[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 20]
[Senate]
[Pages 27274-27275]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT

  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I rise to speak in favor of my amendment 
No. 2528, unanimously adopted into the National Defense Authorization 
Act for fiscal year 2006, to provide targeted size standard relief for 
small U.S. contractors incurring extraordinary security and protection 
costs on foreign battlefields in the global war on terror.
  Right now, in Iraq and Afghanistan, there are many brave, small 
contracting businesses working alongside our uniformed soldiers in many 
cases. Employees of these small contracting firms get shot at and 
encounter roadside bombs, suicide attacks, ambushes, and kidnapings. 
Yet, in order to provide our military with desperately needed goods and 
services, these small battlefield firms diligently endure these daily 
risks.
  These daily dangers force small conflict zone firms to hire well 
armed, private security guards, and to incur extraordinary security 
expenses in order to protect their employees. The violence towards 
civilian contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan has become so prevalent 
that the government often requires companies to provide security 
services, and treats these extraordinary security costs as reimbursable 
contractor expenses. These security expense reimbursements do not 
increase or expand small contracting firms' core business capabilities. 
Instead the money the government pays to small battlefield contractors 
for security expenses is passed directly through to the security 
subcontractor providing protection to the small firms' employees.
  Unfortunately, the Government's valid reimbursement of conflict-zone 
security expenses artificially inflates the size of many small 
battlefield firms causing them to out grow the Small Business 
Administration's small businesses size standards. It is important to 
understand that the SBA size standards were established on the basis of 
normal revenues for small businesses operating in North America. But, 
currently, these domestic size standards are penalizing our small 
contractors operating outside the U.S. and in war zones by eliminating 
their ability to obtain crucial small business contracts and loans once 
they exceed the domestic standards.
  Our most reliable and dependable small battlefield firms, because 
they operate overseas, are.in danger of artificially outgrowing the 
SBA's domestic size standards. Not only does this artificial growth 
hurt small business ability to survive, it also harms the U.S. 
Government's ability to secure contracts for much needed goods and 
services that are used to support our troops in war zones. This 
ultimately reduces the Federal Government's access to experienced small 
contractors and hampers the Government's efforts to comply with the 
Government's annual statutory small business contracting goals.
  My amendment directs the SBA to conduct a study and provide a report 
to Congress on the fairness of exempting reimbursement for subcontracts 
for private security services from the size standards caps applicable 
to small firms that perform contracts and subcontracts on overseas 
battlefields. I urge my colleagues to support our small battlefield 
contractors currently in harms' way by retaining this important 
amendment in the Defense authorization conference report.

[[Page 27275]]



                          ____________________