Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti's mandate to increase access of women-owned and minority-owned businesses to city contracts will not impact how the debt management team handles underwriter, financial advisory or bond counsel pools.
Garcetti signed Executive Directive 35 Thursday, which he says lays the foundation "for increased access to the City of Los Angeles' procurement process for women and minority-owned businesses."
"This report will generally not impact the way our office selects consultants and underwriters for our bond transactions," said Ha To, Los Angeles' chief of debt management. "We will continue to encourage and conduct outreach to MBE/WBE firms to apply for contracting opportunities."
ED 35 was based on recommendations in a study produced in partnership with the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation's Institute for Applied Economics. The study recommended that the city increase accessibility and equity in its procurement process to make it easier for women-based businesses to succeed.
"Women strengthen our economy, families, communities, workplaces, and city, and yet they face obstacles and inequities every day," Garcetti said. "This directive, guided by our study, will provide a sturdy foundation for future equality in economic growth. Let's uplift women and facilitate opportunity, because when they thrive our city thrives."
Women own more than 20% of all businesses in the Los Angeles region, according to the mayor's office. Those businesses are also diverse, with almost half of women-owned businesses being minority owned. And yet, those businesses make up less than 10% of every industry in the Los Angeles Regional Alliance Marketplace for Procurement. The city both advertises requests for proposals and issues city contracts through RAMP.
In addition to underrepresentation on RAMP, according to the report, women-owned businesses are significantly underrepresented in the City of Los Angeles' procurement process in terms of the share of allocated procurement spending awards for several departments.
ED 35 (Equitable Access to Contracting Opportunities) directed city departments, among other things, to collect and standardize certain information for reporting purposes through its RAMP website, To said. This information includes annual revenue, number of employees, location, industry, race/ethnicity of majority owner, and gender of majority owner, she said.
"With the Mayor's executive directive and the delivery of RAMP, the City is improving the procurement process and data collection while ensuring equal access to the City's procurement and contracting opportunities," said Shannon Hoppes, the City of Los Angeles' Chief Procurement Officer. "RAMP will now collect the data and provide the infrastructure to inform the region's diverse businesses of opportunities, capture and centralize critical metrics to help inform and drive future policies that support our business community, and create positive impact on the region's economic future."
The city has made "great strides to reform and improve its procurement environment previously, said Bill Allen, president and CEO of LAEDC, but added that past efforts, while positive did not go far enough.
"The city still trails other major cities when it comes to implementing a strategic approach for women-owned businesses to be better represented in the share of procurement dollars," Allen said. "With Los Angeles County being home to more than 1.3 million small businesses, including more women and BIPOC-owned small businesses than any other county in the nation, we believe this study will be vital to the City of Los Angeles' economic recovery and help promote greater equity within its contracting processes."
The city is stepping lightly to avoid any conflicts with
"In accordance with Prop. 209, we do not give preference based on gender or race. Our debt policy and practices never gave preference based on gender and/or race," To said. "The city does have a Local Business Preference Program which provides that local small businesses receive up to 10% preference for contracts below $150,000 and up to 12% for contracts above $150,000."
