'United Black Legislative Agenda' seeks $75 million to create businesses

Black community leaders gathered at the State Capitol on Wednesday to ask legislators for $75 million to create a capital fund for black-owned business start-ups.

The proposal is the centerpiece of a broader $100 million "United Black Legislative Agenda" rolled out at a Capitol news conference by a coalition of community groups in response to recent evidence of widening racial economic disparities suffered by black Minnesotans, most notably a 13 percent drop in median income between 2013 and 2014 — a period where income rose for every other demographic group in the state.

"Access to capital is the number one impediment to African-American and other businesses of color," said Jeff Hassan, executive director of the African American Leadership Forum. "We also know business owners of color, including African-Americans, hire more people of color than other businesses. It therefore makes sense that we would promote that."

The event drew surprisingly strong turnout as a coalition of community leaders from groups that haven't always gotten along came together to map out their ideas for how best to improve the lives of black Minnesotans.

DFL Gov. Mark Dayton has proposed $100 million in state dollars to tackle racial economic disparities. The proposal unveiled Wednesday shares much with Dayton's outline, including $8 million for a summer jobs program in Minneapolis and St. Paul that would target young people of color. The coalition also asked for a series of policy changes, including a ban on grand juries in criminal proceedings and on privately owned prisons, changes to criminal sentencing and restoration of voting rights for felons who have served their time.

Despite Dayton's support, the coalition faces a tough push at the Capitol. Republicans who control the House are unlikely to support that level of spending, particularly given that most of it would be focused in Minneapolis and St. Paul, which are totally represented by DFLers.

"The GOP controls the agenda" in the House, said Rep. Raymond Dehn, DFL-Minneapolis. "It's not an excuse; it's just a fact."

Among the groups that collaborated on the proposal are the Minneapolis Urban League, Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, Black Lives Matter Minneapolis, representatives of Somali-Americans and the Council for Minnesotans of African Heritage.

"It is not meant to be the definitive document for all of the priorities in the black community," said Anthony Newby, executive director of Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, a nonprofit organization that aims to empower people of color. "What it is meant to do is start a broader conversation that will continue throughout the session, next session and the following session."

Dayton and DFL legislative leaders started talking more frequently last fall about the need to shrink racial economic disparities, soon after the U.S. Census Bureau reported the drop in median income for black Minnesotans. Dayton added it to a list of issues he wanted legislators to tackle in a special session late last year, along with extending unemployment benefits for laid-off Iron Range steelworkers and changes to Minnesota's Real ID law.

Now a month into their session, legislators already have passed bills related to the latter two issues. "We think this is as important as any other of those issues, and demands the same level of attention," Newby said.

A new Senate subcommittee on racial equity issues will start meeting next week to consider the proposals. House Republicans have not created a similar committee and have not indicated that they would be open to anywhere near $100 million to address the issue. Most of the policy changes sought by the coalition face significant opposition from Republicans, as well.

Rep. Jim Knoblach, the Republicans' budget chief in the House, said Dayton and DFLers must be open to a top GOP priority — school choice — if Republicans are to consider racial equity legislation. Republicans maintain that approach would help to eliminate disparities in educational outcomes between white students and students of color.

"Republicans made a proposal to increase school choice for low-income and minority students in an effort to address economic disparities, but Democrats have refused to consider it," said Knoblach, of St. Cloud. "If Democrats are willing to seriously address the achievement gap, I will be flexible in considering their spending proposals."

Under the proposed business capital fund, a group of community development organizations with experience assisting business owners of color would form a board of directors that would take applications and allocate seed money. It differs somewhat from Dayton's approach, which would have more of those decisions made by state agency officials.

"We think more of the allocation needs to come from the community-based organizations that are on the ground in real time trying to address the disparities in the African-American community," said Steven Belton, president of the Minneapolis Urban League.

Dayton said he had not yet seen the coalition's specific proposals. But he said at a news conference Wednesday that it was his intention that both community leaders and legislators would help to shape a final racial disparities plan.

"It's everybody's problem; it's everybody's challenge," Dayton said.

Patrick Condon • 651-925-5049