by Kitty Lovell
December 1, 2021
“I was surprised to hear that an AGC group was hosting a diversity event, because AGC isn’t typically seen as an antiracist organization.” – Ken Canty at the UMass AGC Diversity Guest Lecture in November 2020
It was nearing the end of the semester that capped a tumultuous year, and I sat on my pink desk chair to attend a zoom meeting for what seemed like the millionth time. But this afternoon would end up being very different from the rest. After the wake of another country-wide reckoning with race in the summer of 2020, the Associated General Contractors Chapter at UMass Amherst Executive Board made it a priority to host a diversity centered panel during the fall semester. One after another, the rectangular screens of faces of my peers and professors appeared across the screen. Among them were three guests: Kenneth Canty, Anthony Robinson, and John Bacon. They had graciously accepted our invite to discuss how racism in the construction industry has affected the way they do their work. Together we listened intently to their personal stories of the business sabotage and multi-year lawsuits that seem to be the standard for minority owned construction businesses trying to stay afloat in a particularly discriminatory industry.
Enraged at the stories of injustice, and distraught with a sense of hopelessness and fear for the industry that I was propelling myself into, I dove into my own research.
Among the many jarring statistics that demonstrate an opportunity gap between Black and white construction workers I learned that compared to the 12% that make up the general American workforce, Black construction workers only make up 6% of the construction workforce (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics). As I made the first steps towards understanding a very complicated problem that points to an origin in greed and racism, I started to wonder: why, what should be done to increase representation in the industry, and what can I do as a student?
Construction isn’t cheap. Projects require heavy equipment that is expensive to rent or buy, and materials that are expensive to buy and transport. All new construction companies have to find funding for the large, high risk investments that are required to complete their first project. For minority owned construction firms, getting access to this funding is more difficult. According to a report put out by the Federal Reserve in 2020, the percentage of white business owners that receive at least a percentage of the funding they requested from a bank is 80.2% compared to the 60.9% of Black business owners who were able to say the same. Hispanic and Asian business owners also received less funding than white business owners, 69.5% and 77.1%, respectively.
If a minority-owned construction firm makes it past the initial hurdle of getting funding, they often have to fight for pay for their workers. According to Ken Canty, one of the AGC panelists, prime contractors who pay smaller firms for a variety of services can and have withdrawn payments because of bogus legal claims like “missing a comma”.
As a student, I don’t have control of much. I can’t single handedly dismantle systemic racism and I can’t invest millions in minority-owned construction businesses, but I can make sure that the organizations that I am a part of work to be a part of the solution. For me, that starts with my leadership position in our little corner of the world: the UMass Amherst Chapter of the Associated General Contractors of America. When I proudly claim to be the secretary of the AGC chapter at my college, what am I actually supporting in terms of AGC, a nation-wide organization that is well known within the construction industry?
I was saddened to learn that in some eyes, AGC’s reputation is not so shining. In particular, AGC is not seen as dedicated to anti-racism or valuing diversity and does not have a history of supporting minority-owned businesses. A significant reason for this reputation exists because AGC USA has fought and continues to fight against the protection of minority-owned businesses. The Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) is a program put forth by the US Department of Transportation that assists minority, disadvantaged, and women-run businesses in their pursuit of becoming self-sufficient organizations. The DBE program sets goals on what percentage of the firms that prime contractors hire are considered “disadvantaged”. Some non-minority owned firms believe that this takes jobs away from them, and according to Tony Robinson who has fought for the DBE and similar programs for over 30 years, it is certain that AGC is financing some of this litigation.
The argument that incentives to choose a firm just because they are minority owned, hurts all the other (white) firms falls apart quickly when looking at the broader picture of systemic racism that is so evident in American life. White firms generally have the upper hand because they usually have generational wealth and better access to loans. Since minority-owned firms are rarely given a fighting chance to compete for work, they should be prioritized when they are given the opportunity to work for a prime contractor.
AGC’s litigation against the DBE program is inherently charged by racism and sexism. Until AGC comments on their actions, and begins to make amends to the minority community, they should be seen as what they are: a racist and sexist institution.
AGC at a national level has the power to change their image by investing in minority contractors.
AGC at a local level (like the UMass Amherst chapter) has a job too. We can:
- Be aware of what supporting AGC actually means
- Actively work against this image of AGC by hosting minority centered diversity events
- Take the time during meetings to educate peers on the importance of diversity in the workplace
The thought did cross my mind, “should I stop affiliating myself with an organization that goes against some of my core beliefs?” I am still here because I know the change that has to happen needs to come from within the organization. It begins with the students (my peers and I) who will grow into the construction industry.
Notes from the author:
While writing this blog post I realized that this one aspect of racism in the construction industry is pulling at the thread of the entanglement of a much larger, systemically racist country and world. Clearly, there is a much bigger story here than what I have the resources to uncover. The disparity of opportunity in the construction industry has ties to the inequities that exist throughout the country in housing, education, health care, environmental justice and more. A more in-depth story of systemic racism told through the lense of the construction industry would illuminate the tight bonds that hold an unjust system in place, and possibly how to unravel it for future generations.
Thank you to Ken, John, and Tony for meeting with me over Zoom and letting me listen to all of your experiences and wisdom. You met all of my questions and naivete with love, understanding, and grace. I will continue to work to tell your story at UMass Amherst and beyond.
Sources that I used to inspire/inform this blog post:
- Bureau of Labor Statistics
- Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta – Small Business Credit Survey (2019)
- Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of General Services – Disparity Study (2018)
- CIPD Report – Diversity and inclusion at work: facing up to the business case (2018)
- The National Law Review – Creating Solutions to Racism Problem in Construction Industry (2021)
- Penn Live – Why are there so few Black owners and workers in central Pa.’s construction industry? (2020)
- Construction Management – Construction and racism: time to build an equitable industry (2020)
- Most notably: Interviews with Kenneth Canty, Anthony Robinson, and John Bacon