Happy Holidays, Blog Readers! Please make sure to thank all those that work tirelessly during the holidays to make things merry and bright and I’m not just referring to Santa. We truly appreciate you! We hope you have a very joyful holiday season surrounded by family and friends.
And now in federal government contracting news this week, a big update about labor in federal construction projects.
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Happy Friday! We are halfway through December already and oh my, how time does fly! 2024 is just around the corner and the holiday season is now in full swing. We hope you are enjoying all the season has to offer.
There have been a lot of changes in federal government contracting this year, and here at SmallGovCon, we strive to include weekly, helpful content that explains what the impact of those changes are on federal government contractors. Thank you so much for all the wonderful feedback. We truly appreciate it.
This week in federal government contracting had some interesting updates, including new size standard processes, and what contractors should look for in the new NDAA.
Continue readingSBA recently issued new guidance on how to demonstrate social disadvantage–one of the elements an individual must meet to be eligible for SBA’s illustrious 8(a) Business Development Program. The guidance implements a streamlined social disadvantage narrative format–limiting the number of social disadvantage instances to two and asking only for direct answers to six questions for each instance. The “new” format really just hones in on the elements SBA has always asked for 8(a) social disadvantage narratives to demonstrate, substantively, not changing a thing. Nevertheless, SBA has been quite firm in requiring this new, short and sweet, structured format–so let’s dig into it a bit.
Continue readingSmallGovCon has covered the SBA’s assumption of control over certification of Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Businesses (“SDVOSB”) and Veteran Owned Small Businesses (“VOSB”) since it was first announced well over a year ago. Now, we are coming close to one of the final deadlines associated with SBA taking over these certification processes. It is hard to believe that it is already the end of the calendar year once again. But time flies when you are having federal contracting fun! With the end of 2023 comes a crucial deadline for certain veteran businesses to keep in mind–the date for self-certification to go away.
Continue readingJust as agencies have established goals to award a certain percentage of their procurements to small businesses and businesses participating in socio-economic programs like the 8(a) Program, large business contractors must establish goals to include small business subcontractors in their pool of subcontractors for unrestricted awards over the applicable threshold in FAR 19.702 ($750,000 for most contracts, $1.5 million for construction contracts). While the specific goal will vary with each contract (or in some cases may be on a company-wide basis), it is rare for a contracting officer to find a large business hasn’t met the given goal. However, an investigation by GAO indicates that large business contractors aren’t meeting their small business subcontracting goals as often as the government would hope. Let’s take a deeper look at these findings.
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Happy Friday! Next week is Thanksgiving and we want to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your support of SmallGovCon. We always strive to provide helpful content and we appreciate all the wonderful feedback that we have received from our readers. We hope you have a great Thanksgiving and are able to spend some time with friends and family.
This week in federal government contracting news include a plan to fund the government (hear that one before?), AI and its effect on government, and new GSA acquisitions.
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Happy Friday and welcome to November!
In honor of National Veterans’ Small Business Week, Administrator Isabel Guzman, head of the SBA, hosted a roundtable with the Veteran Institute for Procurement (VIP) to discuss the Veteran Small Business Certification (VetCert) Program. The SBA has certified over 8,300 new veteran- and service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses through VetCert so far. Also, in federal government contracting news, there was an executive order released on how the government can address AI in government. You can read more about these, as well as other newsworthy articles below. Have a great weekend!
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