Lawmakers call for oversight of rail project
Confusion over job opportunities for minorities
JOBS | Patrick Yeagle
Job opportunities for minorities and women on Springfield’s 10 th Street rail relocation project aren’t living up to promises by the city and state, according to one community group. Meanwhile, leaders from the city and the project’s main engineering firm say they’ve actually exceeded their obligations.
The apparent confusion led two lawmakers representing Springfield to propose creating a commission to oversee the project. However, the commission would have little power, relying instead on transparency to encourage compliance with the agreement. That transparency already exists, project leaders say, but they welcome further public involvement anyway.
Leroy Jordan, chairman of the rail task force for the Faith Coalition for the Common Good in Springfield, said it’s appropriate that the first phase of the rail relocation project – an underpass for Carpenter Street at 10 th Street – has uncovered archaeological remains from the 1908 Springfield race riot. The remains include foundations of houses that belonged to black residents and which were burned during the riot. Jordan says those remains are symbolic of the historical segregation caused by the existing rail line, which divides the east side from the rest of the city.
“It’s the rail project that still divides us and threatens to further isolate east Springfield,” Jordan said. “The railroad continues to impact us in ways that are not to our benefit, just as it was when they laid the track 100 years ago.”
Since 2011, the Faith Coalition has worked to convince leaders in politics, business and labor to sign a Rail Community Benefits Agreement, which calls for hiring quotas for minorities and women, job training for minorities and women, fair compensation for displaced landowners and more. Several lawmakers at the local, state and federal levels have signed the agreement, but the Faith Coalition isn’t satisfied with the results so far.
The Faith Coalition worked with Sen.
Andy Manar, D-Bunker Hill, and Rep. Sue Scherer, D-Decatur, to file identical legislation in the Illinois General Assembly to create a rail oversight commission. The panel would be able to call public hearings to examine minority hiring and other topics related to the Springfield rail project and the Faith Coalition’s Community Benefits Agreement.
The legislation, which had not yet been filed before publication, would not include any enforcement mechanism or repercussions for noncompliance, Manar admitted. He says his hope is that the transparency and accountability provided by a commission would lead to the promises made in the agreement being kept.
“If there are benchmarks that aren’t being met, we have a place to air that out,” Manar said.
Kevin Seals, a chief environmental scientist at Hanson Professional Services in Springfield, says the team working on the rail consolidation project has made public input a priority from the beginning, holding regular meetings with stakeholders across the city – including the Faith Coalition. Hanson is the main engineering firm overseeing the project.
Seals says the project has already far surpassed the 4.5 percent goal for minority hiring set by the Illinois Department of Transportation. About 17.4 percent of workers on the Carpenter Street underpass are minorities, Seals says, and about 4.3 percent are women. He adds that about 29 percent of Hanson’s work on the project has been subcontracted to a minority-owned firm in Springfield.
Additionally, an “ombudsman” has been drafted to oversee relocation assistance for residents who will be displaced by the rail project, Seals says. The ombudsman, retired African-American judge Theodis Lewis of Springfield, has already contacted all affected property owners and renters, Seals said. Springfield Mayor Michael Houston adds that federal law mandates how relocation is handled on the project because federal funds are being used, so residents have an extra level of protection that wouldn’t otherwise exist if it was merely a city or state project.
Why was there a breakdown in communication between project managers and the Faith Coalition? Seals explains that an IDOT representative verbally shared the minority participation numbers with the Faith Coalition at a November 2014 meeting, but the holiday season and the cold weather have slowed work on the project, so no further meetings have been held yet.
Sandy Robinson, director of the city’s Office of Community Relations, says the city is implementing software to automate tracking of minority participation on the rail project. Robinson says training on the software is in progress, and it will soon allow easy reporting of minority hiring and other factors of the project to the public.
Bill Logan, executive assistant to Houston, says the possibility of a state-mandated commission to oversee the rail project’s minority participation doesn’t bother him because he feels the project is already transparent.
“It’s a team effort, and we will work with all partners involved in this team as long as we possibly can to make sure that we have a great project here,” Logan said. “So far, that’s exactly what has happened.”
