Whisper Mondragon is the proud new small business owner of Unique Play Place and Unique Work Place.A business where parents with remote jobs can work while their children have supervised care right next door."Our memberships range from drop-in day passes around $20 all the way to full-time co-working memberships," said Mondragon.She opened her doors just weeks ago. For her starting a new business in Colorado was a years-long process, partly due to the pandemic, but also because of hurdles with childcare licensing.Mondragon is far from the only employee turned entrepreneur post-2020."We've had a huge surge in new business applications nationwide, but also in the state and in the region since the pandemic," says Dr. Bill Craighead, Director of the UCCS Economic Forum.According to the U.S. Census Bureau, colorado had nearly 139,000 new business applications in 2023, leading the nation in a year-over-year percentage increase.The numbers were bolstered by Colorado's temporary one-dollar filing fee for a new business, but even once that relief ended, data shows business filings have remained higher than before, both statewide and in the Pikes Peak Region."If I look locally, the number of business establishments in the Pikes Peak region is about 10% higher than you would have expected if you had just continued the trend that we saw in the years leading up to the pandemic," says Craighead.You can learn all about this and more at the UCCS economic forum being hosted on Thursday. For more information about the event and how you can watch it, click here._______Watch KOAA News5 on your time, anytime with our free streaming app available for your Roku, FireTV, AppleTV and Android TV. Just search KOAA News5, download and start watching.