APTA EXPO 2008
Media Partner Article

• BUSRide Magazine
  David Hubbard, Editor
  Topic: Emerging Tech
• Mass Transit
  Fred Jandt, Editor
  Topic: Emerging Tech
• Mass Transit/Sustainability Concepts
  Leah Harnack, Associate Editor
  Topic: Sustainability
• Railway Gazette International
  Chris Jackson, Editor
  Topic: Sustainability
• Minority Business Entrepreneur
  Ginger Conrad, Publisher
  Topic: DBE

Trip Planners Ply Their Heuristics
New trip planning software allows experts’ rules of thumb in paratransit scheduling
by David Hubbard, Editor
BUSRide Magazine

Paratransit services offer qualified disabled individuals the capability to travel in a manner comparable to regular public transit. As more people who rely on public transportation have become aware of their options under the American with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), scheduling demand-response transportation has become a more complex process.

The paratransit mission is to schedule every call for an on-time pickup, and deliver that passenger to the destination traveling the shortest distance in the shortest amount of time.
Unlike regularly scheduled routes in standard transit operations, each day presents paratransit schedulers with an entirely new configuration of pick-ups and drop-offs.

Ideally, every rider expects a direct ride on time door-to-door to and from the destination. Where the agenda must accommodate several thousands of calls in one day, ride sharing is more the norm. The challenge for scheduler is to mix and match riders to the most efficient routes as the plan becomes more complex with every request.

Technological advancements over the last 15 years in scheduling systems and software has made the task much more manageable and has improved customer service. 

William Ho, formerly a professor in computer engineering at the University of Southern California, believes the scheduler should not have to work around the system. Rather, he says the scheduler is the expert and the system serves at his pleasure. Fully automated software gives schedulers the freedom to plot a day’s worth of trip planning in only a matter of minutes.

Ho is co-founder and chief technical officer of StrataGen Systems, Kirkland, WA, a route planning software company that stakes its claim on the efficiency of its proprietary Strategy Engine.

“The strategy engine outlines the trip load for the day according to parameters an expert scheduler builds into his system,” says Ho. “A typical paratransit company operates from various sites where no two demand-response schedules are ever alike.”

With the goal to accommodate the most trips per vehicle per hour, the strength of the StrataGen system allows the incorporation of heuristics — expert rules of thumb — into the daily trip plan. Heuristics are simply another word for common sense guidelines that help a scheduler construct the most efficient trip plan.

“The plan from strategy engine is like an essay,” says Ho. “Heuristics are the sentences the scheduler uses to compose his essay.”

Heuristics at work
A customer requests a 9 a.m. pickup for a 10-mile trip to a medical complex. By law, the driver is on time if he picks up the passenger within a half-hour of the time on the manifest.

But to improve customer relations when precise on-time pickups are impossible for every call, the goal is to at least shorten that window to only 10 minutes.

“The scheduler wants to schedule as many pickups as possible to occur within the first 10 minutes of the 30-minute pickup window ,” Ho explains. “Then if the driver runs behind schedule, he still has the remaining 20-minutes of the window as a time buffer before he is formally considered late.”

The scheduler might also request to pick up all wheelchair passengers first, and as calls come in add rides to only the shortest trips on the existing schedule.
It is not always possible to take all passengers in the vehicle in the direction they need to go. A person headed south may have to endure riding north for some of the trip.
StrataGen allows the scheduler his heuristic to command the vehicle to travel in the opposite direction only five percent of the total distance of the trip. It may combine with another rule of thumb that says with every stop the passenger must move closer to his destination.

“The passenger must always feel the driver is making progress and not driving around in circles,” says Ho. “Schedulers always try to consider these factors, but they do not always  have time in the day to plan each trip to its absolute efficiency. But because the StrataGen system can decipher and configure specific heuristics in a matter of minutes, the schedule is very close and acceptable to what the scheduler asked for each trip throughout the day.”

According to Ho, older scheduling systems could take up to 13 man-hours per day with three people working on subsets to fine tune where the vehicles needed to go and at what time. He says the power of the StrataGen system has reduced that time to 10 minutes.
New York City adopted the SrataGen system after Ho made an “apples to apples” comparison of his system to the city’s existing paratransit scheduling system. At time the trip load averaged 7,500 a day, Ho says StrataGen took only 45 minutes to resolve the daily batching process to everyone’s satisfaction as opposed to 10 hours by the previous system.

