Procurement Compliance Bulletin
06.21.2023
We are less than two weeks away from the close of the 2023 fiscal year and the start of FY2024. As procurement and compliance professionals, you are working in units that are legislatively mandated to participate in the Small Business Reserve (SBR), Minority Business Enterprise (MBE), and Veteran-Owned Small Business Enterprise (VSBE) socioeconomic programs which are intended to make the state's procurement more inclusive for excluded and marginalized small, minority, women, and veteran business owners.
As you prepare FY2023 SBR/MBE/VSBE Program Annual Reports, celebrate your victories, both big and small, and identify which processes/strategies were most effective. Begin the new fiscal year by finding ways to maximize SBR designated spend and MBE/VSBE goal setting and attainment.
We'll end our message by acknowledging Juneteenth, the federal and state holiday commemorating the emancipation of African American slaves. Even though the Emancipation Proclamation was effective in 1863, it was not fully implemented in places still under Confederate control. As a result, in the westernmost region of Texas, enslaved people would not be free until June 19,1865 when some 2,000 Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay, Texas and announced that the more than 250,000 enslaved black people were free by executive decree. It has been called "America's Second Independence Day." Commemoration of Juneteenth should serve to remind us all about the power of laws and policies to right wrongs and make opportunities fair.
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GOSBA is pleased to announce a new liaison/report preparer orientation training program which will be hosted twice a year to help "onboard" and prepare new liaisons for their reporting duties. While we are targeting new liaisons, this class is open to all liaisons, regardless of when you began your liaison role. It can be helpful to all liaisons, including those who have been in the role for a while and simply need a better understanding/refresher of what their duties entail, or a liaison who was caught in the midst of a turnover period in their agency and needs to know where to start.
The first session is being held on July 18, 2023, at 1:00 pm and will include:
- General liaison duties across all three socioeconomic programs, Overview of the Liaison training throughout the FY, waiver resources and requirements, the PRG process overview, program specific reporting requirements & resources.
- Separate Liaison Welcome Packets for each socioeconomic procurement program based on the programs where you serve as liaison.
One-on-one training sessions will still be available to liaisons throughout the year upon request to your designated compliance manager.
Please save July 18th from 1-3 pm.
A special invitation will be sent out next week.
All agencies are required to submit the FY2024 Procurement Forecast pursuant to COMAR 21.11.03.17 and 21.11.01.06.
The FY2024 Procurement Forecast report should contain all projected procurement contracts (including sole source and task orders) reasonably expected to be $100,000 or more and should also include current/existing contracts expected to be procured in the upcoming fiscal year. If you are projecting procurements that have previously been designated as SBR, be sure to add "SBR designated" to the Descriptions column in the template. Also, if current/existing contracts contained MBE and VSBE goals, please note them as requested. While statutes and regulations do not mandate the inclusion of VSBE goals in the forecast, we strongly encourage you to note the potential for VSBE goals whenever applicable.
Agencies only need to submit one report with all projected procurements. FY2024 Procurement Forecast instructions and template are located in the SBR, MBE, and VSBE Reporting Toolkits on our website. Please take the time to read the FY2024 Procurement Forecast Instructions for complete details.
If you have any questions, contact
Lisa Mitchell Sennaar at lisa.sennaar@maryland.gov
The strategic plan template has been radically revised and will now be submitted electronically as a Google Form.
This mandatory report is in a consolidated format with distinct SBR and MBE sections. It uses logic to navigate you through the process. For those agencies that participate in both the MBE and SBR programs, a PDF version is available in the SBR and MBE toolkits so you can coordinate your answers across multiple contributors before submitting the online form. Each agency should only submit one strategic plan.
Strategic planning is an organizational management activity that is used to set priorities, focus energy and resources, strengthen operations, ensure that employees and other stakeholders are working toward common goals, establish agreement around intended outcomes/results, and assess and adjust the organization's direction in response to a changing environment.
The Consolidated Strategic Plan FY2024 is now available in the SBR Reporting Toolkit and the MBE Reporting Toolkit.
If you have questions, contact:
Karen Reyes at karen.reyes@maryland.gov
MBE Program
A new requirement has been added to the MBE Annual Report data for all contracts that close out during the fiscal year. The Annual Agency MBE Compliance Assessment Report is intended to verify if the MBE goal set by the agency was met by the prime contractor upon completion of the contract. This new requirement will take effect with your FY2023 filing (due 9/30/2023).
This is a very data intensive report and requires manual data entry. You are highly encouraged to review the new reporting document to ensure a full understanding of data requirements. Feel free to contact your designated MBE Compliance Manager if you have any questions.
