House lawmakers target SBA IT modernization in bipartisan bill

Lagging IT modernization efforts at the Small Business Administration are getting a push from a bipartisan pair of House lawmakers in a bill released late last week.

The SBA IT Modernization Reporting Act of 2025 from Reps. Gil Cisneros, D-Calif., and Brian Jack, R-Ga., calls on the agency to implement recommendations delivered in a 2024 Government Accountability Office report and provide Congress with detailed plans and briefings on its plan of attack.

“The SBA has a duty to serve the small businesses of America, quickly and efficiently,” Cisneros said in a press release Friday. “Current SBA IT practices have fallen behind, hampering the agency’s ability to do so. I worked across the aisle with Rep. Jack to introduce this common-sense, bipartisan legislation that upgrades the Small Business Administration’s IT practices, ensuring the agency can keep pace with the needs of today’s small businesses.” 

The GAO report in question zeroed in on the SBA’s Unified Certification Platform, a project launched in 2023 to help small businesses more efficiently interact with the agency’s contract assistance programs. The SBA’s deployment of the UCP faced delays, leading the GAO to question the reliability of schedules and cost estimates.

According to the watchdog, the SBA didn’t have a cybersecurity risk management plan for the platform, leaving small businesses applying for and maintaining contracting certifications vulnerable to elevated risks of vulnerabilities.  

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, the then-ranking member and now chair of the chamber’s Small Business Committee, told FedScoop at the time that “small businesses should not be forced to suffer because of bureaucratic incompetence.”

“Not only did SBA fail to meet its own self-imposed deadline and blow through an already bloated budget, but the agency failed to create a portal that works,” Ernst continued. “SBA needs to take responsibility for its irresponsible decision to upgrade the portal during the busiest month for small businesses, that I warned about, and take immediate steps to resolve GAO’s recommendations.”

The GAO report noted that past SBA attempts to modernize its IT systems “did not deliver expected results.” With $178.6 billion in contracts awarded by the SBA to small businesses in fiscal 2023, getting UCP right was critical, the GAO concluded in making 14 recommendations to the agency.

The bill from Cisneros and Jack lays out an 11-point plan for how the lawmakers want the SBA to approach implementation of the GAO’s recommendations. Within 180 days of the enactment of the legislation, the SBA administrator would have to deliver the plan to Senate and House Small Business committees detailing the actions the agency “will undertake to establish and implement policies and procedures to govern information technology modernization projects of the Administration.”

Measures in that 11-point plan include clearly defined risk parameters, risk mitigation strategies, master schedules, cost estimates, traceability studies and more. Following these guidelines on IT modernization, Jack said in a statement, would help the agency “continue doing what it does best — supporting the entrepreneurs and job creators who are the backbone of our communities.” 

“By strengthening and streamlining SBA operations, this bill ensures more small businesses can access the tools, resources, and support they need to grow, hire, and continue to thrive,” he added.