New York City has topped 19,000 on multiple occasions since September, 2007.  In a formal presentation at Transitech in 2005, New York City reported 30 percent increase in efficiency in trips per vehicle-hour, and 10 percent reduction in cost in dollars per trip, all coupled with improved on-time performance and 50 percent reduction in customer complaints.

The year 2007 has been a good one for the letter “i” with Apple almost making it a household name with the advent of its iLife suite of software and the iPhone capturing the public consciousness in a way no other product had since the introduction of the iPod. While not on the same level of stardom that the letter “e” commands with e-mail, e-banking and the rest of its Internet presence, the letter “i” definitely is heading to the top of the charts.

Now Vancouver’s TransLink adds another title to the ninth letter’s pedigree with its iMove Web site. iMove is quite simply a collaborative effort five years in the making to track all of the various forms of transit and the potential problem areas in the Vancouver region in one readily accessible Web site (http://www.i-move.ca/).

iMove provides real time information on construction zones, automobile accidents and schedules of all of TransLink’s, VIA rail’s and Amtrak’s public transportation schedules. It also includes information on area bicycle networks and links to Web sites for the local airport and ferry system.

The information is gathered from the Regional Condition Reporting system, or “Reggie,” which allows participating cities, municipalities and agencies to input information on their local areas, which shows up on iMove. Once information is posted on Reggie, it gets uploaded and ready to be viewed within a minute.

“We’re teaming up with what we call E-Com, which is the emergency communications center for police, fire and ambulance and so forth,” says Drew Snider, TransLink Media Relations, “So as soon as they enter an incident that is likely to cause a traffic problem, it will get posted on iMove.”

Snider said the connection with E-Com will be in place in the beginning of 2008. Another thing the agency is looking to add in the next year is connectivity for the iMove site to not only cell phones and PDAs, but there is more to it than that says Snider.

“[With iMove] you’re planning a route pre-trip,” says Snider. “That’s largely what we we’re aiming it at this time. What we’re looking at in the future, you mentioned about delivery to cell phones and so forth, in vehicles systems would be another one. Where you can just hook up wirelessly and you’ve got it.

“So you know if you’re planning it pre-trip or you are checking something during your trip or from outside the region, you’ll be able to look in and see what’s different and see where the problems are.”

TransLink’s subsidiary Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) will act as administrator and oversee both iMove and Reggie. The system has been under development for five years now at a cost of a little more than $1 million to get it up and running and an annual cost of $250,000. Pulling everyone together is what took most of the time says Snider who admits it has been a little like herding cats.

“I think at this stage its best to say there are probably some various issues that have to be worked through at each end, but I think they have all come to realize the overall importance of something like this. Because you know we’re such a transportation dependent region with so many things happening — we’ve got the airport, we’ve got the seaport, we’ve got ferries going in and out, we’ve got the buses, the SkyTrain, border crossings, there’s a lot. And so to be able to bring that together in one place, plus the construction boom that’s been going on, plus preparations for the Olympics in 2010, that’s a lot of things coming together and people need to know what the transportation system is going to be like practically on a day-to-day basis.

“So I think as the various municipalities have come to realize and the other agencies have come to realize how important this is, they’ve had no problem coming on. There’s been a bit [of push back] from various areas from time to time just as there is with anything else — herding cats is a very good way of putting it. But they’ve generally come on board.”

iMove has gotten a good buzz since it launched as a lab (test) site in October with both the public and the local media. TransLink has been on local morning news programs to explain the new site and how it can benefit commuters, but the media outlets found that they were falling in love with iMove as well, especially their traffic reporters who are thrilled about it.

“Now they’re getting information in one stop,” says Snider. “They don’t have to go flipping through different Web sites and working the phones and doing all the other cumbersome things that happen — it’s up there.

“And in fact, one thing that we’re pitching to the various stations is that they have a functionality … they have administrator status in Reggie where they can input information that they get from people because so many people phone in from their car phones. And that could then show up on the system.”

iMove is easy enough to use. The site uses Google Maps as the basis for its mapping program. Anyone familiar with that program can quickly navigate the map on screen, moving it to your desired location and zooming in or out. From there you can select from a series of dropdown menus with current construction, incidents, events and congestion preset to be viewed on the map. The dropdown menus allow you to view a selection of road, transit, commercial, marine, air, rail and cycling conditions, which you can then save for immediate repeat viewing.

