Jerry and Theresa Thompson are the owners of Landscape Consultants of Texas and Metropolitan Landscape Management, Inc. Like many businesses in this industry, they depend on large, multi-year contracts with the City of Houston to survive. However, the Thompsons say they are being squeezed out of the business because of their race. For decades, Houston has had a policy of racial set asides for businesses.
Erin Wilcox is an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF), which is representing the Thompsons in the lawsuit.
"This case has been going on for a few months now," Wilcox begins, "but our two clients just filed a motion with federal court telling that court [they] don't believe there is any legal basis whatsoever for this racial preference program that Houston has been operating for 40 years; and [arguing] that program should be ended immediately, that it's unconstitutional and it should not go on another day."
The case is in federal district court, but a ruling at the appellate or Supreme Court level would have big implications for these and other race-based policies, according to PLF.
Meanwhile, Houston isn't the only area of the country where this is an issue.
"We're involved in a couple of them," Wilcox tells AFN. "One is in Newport News, Virginia, where we have a Navy veteran who runs a small business selling materials and goods to the United States military, and he is put at disadvantage by the federal version, basically, of this kind of a program."
Another program is in Alameda County, California, where Wilcox says construction companies are put under these same kinds of racial requirements in order to do business with the county.
Editor's note: Images compliments of Pacific Legal Foundation
