The American Small Business League, a Petaluma-based small business lobbying organization, is suing the Obama Administration over disposal of federal contracting data. The ASBL says the data will show the federal government has ignored its own laws by giving contracts meant for small businesses to some of the nation’s largest corporations.

The motion for a preliminary injunction has been filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco against the General Services Administration (GSA). The purpose of the injunction is to force the GSA to restore more than a decade's worth of federal contracting data.

On March 12, the Obama Administration implemented changes to the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation that eliminated the socio-economic field, "isSmallBusiness." In past years, Congress, federal agencies, watchdog groups, and the general public used the field to identify large firms that “had fraudulently misrepresented themselves as small businesses to illegally receive billions of dollars in small business contracts,” ASBL says.

Since 2003, more than a dozen federal investigations have uncovered billions of dollars in fraud and abuse in federal small business contracting programs.

The ASBL estimates that over the last decade nearly $1 trillion in contracts intended for small businesses have actually ended up in the hands of Fortune 500 corporations and other large businesses.

The ASBL's motion for a preliminary injunction will be heard on a 35-calendar day track, according to court documents.

Source: http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=14775