Revised City of South Bend Disparity Study Report

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City of South Bend Disparity Study 2020 • Clearly delineated policies and forms by which a bidder or proposer can establish that it has either met the contract goal or made good faith efforts to do so. Rules for how participation by certified firms will be counted towards the goal. A firm must perform a "commercially useful function" in order to be counted for goal attainment. How various types of goods or services will be credited towards meeting goals must be clearly spelled out (for example, whether full credit will be given for purchases from certified regular dealers or suppliers). • Criteria and processes for how non-performing, certified firms can be substituted during performance. • Contract closeout procedures and standards for sanctions for firms that fail to meet their contractual requirements under the program. A process to appeal adverse determinations under the program that meets due process standards. C. Performance Standards and Review To meet the requirements of strict constitutional scrutiny and ensure that best practices in program administration continue to be applied, the City should con- duct a full and thorough review of the evidentiary basis for a new M/WBE program approximately every five to seven years. South Bend should adopt a sunset date, meaning when it will end unless reautho- rized, for the M/WBE program. This is a constitutional requirement to meet the narrow tailoring test that race -and gender -conscious measures be used only when necessary. A new disparity study or other applicable research should be commis- sioned in time to meet the sunset date. The City should develop quantitative performance measures for overall success of its race- and gender -neutral measures and any M/WBE program to evaluate the effectiveness of various approaches in reducing the systemic barriers identified by the study. In addition to meeting goals, possible benchmarks might be: • Progress towards meeting the overall, annual M/WBE goal. • The number of bids or proposals, industry and the dollar amount of the awards and the goal shortfall, where the bidder was unable to meet the goals and submitted good faith efforts to do so. • The number and dollar amount of bids or proposals and industry rejected as non-responsive for failure to make good faith efforts to meet the goal. 0 2020 Colette Holt & Associates, All Rights Reserved. 101