| Weekly Update from Sam |
| Dear Friends,
Government overreach continues to be a problem under President Obama, including another power grab by the EPA and ongoing duplication of federal programs at the SBA.
Members of this Committee are working to prevent the EPA’s latest overreach. Despite the concerns of small businesses, the administration is moving ahead with a new rule that could allow the EPA to claim controlling authority over nearly any damp patch of land in the United States, including ditches that collect rainwater. This would open the door to unprecedented bureaucratic intrusion into the lives of Americans, and must be stopped.
Moreover, this week, the Committee exposed the SBA’s experimentation with unproven programs that will detract from their core services that serve small businesses. The SBA has created several initiatives, without the consent of Congress, that duplicate existing efforts. These new programs drain resources from what the SBA has proven to be successful.
The administration’s penchant for government growth is predictably not leading to economic growth. As announced Wednesday, the nation’s economy has slowed nearly to a standstill, and grew at a mere 0.1 percent rate for last quarter. Small businesses don’t need new bureaucracies or more government control; they need the administration to get out of the way.
Sincerely,
Sam Graves
Chairman
|
|
Latest Committee Action
|
|
On Wednesday, the Committee examined program duplication at the Small Business Administration. In 2012, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found significant overlap among 52 programs meant to support entrepreneurial endeavors at the USDA, Commerce, HUD and SBA. Despite this clear finding, SBA has created even more of the same. These SBA programs lack a system to clearly measure their progress. Read the Washington Post report here.
On Thursday, Subcommittee on Health and Technology Chairman Chris Collins (R-NY) released a bipartisan letter to the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed by 231 Members of Congress, including Chairman Graves. This letter opposes the EPA’s “Waters of the United States” proposed rule to greatly expand the agency’s jurisdiction through the Clean Water Act over privately held land. Under the new rule, the EPA could claim authority to impede ordinary activities for farmers, ranchers and other small firms potentially causing delays, new costs or permit problems. Last week, Chairman Graves alerted small businesses to this EPA power grab via Small Biz Reg Watch on the Committee’s website. Read more here.
|
|
News from Washington
|
|
On Wednesday, by a vote of 416-1, the House passed H.R. 4486, legislation funding Military Construction and Veterans Affairs. This bill saves taxpayers $1.8 billion in comparison to last year’s spending, and added $1.5 billion in support for veterans, including funds to help reduce the administration’s backlog in services at the VA.
On Thursday, by a vote of 402-14, the House passed the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act, which establishes funding for congressional operations while continuing to cut waste and find savings. Spending on House operations has been reduced by 14 percent under the Republican majority, and the total savings since 2011 is $594 million.
|
Notable Op-Eds
|
|
Redundancy in Programs for Small Businesses
By Sam Graves |
|
| May 2, 2014 |
 |
| What We're Reading |
|
|
|
Small Biz Resources
|
|
|
| Tweet of the Week |
@SmallBizGOP What is roughly equal to the economies of ALL but nine countries in the world? Cost of current fed regs http://bit.ly/1ixY2wd @IBDinvestors
|
| |
|
