Many disabled veterans opt to start their own business. The Veterans Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development Act (P.L. 106-50) was intended to help alleviate many of the challenges that veterans (especially disabled veterans) face when looking for small business assistance.

Among the provisions of the law is the establishment of a modest three (3) percent goal for service disabled veteran involvement in federal procurement contracts. Unfortunately, there has been little success in meeting this goal.

The bill also expanded the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) and Disabled Transition Assistance Program (DTAP) to include information on the new federal opportunities for disabled veteran entrepreneurs.

In October 2004, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13360; this Executive Order called for increased opportunities for service-disabled businesses for prime- and sub- contracting.

It is essential that small businesses have access to assistance and information, including enhanced information about capital formation and business development. Investments in these would greatly benefit veteran owned businesses. Veteran-owned and service-disabled veteran-owned small business goals must be incorporated into the acquisition planning process and the federal government should develop specific strategies for increasing contract awards.

Veterans have earned, and are deserving of, this consideration.

The National Association of Government Contractors supports legislation and other efforts to increase the percentage of procurement contracts awarded to veteran-owned small businesses. Specifically, NAGC calls upon the federal government to meet the three (3) percent procurement goal for veteran-owned businesses and creating “sole-source” contracts to qualified small business concerns owned and controlled by service-disabled veterans.