Oct 6, 2017   SOURCE: BusinessWire

VetLikeMe Mobilizes Veteran Small Business Owners to End SBA Abuses

VetLikeMe is launching a national campaign to encourage Veteran Owned Small Businesses to send comments to the Small Business Administration (SBA) demanding an end to SBA’s practice of fabricating compliance with federal regulations.

Federal small business contracting goals – compiled and published annually by SBA - routinely exclude hundreds of billions in federal contracts from their calculations of the percentage of contracts awarded to Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Businesses (SDVOSB).

The American Small Business League analyzed data from the Federal Procurement Data System and the Congressional Budget Office that revealed that SDVOSB have likely been shortchanged by as much as $200 billion in federal contracts and subcontracts over the last 10 years.

Federal law mandates that SDVOSB receive a minimum of 3% of the total value of all federal contracts and subcontracts. The Congressional Budget Office reported the discretionary spending budget for fiscal year 2016 was $1.2 trillion. SDVOSB should have received a minimum of $36 billion in federal contracts for the 3% goal to be achieved for fiscal year 2016.

A study by the Senate Small Business Committee found that a 1% increase in federal contracts to small businesses creates at least 100,000 new jobs. If the federal government were to ensure SDVOSB received the full 3% of all federal contracts, more than 200,000 new jobs a year would be created.

VetLikeMe has launched a national campaign to urge veteran small business owners to send comments to the SBA opposing the practice of excluding the vast majority of federal acquisitions in these ‘calculations.’

Additionally, VetLikeMe encourages comments that oppose the policy the SBA uses to report awards to Fortune 500 firms, large corporations and their subsidiaries as small business awards.

Fraud and abuse in the federal contracting program for SDVOSB and all federal programs created to assist small businesses have been uncovered by the Government Accountability Office, the SBA Office of Inspector General, Public Citizen, Mother Jones, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, Fox News, Fox Business and RTTV.

SBA is taking public comments until October 15 on ways to improve the efficiency of the agency. Comments can be sent to the SBA HERE.