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WILKES-BARRE — If only the city’s how-to-start-a-business guide was around when Dan Carey was looking for help getting his barber shop up and running.
The guide made available at City Hall this week would have made it a lot easier for the owner of Carey’s Avenue Barber Shop on Carey Avenue.
“This is exactly what I was looking for. I went completely out of order,” Carey said Wednesday after he got a look at the free handout.
His shop is in a space formerly occupied by a beauty salon, so zoning wasn’t an issue for him. However, Carey said he was not sure about permits for renovating the property. As a homeowner, he can get a permit and do the work himself on his home. As a business owner renting space, Carey said he found out he couldn’t take out a permit and do the work.
The step-by-step pamphlet with fee schedules, phone numbers and contact information was created in house and based on feedback the city received during roundtable sessions with small business owners after Mayor Tony George took office in 2016.
“I attended a couple of those meetings. This actually has pleased me beyond belief,” Carey said. “I think these steps are easily followed.”
Carey voiced his frustrations to Ted Wampole, who had not yet taken the city administrator’s post in George’s administration, and they weren’t ignored. Wampole credited Carey with coming up with the idea for a guide.
“He just talked about the things he had to do to open up his business,” Wampole said. And that left Wampole thinking the city has to do a better job to inform people interested in starting a business how to go about it.
“This does that,” Wampole said.
Based on the input from Carey and the other participants at the sessions, the administration created the four-page pamphlet that explains the process from beginning to end and includes zoning and tax information and small business resources.
“It really has everything in it,” Wampole said.
Planning and Zoning Director Bill Harris and Office of Community Development Director Kurt Sauer helped with the guide and Tyler Ryan, assistant to the mayor, designed it, Wampole said. A limited run of 50 was printed and distributed to offices in City Hall for the public. The guide will soon be available online at the city’s website, www.wilkes-barre.city.
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