The depth of information available on iMove and its customizability makes it one of, if not the best transit site on the Web. Just combining the various forms of public transit with road conditions, commercial transportation and even cycling conditions gives commuters a macro picture of the region heretofore not seen. And best yet, it has available more than 100 traffic cameras so viewers can see how traffic actually is moving where they want to travel.

It’s easy to see transit moving in this direction with someone starting a day in their iLife by sitting down with a cup of coffee and checking iMove before heading to work in the morning.

Transit-oriented development (TOD) is when the development is centered on — and dependant on — a public transportation facility. TOD has created amazing growth and investment in cities across the country. Previously abandoned buildings now house high-end condos and specialty retail. Tax base goes up, more money in the community, everyone’s happy — right?

Not necessarily.

Dwayne Marsh, associate director for PolicyLink points out, “Any time that you create new value in property, you’re creating opportunity for investment to increase.” He states, “You’ve created the chance for housing and affordability to be challenged.”

He continues, “There seemed to be a lot of development that generated inequitable outcomes. Poor people — working-class people — getting the short end of the development stick and often having to react to policies and not being able to help shape them.”

Katherine Aguilar Perez, vice president of development for Forest City Development, has seen that same trend. “In many of the cities where TOD and this investment is taking place, communities of color are impacted — particularly socially distressed, economic struggling communities.”

Perez quickly adds, “There is a very fine line between gentrification and investment. Gentrification is seen as replacement, relocation or dislocation of an existing community for the sake of private dollars and public dollars coming in and rejuvenating a place. “

“Then there’s the other side of it, which is investment.” Repeating herself she adds, “Which is private and public dollars coming in to rejuvenate a place.”

Marsh states a similar sentiment. “We realized that we wanted to flip that development paradigm so we started talking about equitable development.” He continues, “It wasn’t like we were thinking neighborhood improvement was a bad thing but we just felt like it was a basic premise that if a neighborhood is improving, the people that have been there through the difficult times and helped turn the neighborhood around, should be able to stay.”

He stresses, “The fundamental thing we try to focus on is making sure there is not involuntary displacement of residents and small businesses when an area is revitalized.”

Consider the Consequences
It’s important to address how transit-oriented development affects existing communities, Perez says. “Planning and developing in a vacuum — that’s gone. Those days of kind of drawing the corridor and deciding where those stations go in a vacuum are gone.”

As Marsh explains, TOD isn’t just good development in of itself, it is good for the entire community.  “It can connect people, especially working-class people, to regional opportunities to connect them to other job opportunities around the region.”

This can translate into savings for the community because the actual development itself creates opportunities for innovative ways in dealing with community-service needs. Marsh says, “If you have a neighborhood that you could bring in a ton of high-end condos into and build tax base, you could call it a success.

“But, if as a consequence, your social service programs are dealing with increased homelessness or more job training needs or neighborhoods are destabilizing and flooded with folks who don’t have any were to live, there’s a net cost to the city as well.”

Perez points out another reason for developers to be concerned. “Why? Because if you don’t grow sensitivity to this issue — it’s an important factor — somebody’s going to face a lawsuit.”

She continues, “We need to be thinking about compact, smart development whole sale, not just it’s nice and good only in these areas. It’s across the country that we need to be thinking about those things in the development industry.”

It Takes Sensitivity and Time
Approaching a project from the perspective of being successful in the community at the local level is not an easy task. Establishing a culturally inclusive and culturally sensitive process to ensure equitable development is difficult and time consuming.

“These urban TODs, it’s not usually one or two parcels, it’s a whole bunch and they’re usually areas where there has been deferred maintenance investment,” states Perez. She stresses, “It’s not just the development, but it’s that whole area.”

“There’s been an increased sensitivity at the federal, state and local levels to be inclusive in the planning of transit areas of transit-oriented development districts in a way that says, OK, you X community, are sitting in the midst or adjacent to a place where we propose a transit center.” Perez continues, “You, community, need to be involved in how that development and transformation takes place to fully benefit from the investment that is projected for this area.”

Working together to compliment the existing community and the existing cultural fabric instead of replacing it, you maintain the placemaking attributes, the local businesses that make the community a place where people want to live, work and play.

