Office of Business Opportunity releases disparity study findings and recommends expanding small-business category amid public pushback

The Office of Business Opportunity (OBO) presented the city'commissioned disparity study and outlined draft ordinance changes intended to align the city's minority and women-owned business enterprise (MWBE) program with the study's findings. The presentation prompted an extended question-and-answer session with council members and a lengthy public-comment period in which business groups and contractors raised concerns about outreach, data, implementation and the potential consequences of changing program categories.

Study and legal background: Director Celenthea Hord told the committee the city began the study in April 2023 and contracted MGT Consulting to analyze five years of city spend data pulled from SAP and to conduct qualitative outreach. Hord summarized the legal rationale for disparity studies, citing the U.S. Supreme Court's Croson decision as the precedent establishing the methodology: ''The legal premise for disparity studies '' 'is that they provide actionable results that can be used to narrowly tailor a supplier diversity program,'' she said.

Key quantitative findings: Hord said MGT found statistically significant disparities for MWBEs overall across procurement categories. She summarized subgroup results: statistically significant disparities were found for Black-owned firms across construction, professional services, other services and goods; for Asian- and Hispanic-owned firms disparities varied by category (construction, goods and other services showed disparities in several cases); for Native American-owned firms disparities appeared across categories. OBO presented aggregated five-year spend figures and disparity-index calculations for each…