SBA Spokesman Terry Sutherland MIA In Whirlwind Of Controversy

PETALUMA, Calif., Oct. 30, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In recent weeks, the Small Business Administration (SBA) has faced mounting evidence that they have intentionally fabricated the numbers in various programs designed to help small businesses.

Strangely, SBA Press Office Director Terry Sutherland has been missing in action from the media coverage on the various controversies. Sutherland has opted out of all interviews with journalists on every investigation and accusations from the media that the SBA has fabricated data in virtually every small business program.

On Friday August 1, 2014, SBA Administrator Contreras-Sweet announced the Obama Administration had awarded 23.39 percent of all federal contracts to small businesses. Almost immediately, information began to surface that the SBA data had been fabricated and the SBA had included billions of dollars in federal contracts awarded to Fortune 500 firms in their small business contracting data.

On Sept. 10, Administrator Contreras-Sweet was lambasted by members of the House Small Business Committee for diverting small business contracts to firms like Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and Chevron.

In September, the SBA Inspector General released Report 14-18 that revealed billions of dollars in contracts that should have gone to Small Disadvantaged Businesses participating in the 8(a) and HUBZone programs had actually been awarded to ineligible firms that no longer qualified for the programs and the SBA had knowingly inflated the achievements in those programs. Sutherland was conspicuously absent from any media reports on the abuses.

In August, the SBA received a great deal of criticism for proposing a "safe harbor from fraud" for large businesses that committed felony federal contracting fraud to hijack federal small business contracts. Again Sutherland declined to be interviewed on the controversy and refused to make any statements.

The SBA received considerable criticism for dramatically increasing small business size standards in a wide range of industries that allowed many of the largest firms in those areas to suddenly qualify as small businesses for the purposes of federal contracting. The Washington Post published a story on the issue titled, "How 8,500 large companies will become small businesses overnight." Sutherland declined to be interviewed for the story.

In the most recent controversy, the SBA has proposed policies to allow even more large businesses to compete for federal small business contracts. In one specific example the SBA has proposed to eliminate the 150-employee small business size standard for small businesses that provides IT products to the federal government.

The new SBA size standard for Information Technology Value Added Resellers would increase up to 500 employees even though the average information technology (IT) small business has less than 20 employees. Once again, Terry Sutherland has refused to comment on any of the stories on the controversial new policy.

In the most recent GAO investigation on the SBA, GAO-14-760 Report said that, "the SBA failed to meet its deadline to process small business loan applications for small companies that were left destroyed in the Hurricane's wake." Sutherland has refused to comment on the GAO investigation.

SOURCE American Small Business League