New Address: Two Embarcadero Center, 8th floor, San Francisco, CA 94111     

Veteran Program Ramp Up

Vote for Claudia for the Small Business Influencer Award – and vote everyday! She’s in the top 10. Let’s keep her there!

  • Welcome Veterans Outreach Consultant
  • Understanding Healthcare Webinar
  • The Goodies – This week’s highlight includes free tuition for Economic Development 201-Business Credit Analysis for staff from non-profit 501c(3) organizations, courtesy of Citi. The training is September 9-13, 2013 in Orange County. Learn more and register.

Welcome Veterans Outreach Consultant, Liz Perez

The Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy reported that veterans are between 45-88% more likely to be self-employed compared to civilians. CAMEO sees an opportunity to serve veterans in their communities, linking them directly to our network of micro business organizations. To help our members better serve veteran entrepreneurs, we hired an expert – welcome to our new Veterans Outreach Consultant, Elizabeth “Liz” Perez-Halperin. Liz will be ramping up our veterans program, with a special focus on women veterans. She’ll be driving outreach efforts and facilitating referral relationships between traditional veteran serving organizations and CAMEO member organizations.

A little about Liz: Elizabeth “Liz” Perez-Halperin is the President and founder of GC Green Incorporated (GCG), a certified woman, Native American, and 9/11 service disabled veteran owned Green Build General Contracting and Consulting Firm. Prior to starting GCG, Liz was in the green build and engineering industry for six years in San Diego, and served in the United States Navy for over eight years as an Aviation Logistics Specialist. She is passionate about using her experience and network to help other Veterans to find job opportunities in the green economy and to promote to Veterans to seek out and follow their own entrepreneurial dreams.

Look for a call from Liz in the coming months.

Understanding Healthcare Webinar

California’s health insurance exchange (SHOP) will be a one-stop shop where our entrepreneurs can find the right health insurance policy for their needs and budget. It will allow small businesses to pool their buying power to help drive down coverage costs. To prepare you, CAMEO is hosting a webinar for you to learn how about the new SHOP exchange so you can tell your clients. We’ve invited Rhea Aguinaldo from Small Business Majority to present on the new healthcare options for California. (We’re thrilled that Rhea is still involved in the CAMEO network!) Join us on Wednesday, August 21, 2013 at 11:00am PT.

This webinar will focus on what the new healthcare law, the Affordable Care Act, means for small businesses. It will focus on both federal and state provisions to help local small business owners understand how the law will affect them. Learn more and register for What Healthcare Reform Means for Your California Small Business.

Anyone who talks to clients should be ‘fluent’ in healthcare and should attend this webinar. Your clients need to know this important information about their healthcare options.

The Department of Health and Human Services launched a call center specifically to serve small employers (50 or fewer employees) in the SHOP Marketplace. It’s open Monday-Friday from 9:00am-5:00pm ET and hours will expand after October 1, with customer service representatives available to help in English and Spanish. Call 1-800-706-7893 (TTY users: 1-800-706-7915).

The Goodies

New opportunities for trainings, conference information, funding, scholarships, and other information that have crossed our desks since the last Must Know: I have posted a running tab of current Goodies on the CAMEO website that lists items that were in past emails. Check it out to make sure you’re not missing anything, like grants whose deadlines are still alive!

For Your Clients: Intuit is giving one lucky small business the opportunity of a lifetime: an ad in the Superbowl on 2/2/14. They are taking business stories now until the end of September. Learn more on Small Business, Big Game.

Free Guide: BALLE posted the Guide to Going Local. It’s full of ideas and advice on how to strengthen the local economy in your town: through buying local, highlighting new entrepreneurs, instilling local pride, investing locally, and more.

Free Webinar: Increasing demands to meet the needs of underserved local communities, CDFIs are re-assessing of how they build their pipelines and produce results. More and more CDFIs are finding it necessary to build a mission-driven sales culture. Register for this webinar on a mission-driven sales culture for CDFI’s, hosted by Friedman Associates on August 22, 2013 at 11:00 am PDT // 2:00 pm EDT.

Free Training: As part of Citi’s commitment to building the capacity of partner organizations serving our local communities, it’s supporting a series of community economic development trainings focused on economic and community development finance conducted by the National Development Council (NDC). Through a contribution from the Citi Foundation, the cost of the tuition for Economic Development 201 – Business Credit Analysis will be provided at no cost to staff from non-profit 501c(3) organizations, including CDCs and CDFIs. The training is September 9 – 13, 2013 in Orange County. Learn more and register.

USDA RMAP Grant: USDA’s Rural Microentrepreneur Assistance Program (RMAP) will provide about $12.2 million to eligible applicants this year. Under the program, USDA may provide loans of up to $500,000 to Microenterprise Development Organizations (MDOs). They, in turn, make microloans for business start-up or development to eligible microentrepreneurs who are unable to obtain conventional credit elsewhere. Grants of up to $30,000 are available for MDOs to provide technical assistance and training, particularly in rural areas that have experienced significant outmigration. RMAP applications are due by September 13, 2013. Learn more or contact any USDA Rural Development state office.

Conference: Beacon Economics and UC Riverside’s School of Business Administration present the seventh annual Riverside/San Bernardino Economic Forecast Conference. Join some of the state’s leading economic forecasters and hear what’s next for the U.S., California, and inland Southern California economies. The conference takes place on October 29, 2013 from 8-11:00am at the Riverside Auditorium and Events Center (Municipal Auditorium). CAMEO members receive the ‘Affiliate Discounted Admission’ of $90. Learn more and register.