Committee advances resolution for LBE disparity study, vows parallel outreach

The Government Audit and Oversight Committee of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors on Jan. 19 advanced a resolution urging the city administrator to commission a disparity study of the city’s Local Business Enterprise (LBE) contracting program, a staff presentation said, and voted unanimously to send the resolution to the full Board with a positive recommendation.

Supervisor Myrna Melgar, the item sponsor, told the committee the study would measure whether the LBE program’s participants reflect the city’s small-business population and identify gaps affecting women-, minority- and disabled-veteran–owned firms. "So this is a resolution, requesting that the city administrator conduct a disparity study for our LBE program," Melgar said, adding she would "fight for these funds" in the city budget to support the work.

City staff described what a disparity study entails and what it would cost. Anton, a project manager with the Contracts Reform Team in the city administrator’s office, said a typical study analyzes utilization (who receives contracts) against availability (which businesses are ready and able to do the work) and supplements statistical analysis with qualitative outreach. "A disparity study in essence is a study of business utilization versus availability," Anton said. Staff estimated a study would generally take one to three years and cost roughly $400,000 to $1 million depending on scope and data needs, but emphasized the city can begin lower-cost, high-impact changes while the research proceeds.

The presentation listed common recommendations that jurisdictions adopt after such studies, including unbundling large contracts into smaller scopes, centralizing information for small businesses, and developing mentoring or networking programs. The deputy city administrator said those changes are "low-hanging fruit" the city can begin to implement now to improve access even before a consultant-led study is complete.

Public commenters representing veteran, Latino, Black, Asian and other minority-business organizations generally supported the study but urged that research be paired with enforcement and programs to rebuild availability where Proposition 209 and other factors have reduced minority-business presence. Hanley Chan, a disabled veteran, cited state law and asked, "If the state has this program, why can't we?" Others urged that staff use existing departmental data where possible to speed results and ensure the study yields actionable findings on how much contract revenue actually reaches small firms.

Chair Supervisor Dean Preston moved to recommend the resolution to the full Board; the clerk called the roll and Vice Chair Connie Chan, Supervisor Rafael Mandelmann and Chair Preston each voted "aye," advancing the resolution by a 3–0 vote. In the same meeting the committee convened in closed session to consider items 2–12 (litigation and settlement items) and, after closed session, the clerk reported the committee had unanimously forwarded those items to the full Board with a positive recommendation and voted not to disclose the closed-session deliberations.

The resolution now goes to the full Board of Supervisors for consideration; staff said they will begin drafting a solicitation for a consultant and pursue immediate outreach and information-centralization steps while funding and the formal study process move forward.