Millions of dollars worth of government contracts designated for service-disabled veterans are being siphoned off by fraud and abuse, according to a recent government report.
In a case-study of 10 firms, including one Florida company, the Government Accountability Office found ineligible companies had won about $100 million worth of contracts earmarked for service-disabled veteran-owned companies.
The ``program is vulnerable to fraud and abuse, which could result in legitimate service-disabled veterans losing contracts to ineligible firms,'' according to the report, which was presented to Congress last week.
Florida is home to 1,421 service-disabled veteran-owned businesses, according to the government's Central Contractor Registry. And while the government has a mandate to set aside 3 percent of all federal contracts for such firms, it often misses the mark.
During fiscal year 2008 -- the latest data available -- service-disabled small businesses won $3.3 billion worth of federal contracts, or about 1 percent. But the GAO study suggests that even those modest results are overstated.
In one case, the GAO found a full-time Department of Defense contractor, who was disabled and worked at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, was passing along a $900,000 contract to manufacture furniture to his wife's company. She, in turn, passed it along to another manufacturer that actually completed the work.
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