Agencies Fail to Meet Women-Owned Goals for Recovery Act

SBA's Associate Administrator for Government Contracting Business Development, Joe Jordon, testified before the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee that agencies are not meeting their women-owned goal of 5% with respect to stimulus contracts. According to Mr. Jordan, as of October 2, nearly 26 percent of all federal stimulus contracting dollars, or more than $4 billion, was awarded to small businesses.  Specifically, more than $1 out of every $4 spent on federal Recovery Act contracts has gone to small businesses, even though the Recovery Act does not set a specific goal for small business contracting.  In most cases, agencies have been instructed to follow the government's annual goal of awarding 23 percent of all prime contract monies to small businesses.  This means that out of the approximately $60 billion in stimulus funds expected to be awarded through federal contracts, about $13 billion should go to small businesses. 
 
While other disadvantaged business categories have received amounts in excess of the relevant goals, agencies have failed to meet the women-owned small business goal of 5 percent.  Rather, women-owned small businesses have received only 4 percent of all Recovery contracts.  "Until the SBA implements the Women's Procurement Program which gives contracting officers a tool to restrict competition to women-owned firms, we will continue to fall behind," said Barbara Kasoff, WIPP President.  The SBA has developed its first online training course specifically geared toward women in federal contracting: Winning Federal Contracts: A Guide for Women Entrepreneurs.  Click here to access the free course. 

Sadie Wathen, Small Business Policy Analyst