SHERBROOKE TURF, INC., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. MINNESOTA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, et al., Defendants-Appellees, United States of America, et al., Intervenor Defendant Appellees. Gross Seed Company, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Nebraska Department of Roads, et al., Defendants-Appellees, United States Department of Transportation, et al., Intervenor Defendant Appellees.
Nos. 02-1665, 02-3016
United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit
Submitted: May 15, 2003. Filed: Oct. 6, 2003.
345 F.3d 964
Counsel who presented argument on behalf of appellees FHA, U.S. DOT and USA in 02-1665, and appellees Federal Highway and U.S. Department of Transportation in 02-3016 was Matt Michael Dummermuth of Washington, D.C. Also appearing on the briefs were Kirk Van Tine, Paul M. Geier, James A. Rowland, Edward V.A. Kussy, Ralph F. Boyd, Jr., Mark L. Gross, and Teresa Kwong.
Counsel who presented argument on behalf of appellees Minnesota Department of Transportation, Tinklenberg, and Molnau in 02-1665 was Jeffery Scott Thompson of St. Paul, Minnesota. Also appearing on the brief was Mike Hatch. Counsel who presented argument on behalf of appellees Craig and Nebraska Department of Roads in 02-3016 was Stephen D. Mossman of Lincoln, Nebraska. Also appearing on the brief were J.L. Spray and Jeffery T. Schroder.
Before LOKEN, Chief Judge, FAGG and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.
LOKEN, Chief Judge.
Since 1982, the federal highway statutes have required that ten percent of federal highway construction funds be paid to small businesses owned and controlled by “socially and economically disadvantaged individuals,” as that term is defined in
Sherbrooke and Gross Seed provide landscaping services to prime contractors on federally assisted highway projects. In each lawsuit, the district court2 held that the subcontractor plaintiff has standing to assert its constitutional claims. We agree. The stipulated facts demonstrate that Sherbrooke and Gross Seed have bid on federally assisted highway projects in the past, will continue to bid in the future, and suffer competitive harm when contracts are awarded to others under DOT‘s Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBE) pro-
I. The Legislative Background.
Prior to the 1982 statute designating ten percent of federal highway funds for minority small business contractors, a comparable provision in the Public Works Employment Act of 1977 was upheld in Fullilove v. Klutznick, 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902 (1980). However, the constitutionality of mandatory set-asides based on racial factors was placed in doubt by later Supreme Court‘s decisions—City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co., 488 U.S. 469, 498-99, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 854 (1989), which struck down the City‘s thirty percent set-aside for minority small businesses, and Adarand, which held that all government race-based classifications are subject to strict judicial scrutiny. 515 U.S. at 235. Following Adarand, the District of Minnesota invalidated the statutory ten percent set-aside of federal highway funds and DOT‘s then-existing regulations, “as applied to highway construction contracts in the State of Minnesota.” In re Sherbrooke Sodding Co., 17 F.Supp.2d 1026, 1037-38 (D.Minn.1998). As a result, the DBE program was suspended in Minnesota in 1999.
In the wake of these judicial decisions, Congress passed the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (“TEA-21“), which continued the ten percent designation subject to DOT implementation.
The revised DBE program provides contracting advantages to small businesses owned and controlled by “socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.” “Socially disadvantaged individuals are those who have been subjected to racial or ethnic prejudice or cultural bias because of their identity as a member of a group without regard to their individual qualities.”
II. Strict Scrutiny Review.
Sherbrooke and Gross Seed contend that the federal highway DBE program, on its face and as applied in Minnesota and Nebraska, violates the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment‘s Due Process Clause. Adarand established that a federal program employing race-based classifications or remedies “must be analyzed by a reviewing court under strict scrutiny.” 515 U.S. at 227.3 Though the DBE program confers benefits on “socially and economically disadvantaged individuals,” a term that is facially race-neutral, the government concedes that the program is subject to strict judicial scrutiny, no doubt because the statute employs a race-based rebuttable presumption to define this class of beneficiaries and authorizes the use of race-conscious remedial measures. See Adarand, 515 U.S. at 212-13.4 Thus, the statute‘s race-based measures “are constitutional only if they are narrowly tailored to further compelling governmental interests.” Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 326, 123 S.Ct. 2325, 156 L.Ed.2d 304 (2003). The Court has cautioned courts conducting this review that strict scrutiny is rigorous but not always “fatal in fact.” Adarand, 515 U.S. at 237 (quotation omitted).
