A group of lawmakers recently forwarded correspondence to the Small Business Administration (SBA), expressing concerns regarding the agency’s 7(a) lending program rule changes.
House Committee on Small Business Chairman Roger Williams (R-TX) joined Vice Chairman Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO), Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Beth Van Duyne (R-TX), and Economic Growth Subcommittee Chairman Dan Meuser (R-PA) in signing the letter to Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Office of Capital Access Associate Administrator Patrick Kelley.
“On April 19, 2023, the Small Business Committee, Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Regulations held a hearing with the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Inspector General (IG) Hannibal “Mike” Ware,” the legislators wrote. “During this hearing, Republicans asked several questions about the SBA’s new rules, which would make significant changes to the flagship 7(a) lending program. The Committee is gravely concerned that the SBA is unable to handle this expanded responsibility given their failures under the COVID lending programs.”
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reports determined the SBA does not have the ability to manage the current loan volume or remedy existing fraud issues, and expanding the program would be significantly challenging.
“The SBA had already faced major challenges in the years leading up to the pandemic,” Williams said. “These existing issues were exacerbated during COVID-19 and culminated in the agency’s historic failure to safeguard against fraud within its programs, costing the American taxpayer billions of dollars. Even with the agency’s abysmal record, the SBA is charging forward with reckless changes to its flagship 7(a) lending program. The SBA’s Inspector General shared these concerns, and it is imperative that the SBA gets back to basics and demonstrates basic competency before adding more risk to the government-backed lending program.”