[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 5226-5227]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

      By Ms. LANDRIEU (for herself and Mr. Durbin):
  S. 3190. A bill to reaffirm that the Small Business Reauthorization 
Act of 1997 does not limit a contracting officer's discretion regarding 
whether to make a contract available for award pursuant to any of the 
restricted competition programs authorized by the Small Business Act; 
to the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I am pleased to introduce the Small 
Business Parity Programs Act of 2010. As the Chair of the Committee on 
Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I have held a number of hearings 
and roundtables on the issues affecting small businesses that contract 
with the Federal Government. The legislation I am introducing today 
represents the second of several steps the Committee is taking to 
address some of the disparities and inequalities that prevent our small 
businesses from receiving their fair share of government contracts.
  As the largest purchaser in the world, the Federal Government is 
uniquely positioned to offer new and reliable business opportunities 
for our Main Street businesses. Government contracts are perhaps one of 
the easiest and most inexpensive ways the government can help 
immediately increase sales for America's entrepreneurs, giving them the 
tools they need to keep our economy strong and create jobs. When large 
businesses get government contracts, they can potentially absorb that 
new work into their workforce. When small businesses get government 
work they must ``staff up'' to meet the increased demand. By increasing 
contracts to small businesses by just 1 percent, we can create more 
than 100,000

[[Page 5227]]

new jobs--and today, we need those jobs more than ever.
  But small businesses face significant challenges in competing for 
these contracts, including a maze of complicated regulations, contract 
bundling, size standards with loopholes for big businesses and a lack 
of protections for sub-contractors. Despite the fact that federal 
agencies have a statutory goal to spend 23 percent of their contract 
dollars on contracts to small firms, and to ensure fair participation 
by women-owned firms, small disadvantaged firms, service-disabled 
veteran firms, and HUBZone businesses, the agencies often fall short of 
these goals.
  The Small Business Parity Programs Act of 2010 is just the second of 
several steps that I am undertaking to ensure that all small businesses 
have fair access to government contracting opportunities. This 
particular legislation will reaffirm Congress's intent that government 
contracting officers have the discretion to choose among any of the 
small business development and contracting programs when deciding to 
make a contract award. This legislation makes clear that small 
businesses that participate in the 8(a), service-disabled veterans, 
women, and HUBZone programs all have a fair opportunity to win these 
contracts.
  Two recent decisions by the Government Accountability Office 
misinterpreted Congress's long-standing intent with regard to the 
operation of the current laws governing these programs. The decisions 
stated that the HUBZone program had preference over all other small 
business contracting programs. The decisions were also relied upon in a 
recent opinion issued by a judge of the Court of Federal Claims, in a 
case called Mission Critical Solutions v. United States.
  I was disappointed by these decisions because they misinterpret the 
intent of Congress in passing the Small Business Reauthorization Act of 
1997. For this reason, along with the Small Business Committee's 
Ranking Member, Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine, I filed an amendment 
containing the provisions included in this bill to S. 1390, the 
Department of Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. The 
amendment was accepted and passed the full Senate on July 24, 2009 with 
overwhelming and bipartisan support. To my disappointment, it did not 
make it through conference Committee with the House and was left out of 
the final bill. The Conference Report accompanying that bill did 
include, however, explicit language reaffirming Congress' intent that 
``contracting officers of the Department of Defense and other federal 
agencies have the discretion whether or not to award contracts pursuant 
to the HUBZone program'' or any of the other small business procurement 
programs.
  As Chair of the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I 
have focused a considerable amount of energy on promoting the interests 
of small businesses in the federal contracting arena. The legislation I 
am introducing will, quite simply, make clear that it has always been 
Congress' intent to allow contracting officers to accord parity to each 
restricted competition program authorized by the Small Business Act.
  This legislation will have an immediate, positive impact for small 
businesses seeking fair access to federal contracts. It will reaffirm 
contracting officers' flexibility to award contracts to HUBZone 
businesses, which provide important benefits for hard-hit communities. 
At the same time, it also will reaffirm Congress's intent to ensure 
robust implementation of the 8(a), SDVO and Women-Owned small business 
development and procurement programs. Among other things, programs such 
as these are crucial to enable the government to address the 
significant discriminatory barriers that evidence submitted to us shows 
still limit the opportunities available for minority-owned businesses, 
women-owned businesses, and SDVO businesses to participate in the 
marketplace.
  The language of our bill is intended to make clear that no single 
restricted competition program has priority over any other, contrary to 
the misinterpretation of Congress' intent by the GAO and one decision 
of the Court of Federal Claims. However, nothing in the bill is 
intended to change the current requirement that, where a contracting 
officer chooses to make an award pursuant to the HUBZone program, that 
award must be made on the basis of restricted competition if the 
contracting officer has a reasonable expectation that at least two 
qualified HUBZone small business concerns will submit offers and that 
the award can be made at a fair market price.
  It is well past time to provide greater opportunities for the 
thousands of small business owners who wish to do business with the 
Federal Government. I believe that this legislation is a good step 
toward opening those doors.
  I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this simple yet 
commonsense bill and I look forward to working with them as we move 
this legislation forward.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be 
printed in the Record, as follows:

                                S. 3190

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Small Business Programs 
     Parity Act of 2010''.

     SEC. 2. SMALL BUSINESS CONTRACTING PROGRAMS PARITY.

       Section 31(b)(2)(B) of the Small Business Act (15 U.S.C. 
     657a(b)(2)(B)) is amended by striking ``shall'' and inserting 
     ``may''.

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