Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner last week signed an Executive Order to help ensure equal opportunity is provided to all Illinois businesses looking to contract with the State. Executive Order 16-08 directs the Illinois Department of Central Management Services (CMS) to oversee the implementation of the recommendations from a 2015 Disparity Study. It also directs CMS to investigate and, if needed, take appropriate steps to implement a sheltered markets initiative, to increase the number businesses owned and controlled by minorities, women, and persons with disabilities doing business with the State.
Executive Order 16-08 directs CMS to institute a number of reforms to how it currently administers State of Illinois Business Enterprise Program (BEP) to address the problems highlighted by a 2015 Disparity Study. Many of these reforms are common sense administrative fixes to make it easier for BEP businesses to understand and access state markets, including: creating an electronic data collection and monitoring system to track BEP utilization; reviewing CMS’ own process for setting BEP goals on state contracts; and, reviewing the time it takes to get procurements out to the public and the time bidders have to submit responses to these procurements.
The Executive Order also mandates CMS to determine whether the creation of “Sheltered Markets” can reduce disparities and, if so, take appropriate steps to establish sheltered markets in industry-specific areas. Sheltered markets may be created when certain State procurement solicitations are specifically set aside for BEP-eligible businesses. These initiatives are able to target areas where discriminatory practices have prevented progress towards parity in contracting. They also complement and bolster the efforts of other BEP measures such as the state goal of 20 percent of contracts awarded to minority businesses.
