Chicago’s City Council has extended its set-aside program for minority- and women-owned businesses (M/WBEs) through 2021. 

The purpose of extending the set-aside program for minority and women owned businesses is to allow time for a consultant to complete a “disparity study,” which the city requires to be conducted in order to showcase the need for the program’s continuance. Although the disparity study was supposed to be completed by the end of 2020, COVID-19 halted the study. It’s now expected to be finished in Spring 2021. 

Minority and female contractors fought for a fairer share in 2016, successfully increasing contracts for minorities to 26 percent and women to 6 percent. The goal this time around is to aim even higher, bringing the minority percentage to 30 percent and women to 10 percent. In order to make sure the companies benefiting from the program are ones that need it, companies participating in the set-aside program will now “graduate” from the set-aside program after reaching gross income and personal net worth caps. 

The set-aside program will require businesses to meet several requirements, including making good-faith efforts to reach the required outreach effort for MBE and WBE participation.

For more details, see: https://chicago.suntimes.com/city-hall/2020/12/2/22087794/minority-women-owned-businesses-contracts-chicago-city-council-set-aside-programs-extension