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Schneider, Marshall Bill to Help Small Businesses Passes Unanimously Out of Committee

July 18, 2018

Bill modernizes sole-source contracting for small businesses

Today, bipartisan legislation introduced by U.S. Representatives Brad Schneider (D-IL) and Roger Marshall (R-KS) passed out of the House Small Business Committee with unanimous support.

H.R. 6369, the Expanding Contracting Opportunities for Small Businesses Act, makes improvements to the sole source contracting process for small businesses.

"Too many small businesses owned by women, service-disabled veterans, or operating in historically underserved communities pass over the opportunity of federal contracts," said Schneider. "Our bill updates the sole-source contracting requirements so more small businesses can access federal contracts, while also enacting safeguards to ensure awards only go to eligible firms. I was pleased to see this bipartisan legislation I introduced with my colleague Dr. Marshall pass out of committee and urge the House to take prompt action to support opportunities for small businesses."

"Small businesses employ nearly 58 million Americans, that's 48 percent of our labor force," said Marshall. "This bill expands sole-source contracts available to service-disabled veteran owned small businesses, women-owned small businesses, and HUBZone-certified small businesses. It also contains important taxpayer protections by establishing a verification process to ensure only eligible businesses participate in these procurements. By making these changes, we're providing necessary oversight of taxpayer resources, and ensuring that qualified small businesses have opportunities to contract with the federal government."

The legislation brings the dollar amount of sole-source awards in line with the size of current contracts, and creates an eligibility check by the Small Business Administration for women-owned small businesses and service-disabled veteran owned small businesses.

The full text of the legislation is available online.