“When a developer comes in, if they’re worth their salt, they’re going to go in and evaluate, what are the attractions to this particular area,” says Perez. “You find a successful café or a deli or a bakery, you say hey, how can we make sure that you’re part of the future development that’s going to take place here.”

Perez explains the process of working with the residential and retail sides of TOD. “Most TODs are in redevelopment project areas for financing purposes,” she says. “You can ensure that there are ways that families and people in the impacted area can be first on the list to move into either affordable units or market-rate unites and ensure that they get an opportunity to benefit from the new project — directly.

“You can show an apartment renter, well, I’ve got a 1,000-square-foot unit that leaks in the winter and is hot in the summer, but if we have this new development, you’ll be relocated for a temporary time, but if you want to come back in, there’s some units here that are going to be brand new, they’re going to be quality projects.”

On the retail side, the developer will come in and identify those businesses that are ready to take the next step with the redevelopment and those that are on the fringe and won’t want to stay. “It’s working one-by-one,” Perez stresses. Some may stay in the development, some may move to an adjacent locale and others may be ready to close their doors.

“There’s a whole bunch of opportunities to help local businesses,” she says. “There’s going to be some people who say, ‘you know what, I really prefer to stay here. I don’t really want to go. I’m really happy here.’

 “It’s working with them to say, maybe you won’t be able to be in this project, but there is an adjacent partial, because it’s not just based on one building or on one project; it’s all the ancillary developments and projects and buildings around.

“Some businesses are on the edge,” Perez adds. “You have an older owner that is ready to get out. ‘I’ve done this for awhile, I’m kind of done’.

“The point is that every single project is different and every set of circumstances is different,” she stresses. “What it takes is an appreciation and understanding for what that, either business owner or landowner, really wants to see at the end of the day.

“It takes a lot of understanding to find a place where everybody feels like they’re all benefitting.” She affirms, “You have to send in people that have that kind of sensitivity engrained in them. Sometimes it’s all about the person who is the spokesperson.

“What that doesn’t mean is that everyone else on the team isn’t part of the process. That’s not what it means.” Perez reiterates, “What it means is, that public face has to be someone that understands that community, maybe speaks the language of the community, is culturally sensitive to that community.”

She also mentions that sometimes it takes several people before finding the right fit with a community. “You have to really find that right person that just clicks with that community.”

Perez adds, “It’s being sensitive to that culture, understanding the nuances of that culture and understanding how, where and when people in that community like to be engaged and want to be engaged.”

TOD for the Future
Around the world, TOD is being pushed to places we can only imagine here in the United States. Perez says,  “As a person who really wants to see TOD successfully transform communities in an inclusive way, and someone that’s very sensitive to that, when I’ve been overseas and I look at what China and other countries have done to leverage that TOD with the infrastructure, it’s beyond Wi-Fi, it’s beyond fiber optics. They’re smart buildings. They’re intelligent buildings. They’re secure buildings. They’re green buildings.”

“A lot of work, but there are a lot of good models out there and I’m encouraged by what I hear from lots of different people all over the world.” She adds, “Not only is TOD relevant, but the future of TOD can be much more spectacular.”

Leah Harnack is the associate editor of Mass Transit magazine.

Rail Transit Helps To Keep Cities On The Move
by Chris Jackson, Editor
Railway Gazette International

‘SUSTAINABLE MOBILITY is more than just a buzz-word; it is the very foundation for a successful future’, believes Hans Rat, Secretary-General of the International Union of Public Transport (UITP).

Writing in Railway Gazette International last year (1), Rat argued that ‘there is a strong and reciprocal link between urban public transport and the cities that it serves’, in that neither can be truly successful without the other.

Cities everywhere face real questions about the quality of urban life, sustainable development and even the survival of a dynamic community-focused civilisation. Rat believes that cities need transit to thrive, but transit can only be successful if it forms an integral part of the urban whole.

In June 2005 UITP’s Roma Manifesto emphasised that ‘public transport is mobility for all’. Amongst other things, it recommends co-ordinated planning of land use and transport, networks designed to maximise social inclusion, stronger investment in transit, and ensuring that all modes are charged fairly for their use of land, energy consumption and environmental impact.

