Online Update: Senate Approves New SBA Chief The Senate has confirmed Maine businesswoman Karen Gordon Mills, President Obama’s choice to head SBA. The April 3 vote, by unanimous consent, came less than 48 hours after Mills appeared before the Small Business Committee for her confirmation hearing. Committee chair Mary Landrieu, D-LA, said pushed for a floor vote before the Senate leaves town for its April recess. “We need a captain of this ship,” Landrieu said. In testimony before the committee, Mills emphasized her record as head of a venture capital firm that invests in small businesses and as a consultant to small manufacturers while she was with McKinsey and Co. She has also served as an economic adviser to Maine Gov. John Baldacci and was recommended for the SBA post by Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe, the committee’s ranking Republican. Landrieu and Snowe renewed their call for SBA to be elevated to cabinet status, as it was during the Clinton administration. Mills declined to take a position on that issue, but said President Obama has told her she will be a member of his National Economic Council and assured her that small business issues are on his agenda. Most questioning at the hearing centered on SBA’s role in providing credit to small businesses. President Obama has designated $15 billion from the Troubled Assets Relief Program (the financial bailout) to purchase SBA-guaranteed loans on the secondary market. The secondary market for SBA loans has been frozen since last summer, meaning many banks have no money available to make new loans. Mills said the dollar volume of SBA loans has fallen by one-half so far in fiscal 2009. She added, “I am very confident…that we will unstick this market.” But some lenders told the Washington Post that the Obama administration’s small business loan program won’t work because it requires lenders to submit to government control if they accept TARP funds. Mills said details of the program are still being worked out. However, SBA loans make up only a tiny part of total small business lending—as little as 4% by some estimates. Mills said one of her first priorities will be to quickly implement bridge loans that are authorized under TARP for troubled firms.