ALEXANDRIA, La. (UrbanCast: 8/26/2026) — Who is actually getting the City of Alexandria’s business?
That question emerged Tuesday as Alexandria officials presented City Council members with figures showing minority-owned businesses receiving more than 13% of applicable City spending, while local business owners and advocates described barriers they say continue to make it difficult for some businesses to get through the door.
The numbers presented by the administration sound encouraging.
According to documents provided to council, minority-owned businesses accounted for 15.38% of reported spending in 2025 and 13.36% during the first quarter of 2026.
Women-owned businesses were reported at 8.32% in 2025 and 7.36% during the first quarter of 2026.
But the documents also leave important questions unanswered.
They do not plainly identify the individual businesses behind those percentages. They do not tell the public how many unique minority-owned businesses received City dollars. And the broad “minority-owned” category does not show how those dollars were distributed among African American, Hispanic, Asian American, Native American or other minority-owned businesses.
That distinction is important in Alexandria, where 55.3% of residents are Black alone, according to current U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts.
Alexandria’s Own Study Previously Found Significant Disparities
There is another reason the current numbers deserve closer examination.
The City of Alexandria commissioned an extensive disparity study by Keen Independent Research that examined City procurement from January 2015 through December 2019.
That study analyzed 1,680 procurements totaling approximately $109.3 million.
It found minority- and women-owned businesses combined received 6.10% of the contract dollars examined, while the study calculated an availability benchmark of 19.64%.
African American-owned businesses received just 1.01%, or approximately $1.1 million, of the procurement dollars analyzed. Their availability benchmark was calculated at 3.15%.
Keen assigned African American-owned businesses a disparity index of 32, far below the 100 score representing parity between utilization and estimated availability.
White women-owned businesses received 1.87% of the dollars examined compared with a 12.84% availability benchmark, producing a disparity index of 15.
The study found no contract or subcontract dollars in its analyzed dataset going to Asian American-owned or Native American-owned firms.
Those findings were significant.
But they should not simply be placed beside the administration’s 2025 figure of 15.38% and treated as an apples-to-apples comparison.
They are not.
The Numbers Measure Different Things
The Keen study covered a different period and used a detailed methodology designed specifically to measure disparities.
Its analysis excluded certain federally funded contracts, including USDOT- and HUD-funded work, and focused largely on goods and services normally purchased within the local marketplace.
Researchers also investigated the race, ethnicity and gender of business owners rather than relying solely on certification records.
Keen further adjusted prime-contract values to avoid double counting dollars paid to subcontractors.
The administration’s current report appears to use a different and much broader accounting method based on City spending recorded under designated business classifications.
Therefore, UrbanCast is not reporting that the administration’s 15.38% figure is false because the earlier study reported lower figures.
What deserves an answer is something different:
What exactly is behind the current 15.38%?
If Alexandria has substantially improved minority-business participation since the period studied by Keen Independent, that would be important progress.
But the documents presented Tuesday do not contain enough detail for the public to independently see how that progress occurred.
One Percentage Could Represent Many Businesses — Or Very Few
A percentage alone cannot show whether economic opportunity is broadly distributed.
For example, 15% of applicable spending distributed among 50 minority-owned businesses tells a very different story from 15% concentrated among three or four businesses.
Both could produce the same headline percentage.
The current report does not plainly tell council members:
How many unique minority-owned businesses received City money?
How much did each receive?
What type of work did each perform?
How many City purchases or contracts did each receive?
How many are African American-owned?
How many are located in Alexandria?
And how much of the reported spending is concentrated among the City’s largest minority vendors?
Without those numbers, the public can see the percentage but cannot fully see the participation behind it.
Steven Williams: “I’m Just Asking for an Opportunity”
The numbers became much more personal when local contractor Steven Williams addressed the council.
Williams told council members he performs demolition work and has experience demolishing structures for private property owners.
He said he obtained insurance, licensing and other credentials as he attempted to become eligible for City demolition work.
Williams said he later encountered a requirement that he have two years of demolition experience with a public entity.
That produced a seemingly circular problem.
How does a local contractor obtain public-entity experience if public-entity experience is required before that contractor can receive the public work needed to gain it?
Williams told council he was not asking to have a contract handed to him.
“I’m not asking for a handout. I’m just asking for an opportunity.”
The City indicated that another solicitation related to its demolition contractor rotation is expected.
Williams’ account does not by itself establish that the City improperly denied him work. The specific solicitation requirements and their legal basis would need to be examined.
But his experience raises a legitimate question about whether qualification requirements unintentionally create barriers for businesses trying to enter public contracting for the first time.
