Senate panel approves eTravel small business set-asides

The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday unanimously passed a spending bill that contains a provision requiring small business participation in the General Services Administration's eTravel Service program.

If the full Senate passes the fiscal 2006 Transportation-Treasury appropriations bill (H.R. 3058), the difference between that and the House version of the bill -- which forbids GSA from spending funds on eTravel -- will be worked out in a conference committee.

Some small business travel agencies have objected to GSA's eTravel program because they believe it would exclude them from receiving government contracts for travel services. After bringing their case to lawmakers, the agencies were successful in getting House members to include an amendment in the appropriations bill that would bar GSA from spending funds on eTravel.

The vendors contracted by GSA to provide agencies with the eTravel program and other small business travel agency owners said those opposed to the project were motivated by their desire to return to the old system where agencies contracted with several travel agencies in a decentralized system.

"You have to be willing to get in to the program and not go backwards," said Paula Wild, president and owner of Manassas Travel, a small travel agency in Salt Lake City. "It's not in the government's best interest to have loose cannons out there."

Patricia Stout, one of the protestors, said stronger language was needed to protect small travel agencies in the move to the eTravel system. The Senate's 23 percent small business requirement "doesn't have that much teeth," says Stout, who owns Alamo Travel in San Antonio.

Leo Hergenroeder, program manager for Northrop Grumman's eTravel program, GovTrip, said while GSA did not establish specific small business goals for the vendors or require a certain level of small business participation, all the travel vendors included small business involvement in their business plans.

Hergenroeder said he is not convinced that the Senate's mandate would mean an increase in business for the small travel agencies because the vendors - including EDS and CW Government Travel Inc. - have exceeded their small business goals. He would not specify Northrop's small business goals for eTravel.

"We have a small business plan and a small business goal for the contract," Hergenroeder said. "We have a number of small businesses both in the travel side and the information technology side that will receive a significant amount of money."