This past week I was in talks with a asphalt milling company who owns NO equipment whatsoever and is participating in bid letting on public contracts, alot of the contracts are stimulus funds for road resurfacing. Whats happening is, a large asphalt milling contractor in the northeast, (thats been run out of Florida completely for a number of reasons) will lease mills to this DBE/MBE contractor putting they're names on the machine but the personnel running the equipment will be people who do not fit the MBE/DBE stats. Hence, the reason the large milling contractor is doing this and using this DBE/MBE company is because they have lost contracts because they do not meet MBE/DBE requirements. No minority workers will be involved at all. The operators will be the same people employed by the large milling contractor but placed on the smaller MBE/DBE payroll. This will restore lost bid letting opprotunties to the large contractor while the small MBE/DBE who own nothing and put nothing into it make a few dollars off the big contractor. In my job search I ran accross them and they are/were extremely interested in having me(I'm a minority) run one of "their" mills. I realized after some discussions that they would have nothing to do with the actual milling operations at all and declined to be bothered with the larger milling outfit because I spent time with them about 4 years ago and they are less than impressive as people, the only thing that saves them is that they run the most expensive, easy to operate mills on the market. In my opinion this is a scam. I'm looking for opinions from other contractors regarding this issue because it means some people are being unfairly cut out of work by the large company using a smaller outfit (who own nothing and know nothing about milling) to increase/maintain the stranglehold they have on the asphalt milling contracts in the eastern USA. Opinions of HEF members come at a high value, I may start naming names in the following posts, make a few calls, send a few emails to state agencies.
I don't do much bid work, and don't compete for any of the fedrally funded jobs, but I know a few people who operate under DBE ( there wifes name ). I think it's not a practical system as most government systems aren't. Example small business is classafide as under 7mil I think. To me there is nothing small or disadvantaged about a 7 mil a year business. Practices of this sort have gone on for as long as they have had these programs and will continue. It's almost designed to make it this way. If I'm trully a small disadvantaged how can I afford to bid a 5 mill job and have the resorces to complete it if something goes wrong? This is just my opinion on the matter. It can open doors for you, but most are doors you'd be best off to leave closed on your own. Although around here if you are one of these minority businesses some of the larger contractors will pay more attention to you as you can help them by bringing this to the table with there bid.
web search Drum- do a web search for Williams Brothers DBE violations. Sorry, I had trouble posting the link. WB got fined for a situation that sounded similar to what you described. thanks
Thank you for the Info. Good reading on a few of the exact same types of contract manipulations going on here. Instead of bothering with notification of state law agencies, I'd rather tip off the people that are losing bid opprotunities for the same DBE/MBE reasons and let them hash it out. It seems unfair that a company which has contracts up and down the eastern seasboard of the USA needs to use such techniques to secure additional work. Seems greedy to me.
To clarify I'm not bashing anyone. I'm just not fond of the system as it pertains to my area is all. ? Acually for that matter I'm not very fond of many government things, so I may be a little sinical towards them. Hope no one took any offence that wasn't my attention.
Its all good Boophoenix... I'd have to completely agree on the distrust of Government programs to begin with and the adminstrative values. That being what it is.... I was extremely offended to have been asked to operate a machines I've been running for years as a "minority". Its difficult to relate aspects of what offends me about it but....to then come to find out that a company is going to use this exact status to profit themselves off the backs of people that would not and cannot be of service too is repulsive.
Dbe but not really This sounds to me like Villager working with All American Milling in Orlando Florida. They came out of no where bidding jobs. The owner is a minority with an engineering firm but no milling xperience. He get the jobs usning his DBE credentials and uses Villager's equipment and opeators to do the work. To me this is an insult to those who have worked hard to develope their business to be tops in the industry only to have someone with no qualifications come in and take work they don't even do themselves. To add insult to injury they stole our format for their quote request and put it on their website. Go to http://aamilling.com/index.php and you will see it is almost verbatim to ours at www.turtlese.com . I believe there needs to be more regulation of companies claiming to be DBE's where they must show ownership of the equipment in order to do the work.
You should have a talk with the AG at the FDOT. We used to have stuff like that here in MI. They clamped down and the 95-100% sub contract stuff appears to be be gone. That's not to say it still isn't going on but it's not as flagrant as it used to be. We had a Williams Brothers here years ago that subleased everything to a minority "owner". He showed up after work from his day job and only wanted to know how many tons had been laid that day
I think the programs are a scam at best, and discrimination against those who have built a business already. Most of the government "Welfare for contractors" plans are easily manipulated by a few people with the insider knowledge of how they work. That said, some states and agencies have placed rules that require the contractor to self perform 50% nof the work, to eliminate the type of thing you are talking about. Well, slow it down at least. There are ways around anything. The government likes to brag about how they helped the minorities, when the only ones helped are a few who took a cut for the use of their name. I also agree with Boophoenix, anyone who has the finances and bonding ability to bid multi million dollar contracts does not qualify as disadvantaged in my book.
that's what i've never understood...we create govt. entities with the intent of doing "great things"....the govt. entities grow, and grow, and grow.....and you hear repeatedly such as this scenario, all the inequities that evolve from it. if i compete and lose a bid against a dbe/wbe contractor...i want some chick or somebody of ethnic origin other than caucasion actually bidding these jobs, running these jobs, running equipment, be an active player. but alas, we've let d.c. into this too deep, and it's open to this kind of crap.
Recently spoke to our accountant that our state DOT has a program in place to help "smaller" contractors upgrade financials from reviewed status to full audits (thus allowing for higher bond lines, bigger jobs, etc..). Sounded pretty good to us............until we found out that it was for HUB firms only, which we're not. So now it stings even more knowing that our tax dollars are going toward helping the competition get a leg up on us!
Thankfully Mr Ando above has named all parties involved and has pointed out they even stole materials from Turtle. Although this operation does not plan to be as active in Florida as they could be initially, they are in the northern areas with contracts already secured. I am going to make sure the State of New York knows the deal with those fools.
all these guys are right. it is a bunch of gov't loop holes they can jump thru & get this work often at higher prices because they know they are somewhat of a shoe-in. now with the ARRA $$$ coming into play they mbe/dbe goals are increased. alot of theses firms are run by the owners qualifying but none of the employees. im not pro/con unions, but if your gonna try to upset their apple cart, unions may be a help(as long as the m/dbe is nonunion)
A phone call to me from one of the partners at the smaller company informing me that they now want to actually buy equipment and run a legit operation... Poor dude has NO idea how much he needs to get going at all. I told him his partner is using him as a minority in this little debacle, he says he knows but wants to use little steps to get in the business. Garbage.