SBA effort for women owners stirs outrage
Frustration with the Small Business Administration has turned to outrage among backers of a long-delayed program that would funnel more federal contracts to small companies owned by women.
Seven years ago, Congress ordered the SBA to draft guidelines so federal agencies could meet the goal of awarding 5% of federal small-business contracts to female owners -- a goal set by law in 1994. Last week, the SBA proposed a rule to implement the program and was criticized by those who said the guideline would be too restrictive.
The new rule would cover just four industries in which the SBA says women-owned small firms don't get their fair share of federal contract dollars: national security and international affairs; coating, engraving, heat treating and allied activities; furniture and kitchen cabinet manufacturing; and motor vehicle dealers.
The guideline also would limit broad eligibility to small businesses owned or controlled by economically disadvantaged women. Contracts awarded under the program would be limited to $5 million or less for manufacturing jobs and $3 million or less for other jobs.
Also, each agency would have to conduct an analysis of its procurement history to see if there was sufficient evidence of discrimination in that industry by the agency before it could reserve a contract exclusively for women-owned small firms.
"I am outraged at the blatant disregard for the law as Congress intended it," said Margot Dorfman, chief executive of the U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce in Washington. "The whole goal of this program is to expand opportunities for women-owned firms. This does nothing to expand the opportunities."
Ceil McCloy, a California small-business owner and federal contractor, agreed.
"I think it's just outrageous," the co-owner of Integrated Science Solutions Inc. of Walnut Creek said of the limited industries to be covered. "I mean, really. Furniture manufacturing? Where is most of that done? It's all offshore, of course."
The proposed rule, which is open for public comment for 60 days after its Dec. 27 publication in the Federal Register, is the third by the SBA meant to implement a law passed in December 2000. Two earlier versions of the rule were eventually dropped.
The law -- the Equity in Contracting for Women Act -- was created to improve the track record of the federal government -- the largest purchasing organization in the world -- when it came to awarding a fair share of its roughly $410 billion in annual procurement spending to women-owned businesses.
