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REPRINTED FROM THENEXTMAYOR.COMApril 24, 2007 press release, (submitted via e-mail) |
April 24, 2007
Contact: Solomon Jones
215.636.9851 / 215.370.5681
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PHILADELPHIA, PA - In testimony before the Minority Business Enterprise Council, Mayoral Candidate Chaka Fattah today called for an increase in the number of minority and women owned businesses getting city contracts.
Fattah cited a study by D.J. Miller & Associates in pointing out that, between 1998 and 2003, just 2.6 percent of the $2.78 billion in contracts the city awarded went to minority firms and 1.8 percent went to women-owned businesses. This, despite the fact that 24 percent of the city's businesses were minority-owned.
"Clearly, in a city with a population that is 42 percent white and 44 percent African American, that is 53 percent female and 47 percent male, our low rates of minority-owned and women-owned business participation in city contracting is a problem," Fattah said.
While participation has improved in recent years, with 14.3 percent of city contracting going to minority-owned businesses and 7.6 percent to women-owned firms in 2005, these figures are well below the present and past Administration's goals and below what we should have in Philadelphia given our demographics, Fattah said.
"Let me be very clear," Fattah added. "Philadelphia must increase its business base to be competitive in the global, Twenty-first century economy. Minority-owned and women-owned business participation is a key factor in that equation to increase economic development in our city ...
"Were I to become Mayor, my Administration would be fully committed to improving participation by making it an integral part of the procurement process and by actively working to eliminate barriers to meaningful minority and female participation in city contracting."
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