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Small Business Administration Administrator Maria Contreras-Sweet told the House Small Business Committee yesterday that credit unions making small-dollar loans - $50,000 and under - through its 7(a) micro-lending program are a great help to low-income, small-business owners.

Contreras-Sweet was responding to a question from Committee Ranking Member Nydia Velázquez, D-N.Y. She testified before the committee Wednesday to discuss SBA's fiscal 2016 budget requests.

Yesterday, at Washington Gas Light Federal Credit Union in Springfield, Va., NAFCU and SBA signed a working agreement to further educate credit unions about SBA programs, with an emphasis on the administration's 7(a) micro-lending initiative. (See related story.)

During Wednesday's hearing, Contreras-Sweet discussed many of the initiatives the administration is working on to encourage more lending to small businesses, including the 7(a) micro-lending program in which many credit unions now participate.

In a letter to the committee Tuesday, NAFCU Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and General Counsel Carrie Hunt reiterated the "longstanding working relationship" credit unions have with SBA and how they use SBA's lending programs to facilitate the flow of capital to small business.

Committee Chairman Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, in his opening statement, also addressed data security efforts saying he was dismayed that the SBA's budget did not include a chief information officer to oversee technology. NAFCU has been vigilant in requesting Congress address the need for national data security standards and notifications for retailers as financial institutions, like credit unions, are already held to such standards under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act.