Report: New York small businesses received over $3 billion in federal contracts during FY2019

Nationally, small businesses secured a record-breaking $132.9 billion in prime federal contracts; women-owned contracting goal met for second time in history as 8 federal agencies receive A+ score

The U.S. Small Business Administration’s release of the “Fiscal Year 2019 Small Business Federal Procurement Scorecard” shows a record-breaking $132.9 billion in prime federal contracts – 26.5% of the federal contracting dollars – were awarded to small businesses. The federal government-wide prime contracting goal is for at least 23% of all prime federal contracting dollars should be awarded to small businesses.

Small businesses throughout New York were awarded $3,076,322,216 in federal contracts during this time.

The federal government exceeded the goal for women-owned small businesses for the second time in the history of the scorecard measurement program, achieving the 5% goal for the first time in fiscal year 2015 and building upon the record successes. The women-owned small businesses achievement for FY19 was 5.19%, setting a new record.

The federal government exceeded the goal for service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses for the seventh consecutive year, achieving the 3% goal for the first time in FY12 in addition to surpassing another goal of contracts going to small disadvantaged businesses. The U.S. government continued its trend of year-over-year record achievement that well exceeds the 5% goal for these firms: 10.29%.

The FY19 numbers are an increase of $12.1 billion over the previous fiscal year and marks the seventh consecutive year the federal government exceeded its small business contracting goal. Targeted sub-goals are also established for women-owned small businesses (5%), small disadvantaged businesses (5%), firms located in HUBZones (3%) and service disabled veteran-owned small businesses (3%), as well, which are meant to be subsets of the overall small business goal of 23%.

“Over a quarter of federal contracting dollars awarded in the Empire State went directly to small businesses. These record-breaking national numbers are a boon to our small business community. The federal government is the largest purchaser of goods and services in the world; small businesses supply the U.S. government with the goods and services needed to operate,” SBA Atlantic & Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator Steve Bulger said. “The accomplishments here in New York are a direct result of the Trump administration’s continuous government-wide focus on increasing small business contracting opportunities. This focus starts at the top with the president’s commitment to our small businesses and funnels down to our field offices and resource partners’ constant work to help small businesses start, grow and expand.”

“It’s great to see SBA prevail! And it’s great to see small businesses receiving the revenue they need to grow and expand,” said Franklin J. Sciortino, SBA Buffalo district director. “Across the country, SBA works with other federal agencies to expand opportunities for small businesses to compete for and win federal contracts.”

The measured socioeconomic categories also achieved national historic highs this year. Small disadvantaged businesses received 10.29%, or $51.6 billion, of all small business eligible contracting dollars, the highest percentage since 2015. Service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses received $22 billion (4.39% of all eligible contracting dollars), and women-owned small businesses received $26 billion of eligible contracting dollars, or 5.19%. Historically underutilized business zone small businesses received about $11 billion of all eligible funds, representing 2.28% - the highest achievement in the past six years. Additionally, $90.7 billion, or 33.27% of the total of $272.7 billion was in subcontracting dollars awarded in FY19.

In its efforts to help small businesses secure federal contracts, the SBA promotes its programs to procuring federal agencies and small businesses, frequently holding training sessions across the country to educate contracting officers on the requirements for SBA's 8(a) business development, “HUBZone,” women-owned and service-disabled veteran-owned small business programs. It also works closely with the National 8(a) Association, Native American Contractors Association, Native Hawaiian Organization Association, Women Impacting Public Policy, American Express and other national and local organizations on contracting outreach efforts.

The individual agency scorecards released by the SBA, as well as a detailed explanation of the methodology, is available online.

In FY19, the federal government exceeded the service-disabled veteran-owned small business and small disadvantaged business goals and the prime contract dollar awards in all small business categories increased from previous years. The federal government also exceeded its subcontract goals for awards to small businesses and women-owned small businesses and awarded more than $90 billion in subcontracts to all small businesses.

SBA continues to collaborate with federal agencies to expand small business opportunities for small business contractors to compete and win federal contracts. The FY2019 scorecard analyzed the prime contracting and subcontracting performance and other contributing factors, which resulted in an overall “A” grade for the federal government. Eight agencies received A+, 14 received a grade of “A” and two received a “B” grade.

The annual procurement scorecard is an assessment tool to: measure how well federal agencies reach their small business and socioeconomic prime contracting and subcontracting goals; provide accurate and transparent contracting data; and report agency-specific progress. The prime and subcontracting component goals include goals for small businesses, small businesses owned by women, small disadvantaged businesses, service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses, and small businesses in “HUBZones.”

Every year, the SBA works with each agency to set its small business prime and subcontracting goals (each agency has different goals), and the agency’s performance is based on the agreed upon goals. The SBA ensures the sum total of all of the goals exceed the 23% target for the federal government as well as the socioeconomic goals established by law.

While each federal agency is responsible for ensuring the quality of its own contracting data, the SBA conducts additional analyses to help agencies identify potential data anomalies. As part of its ongoing data quality efforts, the SBA works with federal agency procurement staff to provide analysis and tools to facilitate review of data, implement improvements to procurement systems, and conduct training to improve accuracy.