB 2023 cuts through the red tape.
The bill is tailored to apply only to Washington state companies raising limited amounts of capital in small individual amounts from in-state investors. If the measure becomes law, Washington would join only a handful of states that have eased access to equity crowdfunding. For a take on the bill from a blogger in Seattle’s trendy Capitol Hill neighborhood, click here.