To:             Business Owners
 
Subject:      Availability and Disparity Study  
The Dallas Independent School District and the Dallas Area Rapid Transit are each conducting an Availability and Disparity Study.  The principal purpose of each study is to determine if there is any disparity between the utilization of minority and woman-owned businesses and their availability to contract with each agency.   A successful Availability and Disparity Study requires the involvement of the local minority and woman-owned businesses willing and able to perform public contracts.   In order to inform the business community about an Availability and Disparity Study, a series of meetings are being sponsored by the Dallas Independent School District.  One of these meetings is being co hosted by Dallas Area Rapid Transit.
 
You are cordially invited to attend any one of the series of community meetings during the week of May 13^th.  At each meeting an overview of the Availability and Disparity Study process will be presented and businesses will have the opportunity to share their contracting experiences.
 
The Availability and Disparity Studies are being conducted by Mason Tillman Associates with assistance from three local consultants.  The local consultants are Mr. Adrian Reyes, President of Adrian Information Strategies; Mr. Arnel Trovada, President of Trovada Public Relations & Marketing and Ms. Sherry C. Tupper, Public Affairs Consultant.
 
The dates and locations for the DISD community meetings are listed below: 
 

Monday Lunch Meeting May 13, 2002 11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. Asian American Chamber of Commerce 11171 Harry Hines Blvd., Suite 115 Dallas, Texas 75229	Tuesday Lunch Meeting May 14, 2002 11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. Center for Community Cooperation 2900 Live Oak Street Dallas, Texas 75204
Monday Dinner Meeting (DART/DISD) May 13, 2002 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. DART Headquarters 1401 Pacific Avenue Dallas, Texas 75266-0163	Tuesday Dinner Meeting May 14, 2002 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. Dallas Black Chamber of Commerce 2838 Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. Dallas, Texas 75215

 
The results of the Availability and Disparity Study will be very instrumental in determining the future of a race conscious M/WBE program.  A successful Availability and Disparity Study will occur only if able M/WBEs who may have been deterred from making their interest known to DISD are accurately counted.
 
We hope that you can attend and participate in one of these meetings.  Each meeting will include a buffet.  To RSVP please e-mail us at DISDDART@hotmail.com or call (972) 980-0228.