Washington D.C.— Today, the House Small Business Committee held a hearing reviewing the work of the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Office of Entrepreneurial Development (OED), which administers a range of free or low-cost training and counseling services to small businesses across the country.
During the hearing, Ranking Member Nydia M. Velázquez (D-NY) highlighted the fact that despite the successes of SBA’s entrepreneurial development programs, they only reach a small percentage of small firms and that adequate funding is needed to ensure more entrepreneurs have access to these vital services.
“Entrepreneurial development initiatives have proven to be a great return on investment. Unfortunately, these services are only reaching a small fraction of our nation’s small businesses, and certain communities can get left behind,” said Ranking Member Velázquez. “My Democratic colleagues and I are fully committed to serving America’s entrepreneurs and providing resources that put them in the best position to survive and thrive. My hope is that we will be able to reauthorize these programs and provide adequate levels of funding.”
SBA utilizes its Resource Partner Network to deliver the free and low-cost training services administered by OED. These SBA-funded organizations include Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs), Women’s Business Centers (WBCs), and SCORE. The counseling these organizations provide can be the difference between success and failure for a small business. A 2013 report from SBA found that small businesses that receive three or more hours of counseling have higher survival rates than firms that receive less counseling.
During the hearing, Mark Madrid, Associate Administrator of the OED, updated the committee on the success OED has had in serving small businesses through their Resource Partners:
In FY2022, WBCs served more than 84,000 clients leading to more than 2,800 new business starts and 8,350 loans that helped women-owned firms create jobs in their communities.
In FY2022 the SBDC network counseled over 306,000 clients and helped them start over 20,000 new small businesses and obtain over $7.8 billion in capital.
SCORE served more than 322,000 unique clients in FY2022 alone.
In the first 18 months of the Community Navigators program, the initiative provided customized, hands-on counseling to nearly 29,000 individuals and helped them access $249,000,000 in funding.
