City Of New York

City Of New York, Department Of Small Business Services, a local government entity, acts as a recipient of federal grant funding and a sub-recipient of federal workforce and infrastructure grants, delivering procurement technical assistance, small business development, and climate-mitigation planning services across New York City and the metropolitan region.

The Department of Small Business Services is a child entity of the City of New York and functions as a government agency rather than a commercial vendor. Its federal footprint consists entirely of grant awards and sub-awards, with no prime federal contracts or contract vehicles. The entity has received 32 prime federal grant awards (52% of its 62-award portfolio) totaling $313.7 million in obligated dollars across a fourteen-agency customer base, alongside 30 sub-award positions flowing through federal grant recipients including the Department of Labor New York, the New York State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The Department's primary capability as a federal grant recipient centers on operating the APEX Accelerator program, a Procurement Technical Assistance (CFDA 12.002) initiative funded by the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Three consecutive cooperative agreements — awarded January 1, 2023 through May 17, 2027 — provide free procurement counseling, training, and technical guidance to small, emerging, and newly started business entities seeking to participate in federal, state, and local government contracting. The awards total approximately $972 thousand in current year funding and target diverse and underserved business communities throughout the New York region. Beyond APEX, the Department operates a Mass Timber Accelerator (funded under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law by the Department of Commerce, ultimately completing May 31, 2026) that provides technical assistance to advance mass timber construction technologies. In parallel, it administers Congressional Project Grants (CFDA 59.059) from the SBA's Office of the Chief Operating Officer — two grants totaling $3.25 million awarded October 1, 2023 and February 1, 2024 — supporting neighborhood development, small business programming, workforce development sub-grants, and climate action planning.

The Department holds a regional climate-planning role under an EPA Region 2 Inflation Reduction Act Cooperative Agreement (awarded July 1, 2023, completing July 1, 2027) that funds development and updating of regional climate mitigation and pollution-reduction plans for the New York-Newark-Jersey City metropolitan statistical area, with particular focus on low-income and disadvantaged communities. The EPA agreement delegates administration to the NYC Economic Development Corporation, which serves as the implementing partner.

Sub-award activity concentrates in two streams: Department of Labor workforce programs (where the Department functions as a sub-recipient of WIOA formula funds, Trade Adjustment Assistance, and state-sector training grants managed by the New York Department of Labor Employment and Training Administration — comprising 23 awards, the plurality of the portfolio) and Federal Emergency Management Agency resilience and flood-mitigation projects (including Coney Island Creek shoreline restoration and South Street stormwater corridor work). Awards per year climbed from one in 2022 to sixteen in 2024, with recent activity showing eleven awards in 2025 and two additional prime cooperative agreements awarded in May 2026. Only one award carries an ultimate completion date within the next twenty-four months, indicating minimal near-term recompete exposure.