Congress Members Rip Delay in Women’s Set-Aside SBA officials have backed away from a pledge to implement the long-delayed set-aside program for woman-owned businesses by Sept. 30. In appearances before congressional committees, two top SBA officials repeatedly declined to say when the final rule will be issued. President Clinton signed the program into law in December, 2000. The officials also refused to say how eligibility for the set-asides will be determined. SBA sent its draft rule to the Office of Management and Budget on April 23, Associate Administrator Anoop Prakash told the Senate Small Business Committee on Sept. 20. He said the rule has been forwarded for comment to the agencies that will be affected by the program. “It is a complex rule. It is not a typical rule,” Prakash said, adding, “It’s being reviewed by 24 different agencies. I couldn’t speak for the pace at which those agencies review.” The delay in implementing the set-aside – now approaching seven years – has cost woman-owned businesses $6 billion in lost contracts, according Committee Chairman John Kerry, D-MA. “It is disgraceful,” Kerry said. “There is sort of a complete indifference to the law, to a sort of pride in job and in accomplishment. I don’t know what it is. It’s either an indifference or an arrogance. It’s one or the other. But either way, it’s pretty unacceptable.” The committee’s ranking Republican, Olympia Snowe of Maine, declared SBA “has displayed a complacency or a disregard for the value of those programs for women entrepreneurs.” SBA Deputy Administrator Jovita Carranza got a similar earful from members of the House Small Business Committee on Sept. 19. “You’re doing everything – SBA and OMB – to stall this process,” said Committee Chairwoman Nydia Velazquez, D-NY. “’We’re not interested in doing business with you,’ that’s the message…to the women business owners of this nation.” Rep. Bruce Braley, D-IA, said the committee should consider whether to hold SBA Administrator Steven Preston in contempt of Congress. Both committee chairs, Velazquez and Kerry, said Preston had assured them as late as July that the set-aside program would be in place by the end of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30. But Carranza also refused to estimate when the final rule would be issued. She said the review by two dozen agencies is “a very onerous process.” The SBA officials would not say how the agency plans to determine which businesses are eligible for the set-asides. Congress mandated that set-asides will be provided for businesses owned by socially and economically disadvantaged women in industries where women are underrepresented in federal contracting. In industries where women are “substantially underrepresented,” all woman-owned firms would be eligible for set-asides. But a Rand Corp. study found extreme variations in underrepresentation depending on how it is counted. The study estimated that woman-owned businesses are underrepresented in 87% of industries, measured by the number of contracts going to those companies. When measured by the contract dollars going to women, however, they are underrepresented in only .005% of industries, according to Rep. Velazquez. The 24 affected agencies have been asked to comment on the issue of eligibility, SBA’s Prakash said.