A 8294: Authorizes the director of the division of minority and women's business development and the mayor of the city of New York to enter into a memorandum of understanding to allow reciprocity between the state and New York City for businesses that are certified as minority and women-owned business enterprises.

  
  STATE OF NEW YORK ________________________________________________________________________ 8294 2025-2026 Regular Sessions  IN ASSEMBLY May 12, 2025 ___________ Introduced by M. of A. SEPTIMO -- read once and referred to the Commit- tee on Ways and Means AN ACT to amend the executive law, in relation to reciprocal minority and women-owned business enterprise certification The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem- bly, do enact as follows: 1 Section 1. Paragraphs (a) and (b) of subdivision 2-a of section 314 of 2 the executive law, as amended by chapter 96 of the laws of 2019, subpar- 3 agraph (i) of paragraph (a) as amended by chapter 669 of the laws of 4 2022, are amended to read as follows: 5 (a) The director shall establish a procedure [enabling] requiring the 6 office to accept New York municipal corporation certification verifica- 7 tion for minority and women-owned business enterprise applicants in lieu 8 of requiring the applicant to complete the state certification process 9 separately. [The] Any municipal corporation that chooses to use such 10 procedure shall first enter into a memorandum of understanding regarding 11 acceptance of such municipal corporation certification verification with 12 the office, and the director shall promulgate rules and regulations to 13 set forth criteria for the acceptance of municipal corporation certif- 14 ication. [All eligible municipal corporation certifications] An appli- 15 cant certified in lieu of completing the state certification process 16 separately pursuant to this section shall [require] meet the definition 17 of a minority-owned business [enterprises seeking certification to meet 18 the following standards: 19 (i) have at least fifty-one percent ownership by a minority] enter- 20 prise or a women-owned business enterprise [and be owned by United 21 States citizens or permanent resident noncitizens; 22 (ii) be an enterprise in which the minority and/or women-ownership 23 interest is real, substantial and continuing; EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets [ ] is old law to be omitted. LBD01154-01-5 
 A. 8294 2 1 (iii) be an enterprise in which the minority and/or women-ownership 2 has and exercises the authority to control independently the day-to-day 3 business decisions of the enterprise; 4 (iv) be an enterprise authorized to do business in this state; 5 (v) be subject to a physical site inspection to verify the fifty-one 6 percent ownership requirement; 7 (vi) be owned by an individual or individuals, whose ownership, 8 control and operation are relied upon for certification, with a personal 9 net worth that does not exceed fifteen million dollars and such other 10 amount as the director shall set forth in regulations, as adjusted annu- 11 ally for inflation according to the consumer price index; and 12 (vii) be an enterprise that is a small business pursuant to subdivi- 13 sion twenty of] as set forth in section three hundred ten of this arti- 14 cle in order to receive state certification. 15 (b) The director shall work with all municipal corporations that have 16 a municipal minority and women-owned business enterprise program to 17 develop standards to accept state certification to meet the municipal 18 corporation minority and women-owned business enterprise certification 19 standards whenever a municipal corporation requests assistance. Upon 20 entering into a memorandum of understanding pursuant to paragraph (a) of 21 this subdivision, each municipal corporation that has a municipal minor- 22 ity and women-owned business enterprise program shall establish a proce- 23 dure requiring such municipality to accept state certification verifica- 24 tion for minority and women-owned business enterprise applicants in lieu 25 of requiring applicants to apply to each entity separately. The munici- 26 pal corporation shall develop rules and regulations in order to accept 27 state certification in situations where an applicant who is certified as 28 a minority or women-owned business enterprise pursuant to the law or 29 rule for such municipal corporation's certification program also meets 30 the definition of a minority-owned business enterprise or women-owned 31 business enterprise as set forth in section three hundred ten of this 32 article. 33 § 2. This act shall take effect on the two hundred seventieth day 34 after it shall have become a law; provided, however, that the amendments 35 to paragraphs (a) and (b) of subdivision 2-a of section 314 of the exec- 36 utive law made by section one of this act shall not affect the repeal of 37 such section and shall be deemed repealed therewith.