Horton Says Small Businesses Are Becoming Discouraged
Richard Horton, chairman of the Mid Louisiana Regional Chamber of Commerce, raised a broader concern.
Horton told council that some small businesses become discouraged while attempting to do business with Alexandria.
He described businesses encountering additional requirements during the process and said entrepreneurs are not always adequately guided through what they need to correct or complete.
Horton also questioned whether City procurement information and business resources are sufficiently updated and accessible.
His argument was not that minority-owned businesses should receive contracts regardless of price or qualifications.
Instead, Horton argued that legitimate small businesses should be given a clear pathway to compete and should understand what prevents them from successfully doing so.
That distinction matters.
A competitive procurement system does not guarantee anyone a contract.
But an effective small-business program should make the path into that competition understandable.
Price Says the City Already Has Rules — The Question Is Implementation
Business owner Fred Price pushed the discussion another step.
Price told council the City already has policies addressing minority participation, vendor development, reporting and assistance to businesses.
His concern was whether those requirements are actually being implemented as intended.
That concern deserves additional attention because the disparity study itself recommended measures beyond merely tracking a percentage.
Among its recommendations were targeted competition for certain small purchases, stronger tracking and reporting, assistance for disadvantaged businesses and other measures designed to expand participation.
In other words, Alexandria’s own independent study recognized that measuring who received the money was only part of the issue.
Creating a pathway for businesses to successfully compete was another.
Small Purchases Were a Particular Problem in the Disparity Study
One of the Keen study’s findings is particularly relevant to Horton’s comments.
Researchers separately examined City purchases between $10,000 and $30,000.
Minority- and women-owned businesses received only 3.4% of the dollars from those small procurements, according to the study.
Keen calculated that approximately 22% participation would have been anticipated based on the availability of those businesses for the work.
The researchers examined 829 small procurements in that analysis.
That is historical data from 2015 through 2019. It does not establish what is happening today.
But it demonstrates that difficulty accessing smaller City purchasing opportunities was a documented issue before Horton raised similar concerns Tuesday.
That makes the obvious follow-up question:
What has changed?
Council Members Struggled to Read the Report
There was also a basic oversight problem Tuesday.
Several council members complained that the financial tables they received were printed in extremely small type and were difficult to read during the meeting.
Council members repeatedly asked for larger versions and explanations of what the numbers represented.
Questions also arose about quarterly reporting.
Some council members said they had not been receiving reports they believed should have been provided regularly.
Administration officials said reporting is conducted internally and indicated information would be provided to council.
That issue should be relatively simple to resolve.
The City can identify exactly which reports are required, when they were produced, who received them and whether council was among the required recipients.
The Disparity Study and Today’s Numbers Are Pieces of the Same Conversation
It would be misleading to claim Alexandria’s 2022 disparity study proves something is wrong with the administration’s 2025 or 2026 percentages.
The periods are different.
The methodologies are different.
The categories are not identical.
And the City may indeed have made substantial progress since the years studied.
But it would be equally problematic to dismiss the earlier findings simply because the current administration can point to a larger percentage.
The disparity study documented significant underutilization among several groups.
Local businesses are now standing before council describing barriers they believe still exist.
Council members are questioning reports they say they have not received or cannot readily understand.
And the current spending report does not provide enough vendor-level detail to show the public exactly who is benefiting.
Those are findings worth discussing.
If the Numbers Show Progress, Show the Public the Progress
There is a straightforward way for Alexandria to answer many of these questions.
Release the vendor-level information supporting the reported percentages.
Show the number of unique businesses.
Show the amount received by each business.
Show the goods or services purchased.
Show the procurement method.
Show the relevant business classification.
Show how many businesses submitted quotes or bids.
Show how many were unsuccessful and, where legally appropriate, why.
And explain what Alexandria implemented following its disparity study and how those measures changed outcomes.
If the City has moved from the disparities documented during 2015 through 2019 to substantially broader minority-business participation today, that is a story worth telling.
But the public should not have to accept a percentage without being able to understand what produced it.
This is especially important in Alexandria, where Black residents represent 55.3% of the population. That demographic figure does not mean 55.3% of City contracts should go to Black-owned businesses, nor does population percentage determine the legally appropriate level of contracting participation.
It does mean the question of whether residents have meaningful opportunities to participate in the economic activity generated by their local government deserves serious public attention.
The issue before Alexandria is therefore larger than whether the City can meet a percentage on a spreadsheet.
The question is whether the percentage reflects genuine, broadening opportunity — and whether the City can show the public the evidence behind it.
