Our promise
MEETING THE MOMENT:
Closing the Racial Wealth Gap through Infrastructure
In previous decades, the transportation sector has exacerbated inequality, destroyed Black and Brown wealth, and damaged Black and Brown communities in the United States. For the country to truly Build Back Better, America must not only eliminate the continuation of bad practices and remove old physical urban scars; we must also affirmatively contribute to the wealth building efforts of Black and Brown America. The coming American Jobs Plan is both a symbolically and materially impactful way of achieving the Administration’s goals of closing the racial wealth gap through federal procurement. The inverse is also true: an infrastructure package that does not consider Black and Brown construction procurement is blinded to the long shadow of transportation policy in this country, as well as the enormous opportunities that lie ahead. Our country will come up short if, after all is said and done, the Department of Health and Human Services buys 50% more paperclips from Black-owned firms, but little has changed in who is receiving prime contracts for building major infrastructure projects.
Billions of dollars are at stake for historically underutilized businesses to help close our country’s racial wealth gap, but will we act?
“To increase generational wealth, this can not be all subcontracting. It has to be an increase in prime contracts with the expectation that if historically underutilized firms are awarded prime contracts, they will hire other diverse workers that will increase generatitonal wealth in underserved communities,”
100K
Community Members Engaged
10,000
Community Service Hours Contributed
20
Local Initiatives Launched
500
Volunteers Mobilized