Hello,
The federal government requires recipients of contracts over $500,000 to
formulate and adhere to a small business subcontracting plan which defines
percentages of purchases of goods and services from small businesses,
including subsets of the small business category, i.e., small disadvantaged
businesses (SDB), women-owned small businesses (WOSB), HUBZone small
businesses, etc. Some of the NIH Institutes are now more aggressively
tracking adherence to goals based on the semiannual reports (SF 294s and SF
295s). I have two questions I'd like to put to the list.

1. One of the questions asked of me by faculty and staff is what are the
penalties if we don't meet the goals. My answer has always been that there
are potential penalties, e.g., non-compliance might affect the agency's
willingness to fund us in the future and/or we could be asked to return the
money. (I have been told by some NIH contract officers that there is an NIH
database that tracks compliance on this and other issues, and it is used by
NIH when deciding who to fund.) But I don't have any concrete information.
My pleas to PIs to (1) construct a thoughtful, realistic budget from which
our Purchasing Department can help them construct a realistic subcontracting
plan, and (2) to be careful to adhere to these plans once the project has
commenced, would be more convincing if I could give some concrete examples
of what has happened to non-compliant institutions. Do any of you know of
penalties that were exacted for non-compliance to small business
subcontracting plan goals? If so, what were they?

2. In response to pressure by the Small Business Administration, the NIH
Institutes are focusing more on the HUBZone goals. We are finding HUBZone
goals impossible to set at higher than zero due to the highly technical
nature of the supplies and services we need and a dearth of suitable HUBZone
vendors. To date, we have been successful in arguing a zero goal in all but
one instance. In that instance, the NIH contract officer held up the award
until we agreed to an arbitrary goal--- which we are NOT meeting. How are
the rest of you doing in this regard?

Thanks in advance for your wonderful support. I appreciate the ongoing
discussions daily and am very grateful for the existence of this listserv.

Rosemary

Rosemary Alexander
Assistant Director, Office of Sponsored Projects Administration
Case Western Reserve University
Via regular mail: 10900 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, OH 44106-7015
Via FedEx, UPS, etc.: 2040 Adelbert Rd., Suite 4, Cleveland, OH 44106
Voicemail: 216-368-2008, Fax: 216-368-4679, Email: xxxxxx@po.cwru.edu

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