On May 21, the Small Business Administration unveiled the SBA Veteran Pledge Initiative. With the support of SBA’s top 20 national lending partners, and 100 additional regional and community lending partners across the U.S., SBA expects to assist an additional 2,000 veterans obtain loans to start or expand small businesses by increasing lending by $475 million over the next five years, an increase of 5 percent over SBA’s historic lending activity to veterans. [Extracted from Montgomery County The Herald June 6, 2013 edition]