Carol In the News

Carol Moseley Braun Announces Plan for Improving Allocation of Contracts to Minority- and Women-Owned Businesses


December 19, 2010 -- Chicago mayoral candidate, Senator Carol Moseley Braun, today announced what she will do to improve the process of allocating city contracts to minority- and women-owned businesses. Standing with her at the Bronzeville campaign headquarters were representatives of minority and women business owners from across the city.


“I want to point out that this is a matter of grave importance, not only to those of us who are African-American, or who are women, or who might be Hispanic or Asian or Native American, or East Asian,” Senator Moseley Braun said, “but to the community as a whole. This issue goes to the heart of defining our community as one of inclusion and diversity, or exclusion and cabals.”


As mayor, Senator Moseley Braun said she would make the following improvements in the process of allocating contracts:


- Demand enforcement of the regulations in place to insure compliance


- Work to improve access to capital by encouraging not only banks but venture capitalists to invest here at home instead of in New York and California


- Unbundle contracts so the hidden opportunities that minorities and women can compete for are clear


- Provide greater technical assistance to those who wish to participate in the certification and bidding process.


- Hold all those awarded major contracts accountable for bringing more minorities and women into their companies as sub contractors


- Ask major contractors to help women and minority companies with capital and bonding


- Work to ensure that in-state contractors get priority so that we stop sending our hard earned tax dollars to outof- state workers


- Create transparency in the allocation of contracts by putting more of the process online and appoint an auditing team to look at every department to find out where the money is going and who it is going to


- Make compliance with the law in this area a condition of performance evaluation for every department head.


Small businesses create jobs in our neighborhoods. Small businesses grow our communities. I cannot help but wonder what innovation or new technology may have been lost, all because a minority or women owned business was denied an opportunity to compete. Leadership in this area must come from the top,” Senator Moseley Braun said.


“As mayor I will demand accountability. Upholding the law in procurement will be an absolute priority. The program was a success when it began,” she continued “and it can be a success again. I am committed to making it succeed. And, in the words of the late John H. Johnson, ‘failure is not a word that I accept.’ Nor is it a word that the people who stand with me today will accept.”


Senator Moseley Braun’s Bronzeville headquarters is located in the historic Supreme Life Insurance Building. The location is symbolically important because it is where Ebony and Jet magazine publisher John H. Johnson was inspired to begin building what became the largest African-American owned publishing company in the nation.

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