WASHINGTON – U.S. Congresswoman Stephanie Murphy of Winter Park, Fla., this week urged Linda McMahon, the Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), to continue SBA’s support for the National Entrepreneur Center (NEC) in Orlando and to protect funds that empower small businesses from proposed budget cuts. In a letter sent the day after McMahon visited the NEC, Murphy said SBA support is critical for the continued success of the NEC and asked McMahon to seek “strong funding” for entrepreneurial development programs.
Click here to read the letter.
“As someone who has spent years in the private sector helping small businesses grow, especially women and minority-owned businesses, I’m working to do the same in Congress,” said Murphy, who is a member of the House Small Business Committee. “The NEC is critical to helping start and grow small businesses throughout central Florida. Now that Administrator McMahon has experienced firsthand the NEC’s valuable work, I’m strongly urging SBA to protect funding that helps the NEC and to push for other SBA resources that help entrepreneurs and nascent small businesses.”
The NEC consists of 13 independent business organizations co-located at a single physical location. These organizations offer a wide range of services in an efficient and collaborative manner. Services include start-up assistance, business planning, business incubation, access to capital, networking opportunities, executive training, government contracting, importing and exporting, legal assistance, marketing, taxes and accounting, and minority business certification.
The NEC is home to the Orlando chapter of the SCORE program and to the University of Central Florida Small Business Development Center (SBDC). SCORE and SBDC are two of the dozen or so “Entrepreneurial Development Programs” that Congress funds and that SBA administers. Other Entrepreneurial Development Programs include Microloan Technical Assistance, State and Trade Export Promotion, Women Business Centers, and various training and mentorship programs designed to help military veteran entrepreneurs.
Murphy also recently led a bipartisan coalition calling on the House Appropriations Subcommittee with jurisdiction over SBA to provide robust funding for these entrepreneurial development programs in Fiscal Year 2018. The Coalition consisted of 39 Members of Congress from both political parties.