Tracking the numbers
For more than a decade, UITP has been collating statistics from more than 120 cities around the world. Its Mobility in Cities Database (MCD) demonstrates conclusively that cities which adopt integrated transport strategies are reaping the benefits (2).
Urban sprawl clearly represents a challenge. The average share of total travel accounted for by transit, walking and cycling decreases from 60% in cities where the density of population and jobs per hectare is above 80 [200 per acre / 20,800 per square mile] to just over 10% in cities where the density is less than 25 [6,500 per square mile].
Figures for Western Europe show that urban population density fell by 6% between 1995 and 2001. At the same time, average car ownership per 1,000 inhabitants rose by nearly 2% a year, reaching 450 in 2001, or just under one car for every two inhabitants. In North America and Australia, the rate is even higher. But some cities with well-integrated transport systems record boardings per inhabitant well above average despite high levels of car ownership.

The MCD shows that the cost and performance of urban transport as a whole are closely correlated to transit’s market share. As a percentage of GDP, the cost to the community (transit investment and operation, road building and maintenance, the cost of driving a car), is halved when comparing cities where transit, walking and cycling handle more than 55% of trips to those cities with less than 25%. In cash terms the difference is more than $2,000 per inhabitant per year.

Equally, average energy consumption for passenger transport decreases from 55,000 MJ [52 million BTU] per inhabitant per year to as little as 12,000 MJ [11 million BTU] in cities with high modal shares for transit, walking and cycling.

Rail’s transforming role
Urban and regional rail transit networks have long served as the core of sustainable mobility. Rat believes rail’s role ‘is being transformed into an urban backbone, around which the city’s multimodal mobility requirements can be structured and developed’. By integrating rail with other modes, both public and private, he explains, ‘we can offer our citizens comprehensive seamless mobility’.

Key to this will be the evolution of park-and-ride and feeder bus networks, along with restrictions on car use in city centres – both through parking controls and road user charges. Cities such as Denver and Dallas, having demonstrated the benefits of light rail on a limited scale, are embarking on ambitious plans for further rail corridors to form the backbone of huge region-wide transit networks.
Many cities have found that investment in rail transit is more attractive, in terms of diverting passengers from car, than even high-quality bus services. Attractive vehicles, segregated rights-of-way, and the long-term security demonstrated by the investment in fixed infrastructure all play their part. And this ‘rail bias’ is now being recognised by the Federal Transit Administration, for example in its assessment of expansion projects for Salt Lake City and Houston.

The use of electric traction– particularly for subways or light rail – can also help to decouple transport’s energy demand from a reliance on increasingly-uncertain fossil fuel supplies, and reduce the level of greenhouse gas emissions (3).

Transit-oriented development
Another boost comes from transit-oriented development. Cities as far apart as Stockholm and Singapore have adopted structure plans that integrate urban development with the provision of public transport, locating housing, retail and offices along transit corridors, with high-density developments around rail stations. A few European cities have even managed to maintain their population density levels through excellent integration between public transport and urban development.
ToD is taking off along North American light rail and subway routes, from Calgary to Charlotte and San Francisco to Washington. But ToD is not just about new developments. In France the construction of new light rail lines is often the driver for revitalising historic city centres. Closer to home, rail transit has encouraged downtown revival in Minneapolis, Houston and San Diego, amongst others.

A strong will
To maintain consistency between urban planning and transport policies, the transit industry must balance the responsibilities of different stakeholders – authorities, operators, suppliers and users. Hans Rat argues that ‘achieving genuine sustainable mobility requires a strong political will and wholehearted commitment’. Behind every successful city, he says, ‘there is a political figure with a vision’, which goes far beyond public transport ‘to embrace mobility and the quality of urban life’.
But with local authorities facing many calls on their finances, transit investment often requires innovative funding sources. Public-private partnerships, gas taxes, parking and road user charges or a levy on land values can help to meet the cost of new facilities. The Hong Kong metro’s successful ‘property+rail’ model shows how the greater economic activity generated by investment in transit can create a revenue stream which will sustain rail operations in the longer term.
The city benefits economically and socially from its investment in public transport, and the transport mode shares the economic benefits that it has helped to generate. Truly a win-win partnership.

