Contractors had years to recruit minority workers

Contractors had years to recruit minority workers
EDITOR:
An article in Saturday's Vindicator by education writer Jo Anne Viviano quoted Atty. Tim Jacob of Youngstown, who represents the Builders Association of Eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, as saying: "It is unfair to exclude any contractors from the project simply because they are not minorities."
No contractor has been rejected for not being a minority. Non-minority contractors still have the bulk of the bid contracts, as they historically have. What we want from Atty. Jacob's clients is this: A workforce that is 20 percent minorities, 20 percent female and 50 percent district residents. This is equal employment opportunity and "equitable inclusion" to which we at the Youngstown city school board gave a lot of thought and consideration. We also had input from legal counsel.
The 20-20-50 "equitable inclusion" way of doing this is what we would like to be the goal of Atty. Jacob's clients. We want every contractor who applies to the bidding process to make good faith effort to seek out through advertisement and word-of-mouth minorities and blacks for the trade union apprenticeship programs.
Atty. Jacob should take a good look at his clients' offices. Are there any black people working? On the job sites, are there any women working in hard-hat jobs? If not, those companies come to the taxpayers' table with no inclusion experience. That is one of the reasons we at the Youngstown school board had to hire an equal employment opportunity contract compliance officer for the district's construction projects.
In 1966-67, President Lyndon B. Johnson mandated the trade unions to train and hire minorities for work on government-funded job sites. We in the black community are still waiting for equal opportunity almost 40 years later. If the clients Atty. Jacob represents were fair and equitable and had not practiced selective exclusion, we at the Youngstown school board would not have needed a compliance officer and could have saved the taxpayers thousands of dollars.
The other quote attributed to Atty. Jacob was that the "pool of qualified contractors is reduced by 50 to 80 percent," because of what is described as an "equal protection issue." Any contractor who falls into that abyss is suffering from a self-inflicted wound. Al Curry will walk any contractor through the procedure necessary to show a "good faith effort" to help train and process 20 percent minorities, 20 percent females and 50 percent district residents to keep our tax dollars as close to home as feasible.
We need to rebuild our communities and replenish our eroding tax base. We will not allow the clock to be turned back to a time when Atty. Jacob's clients had 100 percent of the construction jobs.
CLARENCE N. BOLES
Youngstown
X The writer is a member of the Youngstown City Board of Education and chairman of its legal committee.
Three religions, one God
EDITOR:
This is in response to Dr. McGowen's recent letter in The Vindicator, regarding prayers at the interfaith breakfast.
At least the Christians, Jews, and Muslims believe in the same God, whether they call him God, Yahweh, or Allah in different languages. This is the God that existed before anything else existed, the God who created the universe and everything in it, and who created Adam, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Mohammad.
This is the common God to whom we can all pray together since none of the three religions mentioned above denies the existence of such a God.
KHALID IQBAL, M.D.
Youngstown