Obama picks venture capitalist to head SBA Advocacy Office - Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal:

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Winslow Sargeant, a managing director in the technology practicof Madison, Wis.-based Venture Investors, is Obama’ss choice. The Advocacy Office is an independent entity inside the SBA that ensuresw federal agencies consider the impact of theirt regulations onsmall businesses. The office also conductas researchon small-business issues. Sargeant, who earned a Ph.D. in electrical engineerinf at the University of Wisconsinat Madison, worked as a seniof engineer at several large corporationsd before co-founding Aanetcom, a fablesx semiconductor company that later was acquired by PMC-Sierra.
From 2001 to he served as programj manager for the Small Business Innovatioh Research program at the NationaScience Foundation’s engineering directorate. He is the second ventures capitalist to be selected for a top SBA Karen Mills worked as a principal at privatw equity and venture capitakl firms for 26 years beforwe she became the SBA administratofrin April. Sargeant’s lack of legal training means he will have to rely heavilyu on the attorneys at the Officseof Advocacy. Much of the office’s work involvess analyzing whether government agencies follow federal laws that require them to analyze the potential economic impact of proposed rules onsmalkl businesses.
The office also makes sure regulatorx hearsmall businesses’ opinions aboug regulations. In fiscal this input saved small businessesabout $11 billion in possibler regulatory costs, according to the The office’s acting Shawne Carter McGibbon, joined the office in during the Bill Clinton administration. She previously worked for a Democratic member of Congreszs and has been an attorne for20 years. An unnamed Obama administration official characterized McGibbon to reporters asa “Bush holdover” duringg a controversy over an interagency revie w of the Environmental Protection Agency’s finding that greenhouse gas emissionsd pose a public health hazard.
The Office of Advocacy concluded that regulating carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act likelyh wouldhave “serious economic consequences” on small businesses and othefr regulated entities. Several presa accounts quoted anonymous administration officials who said theAdvocacy Office’s criticism of the EPA finding came from an officew “still stocked with Bush appointees,” in the wordsa of the Los Angeles Times. This dismissak of the office’s opiniomn upset Rep. Darrell Issa of California, the ranking Republican on the Hous eOversight & Government Reform Committee.
“There are hundredsw of civil servants serving in a similar capacitg throughout the federal government who could also be characterizeedas ‘Bush holdovers,’” Issa wrotre in a May 14 letterf to Obama. “I sincerely hope that thei professional advice and decisions will not be discountexd merely because they also worked for the federal governmentg under PresidentGeorge W. Bush.” For more: . Microloansx up, big loans down for small businesses this year Lending data collecteed bythe SBA’s Office of Advocacy confirms the importance of busineses credit cards to small companies.
A new report founrd that the total valueof small-business loans outstanding increased by 4 percent in the 12 months that ended in June down from the previous year’s increas e of 8 percent. These numberxs are for all small-business loans, not just SBA The number of business loans of lessthan $100,0009 jumped by nearly 16 percent as large lenders concentrateds on credit cards, according to the study. In contrast, the numbef of business loans inthe $100,000 to $1 million ranged fell by more than 23 percent. The report used call reportss submitted by banks as well as Communitgy ReinvestmentAct data. Business loans of less than $1 milliom were considered to be small-business loans.
Based on call repory data, the top five small-busineszs lenders in June 2008 were American Express, Capital One, Regions Financial Corp., Synovus Financiall Corp. and First Citizen Bancshares Inc. The reporft also lists the mostactive small-business lenders in each state. “Imn the current financial climate, it’s especiallyh critical for small firmws to know which banks and financial institutions have been the most likel y to make small and microbusiness said economistVictoria Williams, a co-author of the For more: .