Quote
‘The strength of public transport and the vitality of cities are closely intertwined.’
Jerome Pourbaix
Manager, Urban Affairs & Transport Statistics, UITP

Since its founding in 1984, MBE magazine has been committed to economic parity as a lasting solution to the ills of poverty and discrimination. Throughout our 23-year history, this publication has chronicled the evolution of affirmative action and procurement programs within both the public and private sectors, including how these crucial issues have affected the growth and survival of minority- and woman-owned businesses. The effort to eradicate affirmative action laws regarding government contracting continues; therefore we would like to reflect on the achievements that have been made toward the broader diversity mission by revisiting some of the key events that have shaped the legacy of affirmative action. We hope that you, the members of APTA, will continue to support the inclusion of Disadvantaged Business Enterprises.
       –Ginger Conrad, Publisher

1896 The Supreme Court establishes the “separate but equal” doctrine with its Plessy vs. Ferguson decision, which requires railroads to provide “separate but equal” accommodations for black and white citizens. While the case gives some legitimacy to the issue of racial inequality, the decision influences interaction between whites and blacks for years to come; condoning, among other things, segregated schools, restaurants, and bathrooms.

1953 The Small Business Act (Public Law 83-163) is enacted on July 30, creating the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), which is founded with the mission to “aid, counsel, assist, and protect, insofar as is possible, the interests of small business concerns.”

1954 The Supreme Court reverses its Plessy v. Ferguson decision, unanimously ruling in the landmark Brown vs. Board of Education case that “separate education facilities are inherently unequal,” and the “separate but equal” doctrine has “ no place” in public education.

1958 The Small Business Act is amended, and the SBA becomes a permanent, independent federal agency.

1961 President John F. Kennedy makes the first reference to “affirmative action” with the passage of Executive Order 10925, which creates the Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity and orders that all federally funded projects employ “affirmative action” to prevent racial bias in employment practices.

1964 President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act, the most far-reaching civil rights legislation since the Reconstruction Acts, which prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, or national origin.

1965 President Johnson issues Executive Order 11246, which enforces affirmative action for the first time by requiring that government contractors “take affirmative action” toward all prospective minority employees. An amendment made in October extends affirmative action to include gender as well.

1967 The Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, Title IV was amended and the government pledges to assist in the establishment, preservation, and strengthening of small business concerns “located in urban areas of high concentration of unemployed or low-income individuals” or “owned by low-income individuals.”

1968 The Minority Small Business and Capital Ownership Development Program, or the SBA’s Section 8(a) program, is established to increase federal purchases from socially or economically disadvantaged small business owners.

1969 With the passage of Executive Order 11458, the U.S. Office of Minority Business Enterprise within the Department of Commerce is created to provide minority business owners with more federal resources.

Also, President Richard Nixon initiates the “Philadelphia Order,” the strongest plan of its time, which is designed to guarantee fair hiring practices on construction jobs.

1970 President Nixon signs Executive Order 11518, which instructs the SBA to represent the small business community, with an emphasis on minority-owned and controlled business, before all federal agencies.

1971 Federal procurement regulations established under Title 41 require all federal contracts exceeding $500,000 to include a clause encouraging the use of minority subcontractors.

Executive Order 11458 and Executive Order 11625 are expanded to give the Secretary of Commerce the authority to: (1) implement federal policy supporting minority business enterprises; (2) provide technical and management assistance to disadvantaged businesses; and (3) coordinate activities between all federal departments to minority business development.

1977 Congressman Parren J. Mitchell authors an amendment to President Jimmy Carter’s $4 billion public works bill, an alteration that requires state, county, and municipal governments that are seeking federal grants on public works projects to set-aside 10 percent of contracts for minority-owned firms.

The passage of Public Law 95-89 increases loan authorizations and surety bond guarantee authority to minority businesses; and Congress enacts the Community Reinvestment Act (12 U.S.C. 2901), which is intended to encourage depository institutions to help meet the credit needs of the communities in which they operate, including low- and moderate-income neighborhoods, consistent with safe and sound banking operations.

1978 Congressman Mitchell introduces legislation leading to Public Law 95-507, an amendment to the Small Business Act, which requires that federal agencies increase direct procurement opportunities for small, disadvantaged businesses.

The United States Supreme Court hears the landmark case, Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, after which the high court imposes limitations on affirmative action to ensure that providing greater opportunities for minorities does not come at the expense of the rights of the majority; thus declaring that affirmative action is unfair if it leads to reverse discrimination.

The case disputes the admission policy at University of California, Davis, Medical School, which reserved 16 of its 100 places for minority and economically disadvantaged students. In a 5–4 split decision, the Supreme Court rules that, while race was a legitimate factor in admission policies for schools, the use of such inflexible quotas is not constitutional.

