Native American Micro Enterprise Business Services

The Office of Native American Affairs (ONAA) mission is to ensure that American Indian, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiians (referred to collectively as Native American) seeking to create, develop and expand small businesses have full access to the business development and expansion tools available through the Agency’s entrepreneurial development, lending and procurement programs.  ONAA’s overarching goal is to promote and support American Indians, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiian entrepreneurs.  In recent years, ONAA has successfully sponsored and managed nation-wide contractor-led workshops and roundtables, co-sponsored agreements, interagency agreements, and tribal consultations; developed and distributed promotional materials; and attended and participated in national and regional economic development conferences as subject matter experts for these groups. 

Our vision for this program initiative is not to encourage duplication of what ONAA has traditionally done in the past, but to solicit new innovative approaches to meet the needs of these targeted groups at the microenterprise level of business ownership.  The focus of this program initiative is to target specific Native American business operations in underserved markets throughout the country including underserved microenterprise Native American firms to further expand their business development offerings.  Additionally, ONAA’s vision is to support microenterprises that serve their communities and the surrounding communities.  Such empowerment will serve to maximize economic impact and improve quality of life for the targeted underserved communities.

Section 7(j) of the Small Business Act authorizes the U.S. Small Business Administration to provide management and technical assistance to eligible individuals and businesses.  To be eligible for 7(j) services, a client must be:  a socially and economically disadvantaged individual whose firm is a participant in the 8(a) Business Development Program; a business that is eligible to receive 8(a) contracts; or a business which qualifies as small under 13 CFR subpart 121 – Small Business size Regulations, and which is located in an urban or rural area with a high proportion of unemployed or low-income individuals, or which is owned by low-income individuals.  The term “high proportion of unemployed” means the urban or rural county’s unemployment rate is not less than 140 percent of average unemployment rate for the United States or for the State in which such county is located, whichever is less, based on the most recent data available in the annual Local Area Unemployment Statistics report from the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics.  The term “low-income individual” means an individual whose family’s taxable income for the preceding year did not exceed 150 percent of the poverty level amount established by the Bureau of Census, U.S. Department of Commerce, for determining poverty status.

Since its inception in 1953, SBA has served to aid, counsel, assist and protect the interests of small businesses.  While SBA is best known for its financial support of small businesses through its many lending programs, the Agency also plays a critical role in providing funding to organizations that deliver technical assistance in the form of counseling and training to small business concerns and nascent entrepreneurs in order to promote growth, expansion, innovation, increased productivity and management improvement.  The mission of SBA’s Office of Business Development, which bears responsibility for administering the Management and Technical Assistance Program, is to administer the section 8(a) program, which offers business development assistance to over 9,000 small government contractors that, in addition to meeting other criteria, are certified by SBA as owned and controlled at least 51% by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.  As a component of BD, the Office of Management and Technical Assistance (OMTA)