Fighting for Small Business NOPA Speaks at Small Business Scorecard Press Conference

the backbone of the United States' economy is small businesses. Almost NOPA's entire dealer base falls into the category of small business. This is why NOPA makes small business issues on Capitol Hill a top priority.

Most recently, NOPA took the center stage at a press conference in Washington, D.C. that highlighted the lack of effort among federal agencies to meet the mandatory requirement to set aside 23 percent of all contracts for small businesses.

NOPA member Al Lynclen, co-owner and vice president of Chuckals Office Products in Tacoma, WA, joined Congresswoman Nydia M. Velazquez (D-N.Y.), ranking member of the House Small Business Committee, and other small business owners for the fifth annual Scorecard report.

The Scorecard report reviews and grades 22 federal agencies on attaining their mandated small business contracting goals of 23 percent. The release of "Scorecard V: Dramatic Cains in the Federal Marketplace Fail to Result in Small Business Contracts" comes more than two years after President Bush announced his small business agenda, which included small enterprise equity and fairness in the government contracting system as a top priority. But for the fourth consecutive year small business opportunities did not keep pace with government buying.

The last time the small business goal was attained was in the first Scorecard report, which evaluated government contracts awarded in fiscal year (FY) 1999. The most recent government-wide accomplishment (FY 2003) was 22.68 percent. While a shortfall of less than one percentage point may not appear significant, this translates into nearly $1 billion in lost contract opportunities for U.S. small businesses.

Federal government agencies are failing miserably in their efforts to support small businesses and need to be doing far more to ensure equitable treatment for them when it comes to awarding contracts.

At the press conference, Lynden attributes the loss of government business at Chuckals to contracts between the federal government and "Big Box" players such as Staples.

"Blanket Purchasing Agreements were negotiated with no small business input," said Lynden. "Encouraged by large corporations, a false assumption was made that small business could not be competitive in this marketplace on delivery and price. One agency went so far as to call us 'irrelevant.'"

"The large national chains have convinced many agencies that small office supply companies are not competitive and that is simply not true," said NOPA Government Affairs Director Paul Miller. "But because these blanket contracts are often negotiated behind the scenes without any small business input or competition, government buyers don't realize they can meet their small business goals and still get top value for their office products dollar."

NOPA hopes other members of Congress will study Scorecard V and support Rep. Velazquez in her effort to bring fairness to this issue. Every state and congressional district is affected by this problem - it's not a Washington problem, but a national problem that needs to be corrected this com ing year.