Saturday, February 06, 1999
Stadium contracts monitored
BY ALLEN HOWARD
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Within the last week, two groups have organized to become watchdogs for minority contractors dissatisfied with the amount of contracts minorities are getting on the Bengals stadium and Fort Washington Way project.
Stacy Smith, president of Certified Medical Affiliates in the West End, coordinated a meeting Tuesday night at Cafe Cin/Cin, downtown, which included 30 minority businesses.
“We need to come together as a group to work toward getting the contracts that are due minorities and women,” Ms. Smith said. “This is something that should have been done a long time ago.”
The Rev. Dock Foster, chairman of the social action committee of the Baptist Ministers Conference, said his group met last week at Unity Baptist Church in Evanston, where he pastors.
“We are trying to bring to reality, promises that were made to us for supporting the tax levy for the stadiums,” the Rev. Mr. Foster said.
The promise that the Rev. Mr. Foster referred to was a memorandum of understanding among the city of Cincinnati, Hamilton County and the Bengals to try to give 15 percent of the contracts to minorities.
A ruling by U.S. District Judge James Graham that minority set-asides were unconstitutional negated the memorandum.
U.S. Magistrate David Perelman of Cleveland ruled in a separate case that anyone who tried to enforce minority set-asides would be in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
Both rulings killed the Minority Business Enterprise program passed by the Ohio General Assembly in 1980.The Ohio Attorney General's Office has appealed both cases.
One legal instrument remaining is an executive order by former Ohio Gov. George Voinovich in 1997 which said the state is committed to make all state services, benefits and opportunities available to everyone.
State Rep. Samuel Britton, D-Cincinnati, is sifting through the legal rulings, trying to direct the minority contractors to the best options.
He met with the Cincinnati groups Thursday in Columbus and planned to meet again with them in Cincinnati. “The discussions center around whether to help with the appeal which will probably fail, see what we can get out of the executive order or try to raise enough money for another study to show that discrimination against minority contractors still exists,” he said.
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