HIRE Minnesota last Tuesday held a funeral procession to “mourn the loss of another construction season where MnDOT failed to meet their minority hiring goals.” HIRE Minnesota is a coalition of community organizations that are seeking public investments that provide access for all people to jobs, training and living wages, and promote healthy communities, including building sustainable public infrastructure and easing the climate crisis.Protest organizers said, “Our coalition has been working to ensure that MnDOT meets its minority hiring goals and it has been a challenging endeavor. We met with the communications director at MnDOT, Kevin Gutnecht, and with Bernie Arseneau, Policy, Safety and Strategic Initiatives Director at MnDOT. They assured us that they would set up a meeting with the Minnesota Commissioner of Transportation in the coming week.”
Louis King, co-chair of HIRE-MN said the action highlighted the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s (MnDOT) 17 years of failure to meet its hiring goals for people of color and the funeral procession mourns the loss of yet another construction season in 2009.”
Protesters met at Lao Family Community of Minnesota On University Avenue and marched to the MnDOT headquarters, where they we held the funeral ceremony to grieve for the loss of opportunity for people of color at MnDOT. A small delegation of HIRE Minnesota members went inside the MnDOT headquarters seeking to meet with Commissioner Tom Sorel and demand that systems are put in place to bring back hope for better outcomes in 2010, King said.“We are more powerful with more voices,” King said encouraging Minnesotans to join and support the HIRE-MN coalition. “Make sure MnDOT hears our call for justice and equity!”
The marchers, clad in black arm bands, followed musicians who led the funeral procession in songs of mourning and of hope for the future. Outside MnDOT headquarters protesters placed gravestones that showed statistics detailing 17 years of hiring failure. A final gravestone representing 2010 had a question mark symbolizing the hope for better outcomes next year, organizers said.
HIRE Minnesota is a coalition of more than 70 community organizations that is promoting that public investments jumpstart the economy, provide access for all people to jobs, training and living wages for low-income people and people of color, and promote healthy communities, including rebuilding infrastructure and easing the climate crisis. A list of organizations involved in HIRE Minnesota is available online at http://www.hiremn.org.
MNDOT fact sheet:
Workers of color and women are missing from Minnesota’s highway construction sites!MnDOT consistently misses its goals for hiring, training and contracting with women and people of color. Meanwhile the busy highway construction season moves at an accelerated pace due to the addition of federal stimulus dollars, but there is no visible change at highway construction sites. Women account for 50 percent of Minnesota’s total population and people of color account for 14 percent. Where are the women and people of color on MnDOT jobs?
Women and Minority Contracting
Requirements. Federal rules require MnDOT contractors to direct up to 10 percent of funding to women and minority contractors. MnDOT has set its own goal for 2009 at 15.3 percent.
Outcomes. In 2007 and 2008, respectively, only 37 percent and 39 percent of contracts with disadvantaged business enterprise (DBE) goals were reported as meeting goals. This means that although the remaining contractors – more than 60 percent each year did not meet their goals, their actions were deemed “good enough” by MnDOT. Since
2000, MnDOT has only met its women and minority contracting goals once, in 2004. The goal for 2004 was only 5.8 percent, significantly lower than the goal for any other year reported.
Workforce Development
• Requirements. MnDOT requires contractors to file an Equal Employment Opportunity
(EEO) plan. Performance against those plans is monitored by MnDOT’s Office of Civil Rights. Contractors that do not comply and do not take corrective action are referred to the Minnesota Department of Human Rights, which can withdraw the contractor’s Human Rights Certificate, making them ineligible to bid on MnDOT projects. As of March 2007, MnDOT’s hiring goals for all counties in the Twin Cities 7 county metropolitan area were 11 percent for people of color and 6 percent for women.
• Outcomes. In 2007 and 2008, a total of 7 contractors were under corrective action plans with MnDOT’s Office of Civil Rights. None were referred to the Minnesota Department of Human Rights. Meanwhile, overall performance continues to slip.
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