News & Events

As part of the Dulles Regional Chamber's GovConnections Steering Committee, our January session on recent changes in Small Business contracting -- particularly the new Women-Owned Small Business (WOSB) opportunities and the fall-out that the rest of the contracting community will likely face from the GTSI-Alaska Native Corporation's suspensions.

Women-Owned Opportunities.  Bridget Bean, SBA's Washington Metro District Director, explained how the SBA plans to administer the new Women-Owned Small Business rules.  As those of you who received our November, 2010 e-mail know, the SBA is implementing its newly established WOSB Contracting Program that just opened to participants on Friday, February 4, 2011.  A copy of our email summary is on our website.  The federal government is now permitted to set aside certain procurements for WOSBs to the exclusion of other, non-women-owned small businesses.

Who Wins.  The biggest beneficiaries of the program will be women-owned small businesses that operate in 83 specifically identified NAICS codes that the SBA targeted under the program.  Forty-five of the NAICS codes were further set aside for participation by only Economically Disadvantaged WOSBs (EDWOSBs).

Breaking News -- Special Waiver.  One of the big announcements by Ms. Bean was that the SBA is suspending the Economically Disadvantaged requirement for at least the first 2 years of the program.  This means all WOSBs may participate in any Women-Owned Small Business Set-Aside, even procurements under the 45 NAICs codes initially restricted to EDWOSBs.

Update Your CCR Now.  Women-Owned Small Business should immediately update their CCR registrations in order to catch the attention of government Contracting Officers.  CCR is the gateway to government procurement.  Under the new WOSB set-aside program, government Contracting Officers may only set a procurement aside of at least two WOSBs are expected to submit a proposal.  Failure of a qualifying WOSB to denote its status in CCR may prevent a government Contracting Officer from finding that company -- and it may even prevent a WOSB set-aside in the first place if the Contracting Officer cannot find two WOSBs to compete for the contract.

SBA Get Tough Suspensions.  Rebecca. Kehoe from Watkins, Meegan, gave the group an update on recent SBA enforcement activities, which focused on GTSI and Alaska Native Corporations.  You may recall that GTSI was suspended from participating in government contracts late last year by the SBA for alleged improprieties in its small business programs.  After a brief suspension, the company was able to re-start its government contracts, but only under certain limited conditions.  GTSI was forced to stop working with small business prime contractors, it stopped participating in the mentor-protege program, and it suspended future joint venture contracts with small businesses.  GTSI was also subject to additional monitoring by the SBA.  GTSI's CEO and Senior VP and General Counsel resigned in the wake of this suspension.  Now the SBA has suspended some of the Alaska Native Corporations as well.

Be Careful Out There.  The contracting community is still waiting for the full impact of the GTSI incident.  In the near term, the fallout of the GTSI incident is that both small and large businesses will likely be under additional scrutiny when applying for and participating in the SBA programs.  Please call us if you would like to discuss the substantive aspects of this presentation or for more information on upcoming GovConnections events.  The Chamber asked OF&P's Government Contracts Practice to continue as the lead law firm partnering with them on another year-long series on the changing dynamics of the government contract industry.  Our next one features Rich Wilkinson of Deltek who always has interesting views and information on opportunities in the contracting industry.  It's coming up on Tuesday, March 15th at lunch.  We welcome your participation at future sessions!

David A. Lawrence, Esq.  703-218-2181

Brian A. Darst, Esq.          703-218-2140

Matthew R. Keller, Esq.   703-218-2117

Government Contracts Practice Group.