House Strategies Group LLCFrederick measured itself, then built the programs. The update tests what they changed.
A preliminary landscape analysis for the City of Frederick's forthcoming supplier diversity assessment and disparity study RFP (draft under review), built entirely from public data: the City's 2021 baseline, the programs the City built from its recommendations, and the questions the update must answer in an era that demands evidence built to survive review. It is the data, analytics, and visualization capability House Strategies Group is putting forward to lead the study.
Sources: the City's 2021 Disparity Study (Griffin & Strong, P.C.); City of Frederick program record and the 2022 annual program review; U.S. Census Annual Business Survey 2022. A gap is a question, not a verdict; preliminary public-data reads carry their limits inline.
What this is
Frederick is not starting from zero. That changes what the update must do.
A procurement disparity study asks a single, measurable question: do minority- and women-owned firms win public contracts in proportion to how many of them are ready, willing, and able to do the work? The City of Frederick answered a first version of that question in 2021 and then acted on it. This portal reads the public record since, so the City can see the analytical approach before a single primary record is collected.
The City's 2021 study, conducted by Griffin & Strong, P.C., found statistically significant MWBE underutilization in all five categories it measured, findings that survived regression controls. The City then built what the study recommended: annual aspirational goals set at the study's measured availability levels, a race-neutral Small Business Reserve, and dedicated compliance staffing. The first annual review reported about 20 percent of 2022 procurement spend, $8.8M of $44M, reaching small, women-owned, or minority-owned firms.
The forthcoming update is the first test of what those programs changed. And the era has raised the bar for what counts as evidence: a federal court permanently enjoined Houston's MBE program in July 2026, and Maryland's 2026 reauthorization of its own MBE program codifies race-neutral-first. The methodology page is explicit about what a full, Croson-defensible study adds that public data cannot.
The 2021 record
Significant disparity in all five categories. Two of them at zero.
In the 2021 record, MWBE prime utilization fell significantly short of availability in every category. Professional Services and Goods recorded zero MWBE prime dollars across all five study years. And 96.58 percent of all MWBE prime dollars went to a single construction firm, so the aggregate 25.09 percent MWBE share rests almost entirely on one vendor. A gap is a question, not a verdict: the study's own anecdotal record pointed at an entrenched informal network and unmonitored good-faith efforts, and the update must test what the City's programs did to those mechanisms.
The 2021 disparity index by category
Prime utilization ÷ availability, MWBE combined. Below 0.80 flags substantial disparity; all five categories were statistically significant.
Source: The City's 2021 Disparity Study (Griffin & Strong, P.C.), category grid. Figures are the study's own.
The first test
The City built what the 2021 study recommended. The update measures what changed.
Aspirational goals at measured availability, the Small Business Reserve, compliance staffing, and required annual reviews all followed the study. The only public program read so far is the 2022 review: about 20 percent of procurement spend reached small, women-owned, or minority-owned firms, and 154 SBEs have been certified since January 2022. No later annual reports or utilization dashboard have been published. Task 3 of the City's forthcoming RFP is a programs assessment; this module is the head start.
Why House Strategies Group
This work needs new voices.
A handful of firms have produced most disparity studies for a generation, and the experience requirement the studies measure also guards the field. A study about open competition is more credible when the field that produces it is open too. House Strategies Group intends to be one of the new voices, and earn the seat with rigor and transparency.
The analysis
The modules, one preliminary picture.
Each module is a self-contained piece of the disparity-study workflow, built so an evaluator can see exactly how House Strategies Group would run the study.