RIDOT's Mission 360 Program Featured in Providence Business JournalJune 18, 2007
Partners help DOT diversify Providence Business Journal By Justin Sayles
A new R.I. Department of Transportation program is looking to take a full-circle approach to providing local minority-owned firms their chance to get work through government contracts.
Launched in March, Mission 360° aims to give local disadvantaged business enterprises (DBEs) greater opportunities to get work derived from U.S. Department of Transportation funding as well as access to the knowledge needed to run a successful subcontracting business.
Funded by the Federal Highway Administration, Mission 360° is a partnership between the department, Plexus Corp., North Star Marketing and Vanasse Hangen Brustlin. It targets companies that have not previously bid for such work, or at least not won bids.
According to Philip Kydd, assistant director of the RIDOT’s administrative services division, the program will help the state better meet its minority contracting goals. Kydd said that contracts awarded through RIDOT long have met the letter, but not necessarily the intent, of federal guidelines mandating that DBEs receive a portion of the work funded by the federal government.
(Rhode Island has its own minority business enterprise program, which requires that 10 percent of funds for state-backed projects go to qualified firms. However, Mission 360° is specifically designed for federally funded transportation projects.)
Federal provisions require that 10 percent of transportation project funds given to states be expended with DBEs. Historically, Rhode Island has averaged 12 percent DBE involvement in the approximately $300 million awarded annually, Kydd said.
But nearly two-thirds of the funding was being awarded to woman-owned businesses. A majority of the remaining money went to Portuguese-owned firms. Both groups qualify as DBEs, but according to Kydd, less than 1 percent of the federal money was being awarded to businesses owned by other minority groups.
“There really wasn’t equity within the disadvantaged business enterprise community,” Kydd said.
The lack of work going toward other minority groups had been the result of several factors, Kydd said. On the one hand, prime contractors had developed relationships with subcontractors they had used for years. Also, DBEs that hadn’t been part of the process often either lacked knowledge of how to successfully bid on a project or were off the prime contractors’ radars.
“Even those that were out there weren’t able to break into the industry,” Kydd said.
Mission 360° looks to cut into both problems by helping minority-owned firms get involved in projects and working to make prime contractors more aware of their existence.
The program provides a number of business development services to companies, including insight into the RIDOT bidding processes. The program’s staff works with the firms to educate them about RFP and bidding responses and also provides resources about what contracts are presently available, as well as which future projects are slated to go out for bid.
However, Kydd stressed that Mission 360° doesn’t aim to take contracts away from the firms that already have a positive relationship with the department and prime contractors. Rather, the idea is make more opportunities available to other DBEs in the state.
With the inclusion of the corporate partners North Star Marketing Inc. and Plexus Corp. – the latter being the planning and project firm that recently has come under scrutiny for unrelated contracts with the RIDOT – Mission 360° also aims to help firms develop marketing strategies to make others aware of the work they do.
The department keeps a one-page sell sheet on each of the 20 companies that have signed on for the program to date, each highlighting the company’s strong points, and in some cases, recommendations from prime contractors such as D’Ambra Construction Co. and Taco Inc.
Web site development support is also available, and the Mission 360° staff plans to offer workshops on the subject.
The Mission 360° team also helps the firms with a variety of other issues, including writing business plans, cost controls, managing relationships and financial management.
All of these tools, said North Star Marketing President April Williams McCrory, are essential to master in order to run a successful business. But they can overwhelm a company founded by people who simply went into business because they were good at a craft.
“We’re trying to help them be more business-savvy and teach them the mindset of what it takes to run a business,” McCrory said.
While Cliff Cherry’s company, Capital Curbing Inc., had successfully been awarded contracts through the transportation department work before Mission 360° was launched, Cherry said the program has helped improve his operations. In particular, the Mission 360° staff has been a “sounding board” for bids, helping him to determine the best price that will get him a job and maximize his profits. The program also has allowed him to gain greater insight into administrative and contractual issues.
He presently has two curbing contracts through the department, on Route 107 in Burrillville and Route 5 in Warwick.
Rhonda Simpson, owner of material transportation company Solid State Enterprises, said that the program has been invaluable. She started the business in 1997, but hit a rough patch due to personal problems a few years later.
When Simpson became aware of Mission 360°, she contacted the program to see what types of support were available. With the RIDOT help, she was able to secure funding through the Minority Investment Development Corporation that helped her get her business back on track. And Mission 360° has helped her navigate business issues she was having.
Today, she claims John A. Rocchio Corp. and D’Ambra Construction among the prime contractors she has worked with.
“It’s not even so much the money,” she said. “It’s the support.” << Back to News |