Diversity 365 was a program created by former mayor Luke Ravenstahl to make sure the city of Pittsburgh had diversity in their hiring. In short Blacks were at least considered during city hiring. Well, that program has been eliminated and my question is what program has been implemented to replace it?
Diversity is the most important aspect of city government. Why? Because equal employment is more important than anything else. Without employment one cannot put a roof over his and his family’s heads, food on the table, cloths on their backs, or get a quality education. He can do nothing. Without equal employment everything else is unequal and Blacks will never catch up.
Two big questions with the city right now is what program or programs will replace the Diversity 365 program and who will replace Phil Petite, who died months ago. He was in charge of making sure Blacks and women got their equal share of city contracts.
Phil received a lot of criticism because of a report he filed which he called a dream list, which was made up of ficticious figures of minority and women contracts. He said they were what he would have like to have seen done.
I knew Phil personally and there were and are few people more concerned with Blacks receiving their equal piece of the economic pie than him. He worked for years opening doors for Blacks out of the K. Leroy Irvis office as his top aide. When Irvis stepped down as the most powerful Black state representative ever, Phil had to move on. He landed the job with the city, and even though there were many disappointments, he was able to fight to get a lot of things done for which he never received recognition. If not for Phil the numbers, with which many people are unhappy, would have been much lower than they were when he passed.
Just like he received little to no credit for his work in the Irvis office, he hasn’t gotten any for his work for the city. To the point where no one is asking about who’s replacing him. A concerned person in this position can be the difference between Blacks receiving 20 percent of the jobs instead of 5 percent. The numbers weren’t what most of us would have liked with Phil, but could anyone else have done any better? Remember, even though people are heads of departments, they only have as much power as their bosses allow. They can fight it but in the end if they want to keep their jobs they do what the boss, in this case the mayor, tells them to.
Yes some people say if you can’t get what you want then you should quit. What would that accomplish? Even though you want 30 percent, and only get 20 percent, without Phil, or someone fighting for that 30 percent Blacks end up with just 10 percent or less. How many of us get what we want on any job?
I commend Phil for what he accomplished, and Tamiko Stanley, who headed Diversity 365 program, for her work as well. I’m really surprised none of the civil rights groups have voiced their concerns about the eliminations of these two critical departments or offices which were committed to equal employment, which is called diversity in today’s world. Are they waiting for all the vacancies to be filled with White faces before they voice their concerns about the lack of Affirmative Action, or Diversity programs being in place in the city.
Apparently these positions are not important to the new mayor, because he has done nothing that I can see to strengthen these offices. Nor has the new Personnel Director said anything. I raise the question of just how committed to diversity are they?
I could be wrong, and I am more than willing to eat crow. But every time I asked these questions before I was referred to Talent City, a group put together to recruit and fill vacancies at the cabinet and executive levels such as Valerie McDonald Roberts, and the police chief. Now their job is done. So what about all the other positions in city government which are the majority of hires, which is happening every day, from the janitors to the assistants?
The mayor and chief executive for the county keep giving impressive numbers when it comes to high percentages of Blacks and women, but I would like to know how valid they are, and who’s in place to keep them that way, or to improve upon what we have. Blacks make up 30 percent of the city, we should make up somewhere close to that number in overall city employees as well as the percentage of Blacks receiving contracts from the city.
So my question is who do we talk to? Who’s in charge?
(Ulish Carter is the managing editor of the New Pittsburgh Courier. He can be reached at ucarter@newpittsburghcourier.com)
