Industry groups mobilizing to oppose November ballot measure.

L.A. COUNTY - The California Civil Rights Initiative is one step away from landing on this November's ballot, and industry groups representing minority-owned businesses are already strategizing on how to defeat the initiative. Furthermore, CCRI has galvanized many of L.A.'s minority business groups to work together for a common cause for the first time.

As it is written, CCRI "prohibits ... government institutions from ... giving preferential treatment to any individual or group in public employment ... or public contracting on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin."

Sponsors of the initiative have already gathered the 693,230 signatures necessary to get CCRI on the ballot in November. County officials from throughout California are now verifying the signatures, and most are expected to report their findings to the Secretary of State's office by mid-April.

The perceived threat CCRI poses to minority businesses brought leaders from L.A.'s Africans-American, Hispanic and Asian business communities together at a highly spirited meeting of the L.A. Unity Forum in mid-March.

The Unity Forum is an annual series of meetings, with this year's meetings being the third. This year's initial event took on added significance due to the threat of CCRI, according to Paul Suzuki, coordinator for the Unity Forum and a partner at downtown L.A.-based law firm Suzuki & Ito Partners.

"(CCRI) is pulling everyone together. Everyone is in agreement that we need to work together. That was the consensus at (the Unity Forum) meeting," Suzuki said.

Broader meeting

In addition to the Unity Forum's initial mid-March meeting, the forum has scheduled another, broader-based meeting for April 24 to pull in minority business leaders from throughout the L.A. area. The second meeting is slated to be held at American Honda Motor Co. headquarters in Torrance. Suzuki said he expects 400 minority small-business owners to attend, compared with about 250 at past meetings.

"The next thing is to create an agenda. We want to create a uniform position on this (CCRI), together," he said.

One task the Unity Forum's members plan to undertake collectively is putting together an anti-CCRI media campaign, according to Bill Yang, a principal at engineering firm William Yang & Associates in Burbank.

"Every (minority) group has to do its own work to reach its own people, but collectively we have to do other things together. Something like a big media campaign requires money, and no individual group can take on that task by itself," he said.

Clarence Washington, chairman of the affirmative action committee for L.A.'s Black Business Association, said the Unity Forum will function like an umbrella body covering many smaller nuclei working to defeat CCRI. Specifically, the forum will be a venue for minority business groups to strategize on coordinated campaigns to get out the vote, write letters, stage rallies and educate the public on issues surrounding CCRI and affirmative action, Washington said.

In addition to the coordinated efforts, separate campaigns likely will be conducted by various minority business groups within their respective communities, he added. "It would be a nightmare to try and bring all these groups together under one organization," he said.

Charles Blackmore, chairman of L.A.'s Black Business Association, put it differently: "We're working with both the ABA (Asian Business Association) and LBA (Latin Business Association) on this. We're strategizing together, and then each group goes back to their (respective) communities."

Incomplete backing

Much of the minority business community is throwing its weight behind the drive to defeat CCRI, should the measure make it onto the November ballot, as expected. At the same time, however, some minority business owners believe affirmative action is an idea whose time has passed, and minority-owned firms must now learn to compete in the business world without preferential treatment.

One such businessman is Joe Ortiz, president of public relations firm Joe Ortiz & Associates in North Hollywood. He said he and many of his Latino business friends have mixed feelings about CCRI and the affirmative action issue in general.

"Philosophically, I think there are still a lot of questions on whether (affirmative action) really worked," he said, adding that his business has never benefited from affirmative action policies.

He admitted that affirmative action has definitely helped some minority business owners, though it has also acted as a disincentive in some cases.

"The ones who are screaming the loudest (in opposition to CCRI) are the ones who were able to get their foot in the door because of affirmative action," he said. "But a lot of incentive also goes out of the window" when companies are given that kind of preferential treatment.

Ronnie Jones, executive vice president of Tumohr Construction Co. of Inglewood, expressed similar mixed feelings about CCRI and affirmative action in general. Jones, however, said he doubts affirmative action has ever really benefited minority-owned businesses.

"Contractors have always tended to go to subcontractors that they have a relationship with," rather than reaching out to include minority-owned businesses, he said.