The general assembly finds and declares that:

(1)  A vibrant and growing small business sector is critical to creating jobs in a dynamic economy;

(2)  Small businesses bear a disproportionate share of regulatory costs and burdens;

(3)  Fundamental changes that are needed in the regulatory and enforcement culture of state agencies to make them more responsive to small business can be made without compromising the statutory missions of the agencies;

(4)  When adopting regulations to protect the health, safety, and economic welfare of Rhode Island state agencies should seek to achieve statutory goals as effectively and efficiently as possible without imposing unnecessary burdens on small employers;

(5)  Uniform regulatory and reporting requirements can impose unnecessary and disproportionately burdensome demands including legal, accounting and consulting costs upon small businesses with limited resources;

(6)  The failure to recognize differences in the scale and resources of regulated businesses can adversely affect competition in the marketplace, discourage innovation, and restrict improvements in productivity;

(7)  Unnecessary regulations create entry barriers in many industries and discourage potential entrepreneurs from introducing beneficial products and processes;

(8)  The practice of treating all regulated businesses as equivalent may lead to inefficient use of regulatory agency resources, enforcement problems, and in some cases, to actions inconsistent with the legislative intent of health, safety, environmental, and economic welfare legislation;

(9)  Alternative regulatory approaches which do not conflict with the stated objective of applicable statutes may be available to minimize the significant economic impact of rules on small businesses;

(10)  The process by which state regulations are developed and adopted should be reformed to require agencies to solicit the ideas and comments of small businesses, to examine the impact of proposed and existing rules on such businesses, and to review the continued need for existing rules.