One case coming up to D.C.’s District
Court could strike a serious blow to the government’s controversial use of
racial preferences in federal contracting. Through several agencies and
covering many industries, the federal government since the late seventies has
administered a host of programs which set aside contracts specifically for
minority-owned businesses. In 2008, after a 10-year long fight in the courts,
Rothe Development Inc., a federal contractor from Texas, scored a big victory
in D.C.’s Federal Circuit court forcing a key set-aside program to be declared
wholly unconstitutional. Now, thanks to a new complaint from the company, the
days of the government allocating federal contracts on the basis of race may be
numbered.
The program at issue in Rothe’s 2008 victory was the
“Small Disadvantaged Business program” (SDB), which had allowed the Department
of Defense (DoD) and other agencies to take 10 percent off the price of bids
submitted by so-called “small disadvantaged businesses” giving them an
artificial boost in the bidding process. Although more competitive, Rothe, a
white-owned business, was denied a contract to build a switchboard system for
an army base in Mississippi. A “competing” bid from a Korean-owned business was
given a “10 percent price evaluation adjustment” and as a result, Rothe was
denied the bid…..To Read More…..
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