1979 Executive Order 12138, signed by President Carter, requires federal agencies to take affirmative action in support of businesses owned by women.

1980 Two years after the Bakke ruling, the Supreme Court rules that some modest quotas are in fact constitutional. After hearing the Fullilove v. Klutznick case, the Court upholds a federal law requiring that 15 percent of funds for public works be set aside for qualified minority contractors, citing that the affirmative action program has a “narrowed focus and limited extent” and that there is no “allocation of federal funds according to inflexible percentages solely based on race or ethnicity.”
 
1982 Congressman Mitchell works to amend the $71 billion Surface Transportation Assistance Act to include a 10 percent set-aside for minority contractors.

1983 President Ronald Reagan signs Executive Order 12432, which requires all federal agencies to develop specific goal-oriented plans for expanding procurement opportunities to minority businesses.

1985 Congressman Mitchell introduces H.R. 1961, which establishes criminal penalties for front companies that have taken advantage of minority programs, such as by receiving an 8(a) contract, a small business set-aside, a subcontract awarded under the Section 8(d) subcontracting plan, or a contract awarded under the 10 percent set-aside of the Surface Transportation Assistance Act of 1982.

1986 In the case of Wygant v. Jackson Board of Education, the Supreme Court rules against a school board policy that protected minority employees by laying off non-minority teachers first, even though the non-minority employees had seniority. The high court reasons that, “Though hiring goals may burden some innocent individuals, they simply do not impose the same kind of injury that layoffs impose. Denial of a future employment opportunity is not as intrusive as loss of an existing job.”

1987 The passage of Public Law 99-661 requires all majority contractors working with the Department of Defense to work toward a 3-year goal of increasing minority business participation by 5 percent. This  first-of-its-kind legislation sets a precedent to require affirmative action efforts by government contractors.

A federal court orders that the State of Alabama Department of Public Safety adopt specific racial quotas, requiring that for every white trooper hired or promoted, one black trooper would also be hired or promoted until at least 25 percent of the upper ranks of the department was composed of blacks. The United States v. Paradise decision came 12 years after an initial federal court decision that found that the department had systematically discriminated against blacks in hiring, citing that “in the thirty-seven-year history of the patrol there has never been a black trooper.” The Supreme Court later upholds the use of strict quotas in this case as one of the only means of combating the department’s overt and defiant racism.

1989 Reaching farther than any other state or local minority business enterprise initiative, the California Public Utilities Commission issues California General Order 156, which calls for the setting of goals, establishment of viable program initiatives, verification of racial or gender ownership status of suppliers, and the adoption of a formal complaint procedure.

City of Richmond v. Croson challenges a Richmond, Virginia, program of setting aside 30 percent of city construction funds for black-owned firms. The Supreme Court rules that affirmative action must be subject to “strict scrutiny” and is unconstitutional unless racial discrimination can be proven to be “widespread throughout a particular industry.” The Court maintains that “the purpose of strict scrutiny is to ‘smoke out’ illegitimate uses of race by assuring that the legislative body is pursuing a goal important enough to warrant use of a highly suspect tool. The test also ensures that the means chosen ‘fit’ this compelling goal so closely that there is little or no possibility that the motive for the classification was illegitimate racial prejudice or stereotype.”

1990s During this decade, several Circuit Court cases are filed regarding set-aside programs and public contracting, many of which were found invalid or insufficient to establish that under-representation of minority business enterprises in public contracts was the result of discrimination; or, in some cases, found that, without having exhausted racially neutral means, the use of target goals amounted to quotas, presenting a constitutional threat.

1990 Metro Broadcasting, Inc. v. FCC. The Supreme Court upholds a race-based preference in granting broadcast licenses. According to the majority, while racial preferences created by state law must meet the test of strict scrutiny, benign race-based preferences that are enacted by Congress need not satisfy strict scrutiny, but must simply be substantially related to the achievement of important governmental objectives.

1995 After hearing Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peña, the Supreme Court once again calls for “strict scrutiny” in determining whether discrimination existed before implementing a federal affirmative action program, requiring that affirmative action programs have a “compelling governmental interest,” and be “narrowly tailored” to fit the particular situation. In the 5-2 decision, the majority of judges asserts that “the unhappy persistence of both the practice and the lingering effects of racial discrimination against minority groups in this country” justified the use of race-based remedial measures in certain circumstances.

