Builders and Contractors Exchange
Weekly Bulletin: 2 February 2007
Enhancing opportunities for small, women and minority owned businesses
On August 10, 2006, Governor Tim Kaine issued Executive Order 33 (“Order”) titled “Enhancing Opportunities for Small, Women and Minority Owned Businesses” (“SWaM”). The Order defines “small business” as one with 250 or fewer employees or gross receipts of $10 million or less averaged over the previous three years. The definition also includes small businesses certified as minority-owned and/or women-owned businesses. The Order provides for various initiatives in an effort to maximize participation of SWaM with new approaches intended to improve the procurement process. The most noteworthy initiatives include measures such as:
- Development of a uniform, state-wide method for evaluating and monitoring SWaM participation plans in all state procurements by the Department of Minority Business Enterprise and executive branch entities/institutions with procurement authority.
- Implementation of processes by the executive branch entities/institutions with procurement responsibilities for producing SWaM subcontracting data as established by DMBE in consultation with the Department of General Services and the Virginia Information Technologies Agency.
- Formulation of policies and procedures for the Commonwealth's small business set aside program and implement small business enhancement tools to be done by DMBE, in consultation with executive branch entities/institutions with procurement policy responsibilities.
- Review of practices, procedures and proposal evaluation criteria by the executive branch entities/institutions with procurement responsibilities to identify and remove barriers or limitations to SWaM participation.
- The Interagency Advisory Council on Administrative Dispute Resolution in conjunction with DMBE, and the Virginia Department of General Services shall establish a SWaM contract mediation program. The mediation program shall offer dispute resolution alternatives for conflicts between executive branch entities or institutions and a small business in a contract situation.
The complete text of the Order may be found at
http://www.governor.virginia.gov/Initiatives/ExecutiveOrders/2006/EO_33.cfm.
The implementation of these initiatives will hopefully increase the number of small businesses in Virginia and more importantly assist in removing impediments to SWaM participation and thereby improve the Commonwealths’ performance in contracting with small businesses. The Commonwealth has set as a goal that 40% of its purchases be made from small businesses.
You may also find further information relating to SWaM on the Virginia Department of Business Assistance’s web site at http://www.dba.state.va.us/mwbusinesses/
and at the Department of Minority Business Enterprise’s web site at http://www.dmbe.virginia.gov/.
However, you may want to talk your attorney when navigating through the various measures to be implemented through this Executive Order.
Questions?
If you have any questions about this article or any other related matters, please contact:
This article is meant to bring awareness to this topic and is not intended to be used as legal advice.