Please take a moment and download the new
Annual Agency MBE Compliance Assessment Report
FY2023 Annual Agency MBE Compliance Assessment Report
VSBE Program
An additional requirement has been added to the VSBE Annual Report data beginning with FY2023. The new VSBE Program Outreach Form will capture outreach activities to the veteran business community that were performed during July 2022 through June 2023.
The report includes data that has not been captured previously and will likely require manual data collection. You may need to work with associates outside of the procurement unit to gather this data. Please review the new reporting document to ensure a full understanding of data requirements. Feel free to contact Danielle Davis, VSBE Compliance Manager if you have any questions.
Please take a moment and download the new
Veteran-Owned Small Business Enterprise ()VSBE) Program Outreach Form
FY2023 Annual Reporting
The Annual Reporting period begins on July 1, 2023
The annual reporting period will commence after the close of FY2023. Annual reports will be due September 30th and should contain data from the start of the fiscal year.
Please remember that liaisons do not submit a 4th quarter report. Instead agencies should work on the FY2023 MBE Annual Report, making sure to use the latest templates. The MBE Annual Report instructions and template will be updated to the MBE Reporting Toolkit by July 1, 2023.
If you have questions pertaining to the MBE Annual Report, feel free to submit them via email and/or contact us to schedule a meeting.
Nichelle Johnson at nichelle.johnson1@maryland.gov or
Karen Reyes at karen.reyes@maryland.gov
SBR Program
FY2023 Annual Reporting
The Annual Reporting period begins on July 1, 2023
The annual reporting period will commence after the close of FY2023. Annual reports will be due September 30th and should contain data from the start of the fiscal year.
Please remember that liaisons do not submit a 4th quarter report. Instead agencies should work on the FY2023 SBR Annual Report, making sure to use the latest templates. The SBR Annual Report instructions and template will be updated to the SBR Reporting Toolkit by July 1, 2023.
If you have questions pertaining to the SBR Annual Report, feel free to submit them via email and/or contact us to schedule a meeting.
Lisa Mitchell Sennaar at lisa.sennaar@maryland.gov or
Tanita Johnson at tanita.johnson1@maryland.gov
Annual VSBE Reporting FY2023
The Annual Reporting period begins on July 1, 2023.
The annual reporting period will commence after the close of FY2023. Annual reports will be due October 1st and should contain data from fiscal year dates July 1, 2022- June 30, 2023.
Please make sure you have the cheat sheets and checklists downloaded to start the preparation for the upcoming reporting cycle. A completed VSBE Annual Report, raw and scrubbed backup data, and VSBE Outreach Form are due October 1st.
If you have any questions or concerns about the annual reporting data,
please contact Danielle Davis at danielle.davis2@maryland.gov.
Quarterly Compliance Call
GOSBA hosts a compliance call each quarter to address issues impacting how the SBR, MBE, and VSBE procurement programs are implemented by participating state agencies and departments. Topics for discussion come from you, our liaisons and procurement officers. We discuss them in an open and transparent forum so we can all learn from one another.
Our June 1st Compliance Call agenda items included:
- FY2024 Procurement Forecast Review (Q & A)
- FY2024 SBR & MBE Consolidated Strategic Plan (Q & A)
- Announcing Orientation for New SBR/MBE/Liaisons and Report Preparers
- VSBE Outreach Form
- MBE Compliance Assessment
- FY2024 Survey Requirements
If you missed our June 1st call, please find a summary of the topics covered HERE, in the latest Compliance Library. You may also find it in the SBR, MBE or VSBE Reporting Toolkits.
For questions about the compliance call, please email lisa.sennaar@maryland.gov or nichelle.johnson1@maryland.gov.
The House Appropriations Committee has mandated an additional round of surveys in 2023 to address ongoing concerns about attainment of MBE goals, liaison vacancies, and the liaison's role within each agency. Surveys are being conducted by the Governor's Office of Small, Minority & Women Business Affairs in collaboration with the Department of General Services Office of State Procurement. A report is due to the Committee in December.
The Agency MBE Participation Attainment Survey will launch by July 1st.
- As a reminder, the data has been requested to:
- Understand how state agencies approach MBE goal attainment.
- Determine if there is room for improvement within specific agencies.
- Surveys will be sent to Procurement Directors.
- Liaisons will need to collaborate with procurement directors to provide accurate and scrubbed FY23 MBE annual procurement data for the survey.
- The Agency MBE Participation Attainment Survey will close on October 31, 2023.
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Submission of this survey is required and agencies who fail to submit the requested data by the due date will be reported as non-responsive to the Committee. No extension can be granted.
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The Agency Liaison Survey will launch later this year. More detailed information about the liaison survey will be provided soon.
SBR/MBE/VSBE Liaison Trainings:
- July 18 SBR/MBE/VSBE New Liaison Orientation (virtual) 1:00- 3:00 pm
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