In response to the ruling, President Clinton outlines the White House’s guidelines on affirmative action, calling for the elimination of any program that “(a) creates a quota; (b) creates preferences for unqualified individuals; (c) creates reverse discrimination; or (d) continues even after its equal opportunity purposes have been achieved.”

1996 The Hopwood v. University of Texas Law School case redefines affirmation action in the admission processes once again. The 5th U.S. Court of Appeals suspended the university’s affirmative action admissions program and rules that the 1978 Bakke decision is invalid, asserting that “educational diversity is not recognized as a compelling state interest.” The Supreme Court later allows the ruling to stand.

1997 Spearheaded by Ward Connerly, a member of the University of California Board of Regents, the state of California passes Proposition 209, a state ban on all forms of affirmative action. The proposition states that, “The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.” The controversial ban is delayed in the courts for almost a year before it goes into effect.

1998 The state of Washington approves Initiative 200, making it the second state to abolish state affirmative action measures.

1999 President Clinton signs Public Law 106-50, the Veterans Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development Act, which, among other requirements, establishes additional procurement assistance for veterans, including a 3 percent government-contracting goal for service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses. It requires the head of each federal agency to take the necessary steps to establish the 3 percent goal in that agency’s prime contract and subcontract awards.

2000 The state of Florida, like California and Washington, takes action to end affirmative action within the state by approving the education component of Governor Jeb Bush’s One Florida initiative, which bans race as a factor in college admissions.

The University of Michigan’s undergraduate affirmative action policy is questioned in Gratz v. Bollinger. A federal judge rules that the use of race as a factor in admissions at the University of Michigan was constitutional, after the university argues that the affirmative action program serves “a compelling interest” by providing educational benefits derived from a diverse student body.

2001 The University of Michigan Law School’s affirmative action policy is challenged. Although this case, Grutter v. Bollinger, is similar to the university’s undergraduate lawsuit, a different judge draws the opposite conclusion, nullifying the law school’s policy and ruling that “intellectual diversity bears no obvious or necessary relationship to racial diversity.” The decision is reversed on appeal on May 14, 2002.

2003 The Supreme Court upholds the University of Michigan Law School’s policy, 5-4, ruling that race can be one of many factors considered by colleges because it furthers “a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body.” The high court, however, rules 6-3 that the more formulaic approach of the University of Michigan’s undergraduate admissions program, which uses a point system that rates students and awards additional points to minorities, has to be modified, since it does not provide the “individualized consideration” of applicants deemed necessary in previous Supreme Court decisions.

About the Author
Ginger Conrad 
Publisher
MBE magazine

Ginger Conrad founded MBE (Minority Business Entrepreneur) magazine in 1984. The Los Angeles-based bimonthly magazine has grown from a circulation of 12,000 to its current distribution to 40,000 minority and women business owners nationwide, as well as readers in corporations and government agencies who are concerned with minority/women enterprise development.
MBE examines procurement and contracting programs in the public and private sectors and features success stories of entrepreneurs whose accomplishments may serve to inspire others.

Ms. Conrad has more than 30 years’ experience in magazine publishing, and is the sole proprietor of MBE. Prior to starting MBE, she worked in the publishing industry in various key positions, which included associate publisher for Showcase USA  (an export trade publication) and the IEEE Computer Society’s publications.

A recognized expert on business development issues, Ms. Conrad has appeared on nationally syndicated television and radio programs. She has been a panelist or speaker at events sponsored by numerous organizations that include the U.S. Small Business Administration, the Institute for Supply Management, the National Association of Minority Contractors, the National Minority Supplier Development Council, the Minority Business Enterprise Legal Defense and Education Fund, and the New Ventures Conference 2000.

Highly regarded as a dedicated media advocate for minority and women’s enterprise development, Ms. Conrad has been honored by the public and private sectors for her many efforts and outstanding achievements. She’s received awards from the Small Business Administration, the National Minority Business Council, the National Association of Purchasing Management, and the U.S. Minority Business Development Agency, and the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, among others.

Ms. Conrad continues to be actively involved in leadership positions in various organizations that include the Institute for Supply Management’s Minority & Women’s Business Development Group and the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council. She is a former member of the Minority Business Resource Advisory Committee for NASA.