The House Small Business Committee’s Republican leaders have a high-profile ally in their recent criticisms of pilot programs and new initiatives at the Small Business Administration.

      The committee’s senior Democratic lawmaker, Rep. Lydia Velazquez of New York, has been vocal at recent hearings raising objections to new SBA programs that lack specific congressional authorizations or may have limited oversight or metrics for judging their success.

      While GOP members on the panel have repeatedly slammed Obama Administration programs, their comments have been viewed, to some degree, as politically motivated. Velazquez’ comments are likely to have greater impact because she hails from the same political party as the president and because of her status as the senior Democrat on the House small business panel.

      While Velazquez has urged more innovation and new approaches at the SBA in the past, she currently is pressing the agency to rely almost exclusively on longstanding programs such as Small Business Development Centers that she says are efficient and proven to work.

      “Initiatives like the Small Business Development Center are recognized delivery mechanisms for nearly every entrepreneurial develop pilot program the agency has created,” Velazquez said at the April 30 hearing. “The real question is - why spend money on initiatives that lack the proven track record and safeguards that other SBA programs have? This makes no sense.”

      The programs under fire are primarily the SBA’s $15 million for Entrepreneurship Education, $6 million for Regional Innovation Clusters, $7 million for Boots to Business veterans entrepreneurship training program, and $5 million for Growth Accelerators. The GOP lawmakers on the committee wrote an advisory report in March recommending $50 million in cuts to the SBA’s budget, including $39 million to be chopped from those entrepreneurial education programs as well as Women’s Business Centers.

      “Similar to previous years, the SBA continues to support initiatives that lack a specific statutory authorization. This practice is wasteful, and should not be allowed to continue,” Velazquez said at the report markup in March in which she backed the proposed $39 million reduction in the SBA budget.

      She also said she agreed with concerns raised by Chairman Sam Graves, R-MO, about apparent lack of oversight and performance metrics for SBA pilot projects.

      “By continuing new programs, the SBA is squandering limited resources,” Velazquez added. “It should be relying on time-tested programs at a fraction of the cost.”

      Velazquez is urging fewer initiatives and more support for SBA’s longstanding programs. But a year ago, she was pressing the SBA to innovate more and to avoid relying on two of the SBA’s longstanding programs -- Procurement Center Representatives (PCRs) and Offices of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization (OSDBUs).

      “This (PCRs and OSDBUs) has not worked in a decade and there is no evidence suggesting it will work now,” Velazquez said at the time. “ We should be exploring innovative ways to meet contracting goals, not maintaining the current, broken system that fails small businesses.” Her spokesman declined to comment further.

      Despite Velazquez’ criticisms, the SBA does not appear to be backing down on new programs. On May 13, the agency launched its $2.5 million growth accelerator competition for small tech startups, a program that Valezquez and others claimed was duplicative.

More information: April 2014 hearing video: http://goo.gl/qO3Ipm
March 2014 hearing video: http://goo.gl/ddD7vA
Velazquez March 2013 statement: http://goo.gl/ZiklbM