Service Corps of Retired Executives

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Small Business Administration's Service Corps of Retired Executives Program (SCORE), focusing on how SCORE: (1) determines budget allocations for regional locations; (2) officials view the fairness of the allocations; and (3) meets the needs of rural communities. GAO noted that: (1) SCORE regional budget allocations are based primarily on historical trends in actual expenditures; (2) SCORE officials stated that their areas receive a fair share of SCORE funds, given the small size of the total budget; and (3) to meet the needs of rural communities, SCORE uses approaches such as waiving the guidelines for the number of volunteers needed to start a chapter and using persons or funds from larger chapters to subsidize rural chapters.