Page 6 - Florida Sentinel 10-18-16 Online Edition

Editorials/Column
FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN
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Letter To The Editor
Diversity, Equity, Fairness And Economic Inclusion Is Good Business And The Right Thing To Do
his is about the lack
of diversity in key de- cision making leadership positions within certain organizations; inequity, unfairness and the eco- nomic exclusion of African American business owners and other Minority Busi- ness Enterprises (MBE’s) in actual spending.
A joint Economic Devel- opment Committee cre- ated by the Tampa Organization of Black Af- fairs (TOBA) and the Sat- urday Morning Breakfast Group (SMBG), was formed to collect and ana- lyze data about actual spending and hiring trends in three of Tampa's largest (randomly selected) or- ganizations (The City of Tampa - COT, The Univer- sity of South Florida Sys- tem - USFS and Tampa General Hospital - TGH) that have a significant im- pact on the local economy and employment.
Based upon the com- mittee's analysis of the data, there is evidence of economic inequity, unfair- ness and exclusion of African American business owners and other Minority Business Enterprises (MBE’s) in actual spending by these organizations. The findings showed sig- nificantly low amounts of funds spent with African American owned busi- nesses and other MBE’s. This revelation prompted TOBA and the SMBG to propose solutions to close the gap.
Part of the process in- cludes meeting with the African American business owners, other MBE’s and also separately with repre- sentatives from the COT, USFS and TGH to review our findings. Our goal is to create effective policies, practices and procedures that would result in actual increased spending with African American owned businesses and other MBE’s without organiza- tions sacrificing quality, timely service or competi- tive pricing.
MBE CERTIFICATION VS. ACTUAL SPENDING
During the process we are learning that some or- ganizations have MBE cer- tification programs that
businesses must complete before they are deemed (by the COT, the USFS, TGH and other organizations) to be ready, willing and able to provide needed goods, construction or professional related serv- ices.
In most instances, we learned there are numer- ous African American owned businesses and other MBE’s that are certi- fied, but those businesses have not experienced ac- tual spending by the COT, the USFS and TGH with their companies. In some cases, African American owned businesses have in- dicated (as result of years of exclusion) they are not motivated to respond to proposals or bid on jobs after being historically ex- cluded for so long. How- ever, in most instances, the problem is the lack of will by certain organizations to have policies, procedures, practices, management, staffing, technology, etc. to mandate, track and en- force performance man- agement agreements.
One African American business owner and other MBE’s reportedly submit- ted a response to a bid for a 2-year, $700,000 dollar service contract among 10 total companies and 5 con- tracts were awarded but none were awarded, to African American owned or MBE’s.
SOLUTIONS
One solution is to have
a commitment from execu- tive level leadership to change the culture of their respective organizations to make it a normal way of life to be fair, equitable and inclusive.
Another solution would be to have staff sign per- formance management agreements with diversity, equity and fairness goals (demographically by race and gender) and mandate staff (with the authority to spend organization funds) to comply or face discipli- nary consequences for fail- ure to perform. Otherwise, status quo will continue to be the norm.
For example, the COT spent $288 million dollars in five years, but only spent %2 of those funds with
African American and His- panic owned business yet the Hispanic population is 25% and the African Amer- ican population is 24%. While the combined 49% population of African Americans and Hispanics may not be paying $49% of the taxes, these groups are paying more than 2% and should be enjoying more than 2% of the opportuni- ties to be paid for provid- ing their goods and services. NOTE: The USF System and TGH are ac- tively working on solu- tions. The COT is on the brink.
A legislative solution, in the form of an ordinance, has been proposed by COT, City Council Members. The ordinance would re- quire all COT contracts to include language that must show actual spending with African American owned businesses and other MBE’s before the COT City Council would approve the contract, unless no African American owned business or other MBE was avail- able to provide the needed goods or services.
This Thursday, October 20th at 8:30 A.M., the COT City Council Members will voting on the referenced ordinance. Should COT City Council approve the ordinance, the next step would be for the COT Mayor to approve and sign into effective law.We would like to believe that all COT City Council Mem- bers and the Mayor would fully support equity, fair- ness and the economic in- clusion of african americans and other MBE’s.
African American owned businesses and other MBE’s should attend the COT City Council meet- ing to better understand the ordinance. This ordi- nance should be approved by the COT City Council and the Mayor because, di- versity, equity, fairness and economic inclusion is good business and the right thing to do.
JAMES RANSOM Board Member and Chair- man of the Economic De- velopment Committee Tampa Organization of Black Affairs
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Sexual Assault: Not For Women Only
nly a woman or a man who has been groped, nearly
raped or raped, spanked on the behind, or fondled knows how it feels to have these things done to you by both relatives and/or strangers. Or, if you have ever been slowly undressed visually by a member of the same sex or opposite sex, you feel like you’ve been photographed naked while tak- ing a shower and want to “scrub your skin clean.”
These statements were made by “Janice,” a middle-aged woman who has been the victim of all three behaviors, and is concerned about how lightly the issue has been taken. If nothing else good comes from Donald Trump’s quest to be- come President of America, we can “thank” him for placing three pink elephants in the middle of American conscious- ness: unfair taxation policies, racial and religious intoler- ance, and the lack of sensitivity and awareness of the nature of sexual assault in America, all of which will never be the same again.
No doubt, increased sensitivity to women and their sta- tus has resulted in a drop in the rate of sexual assault by 74 percent since 1993, from a rate of 4.3 assaults per 1,000 peo- ple in 1993, to 1.1 per 1,000 in 2012.”
However, in spite of the rate reduction, “an American is
sexually assaulted every two minutes.” One out of every 6 American women has been the victim of an attempted rape or completed rape in her lifetime; one in 33 men have expe- rienced an attempted or completed rape; and 63,000 chil- dren a year were victims of sexual abuse. In addition, 9 of every 10 victims of rape are female; 17.7 million American women have been raped, and 2.78 million men have been raped since 1998.
Indeed, Americans need to have some honest conversa- tions about these issues as soon as the election is over.
Who Is Billy Bush, And Why Should We Be Concerned About Him?
William Hall “Billy” Bush is a radio and television host who gained fame by being featured on The Billy Bush Show (a nationally syndicated radio program), who’s
been a correspondent on Access Hollywood, and became a primary anchor and co-host on NBC’s Today Show until Oc- tober of this year when he became embroiled in a contro- versy regarding Bush’s secret recording of a lewd conversation he had with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump five years previously.
Following the airing of the incident five years later, Billy Bush was summarily suspended from the Today Show. Why?
Was Billy given the boot because he’s a member of the presidential Bush family (Herbert Walker, George Dubyuh etc.)? Naah! Was it because he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Studies and Government from Colby College then married Ms. Sydney Davis (who?) and begat three children?
Obviously, we are at a loss as to why the Today Show fired Bush for blowing the whistle on a man who had hopes
of filling the highest office in the land if not the world.
So, what did the Billy do wrong?
According to Today’s Show pundits, “B.B.” was suspended indefinitely due to the fallout
of his released conversation with Trump thereby running the risk of ruining Trump’s chances to tramp around the Oval Office. That’s what he did wrong!
But such “lockerroom” logic reminds us of whistle blowers of the past who learned too late that “NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED!”
Remember Black Watergate security guard Frank Wills who alerted police about a possible break-in and for his heroism died sick and penniless? Then ask Edward Snowden about the thanks he got for alerting the world about “Big Brother” NSA. No, Billy Bush did nothing wrong except to save America from being the laughing stock of the world. Now you know why you should remember his name.
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