A. Compelling Governmental Interest.
To survive strict scrutiny, the government must first articulate a legislative goal that is properly considered a compelling government interest. Neither Sherbrooke nor Gross Seed challenges the district courts’ conclusion that Congress and DOT acted to further a compelling interest. As the Tenth Circuit said in Adarand II, “we readily conclude that the federal government has a compelling interest in not perpetuating the effects of racial discrimination in its own distribution of federal funds and in remediating the effects of past discrimination in the government contracting markets created by its disbursements.” 228 F.3d at 1165; accord Croson, 488 U.S. at 492.
In addition to identifying a compelling government interest, the government must demonstrate a “strong basis in the evidence” supporting its conclusion that race-based remedial action was necessary to further that interest. “Racial classifications are suspect, and that means that simple legislative assurances of good intention cannot suffice.” Croson, 488 U.S. at 500. Sherbrooke and Gross Seed argue that Congress lacked strong evidence supporting its conclusion that race-based classifications and remedial measures were necessary. They argue that, in enacting TEA-21, Congress had no “hard evidence” of widespread intentional race discrimination in the contracting industry, relying instead on misrepresentations contained in “Appendix I,” a Depart-
We agree we must take a hard look at the evidence, and we have done so. We conclude that Congress had a strong basis in the evidence to support its conclusion that race-based measures were necessary for the reasons stated by the Tenth Circuit in Adarand II, 228 F.3d at 1167-76. As the Tenth Circuit‘s analysis demonstrates, Congress has spent decades compiling evidence of race discrimination in government highway contracting, of barriers to the formation of minority-owned construction businesses, and of barriers to entry. In rebuttal, Sherbrooke and Gross Seed presented evidence that the data was susceptible to multiple interpretations, but they failed to present affirmative evidence that no remedial action was necessary because minority-owned small businesses enjoy non-discriminatory access to and participation in highway contracts. Thus, they failed to meet their ultimate burden to prove that the DBE program is unconstitutional on this ground. See Rothe Dev. Corp. v. U.S. Dep‘t of Def., 262 F.3d 1306, 1317 (Fed.Cir.2001).
Finally, Sherbrooke and Gross Seed argue that MnDOT and NDOR must independently satisfy the compelling government interest aspect of strict scrutiny review. Under the prior law—when the ten percent federal set-aside was more mandatory and Fullilove, not strict scrutiny, provided the governing constitutional principle—the Seventh Circuit held that a contractor who conceded the validity of the federal program could not challenge a grantee State for “merely complying with federal law.” Milwaukee County Pavers Ass‘n v. Fiedler, 922 F.2d 419, 423 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 500 U.S. 954, 111 S.Ct. 2261, 114 L.Ed.2d 714 (1991); accord Harrison & Burrowes Bridge Constructors, Inc. v. Cuomo, 981 F.2d 50, 57 (2d Cir.1992); Ellis v. Skinner, 961 F.2d 912, 915 (10th Cir.), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 939, 113 S.Ct. 374, 121 L.Ed.2d 286 (1992); Tenn. Asphalt Co. v. Farris, 942 F.2d 969, 975 (6th Cir.1991). Based on this precedent, the government argues, and the district courts agreed, that participating States need not independently meet the strict scrutiny standard because under the revised DBE program the State must still comply with the DOT regulations. Sherbrooke and Gross Seed respond that the prior cases are distinguishable, and Minnesota and Nebraska DBE programs must independently satisfy strict scrutiny under Croson, because the present TEA-21 regime “is characterized by state discretion throughout.” This issue was not addressed by the Tenth Circuit in Adarand II.
We conclude that neither side‘s position is entirely sound. Compelling government interest looks at a statute or government program on its face. When the program is federal, the inquiry is (at least usually) national in scope. If Congress or the federal agency acted for a proper purpose and with a strong basis in the evidence, the program has the requisite compelling government interest nationwide, even if the evidence did not come from or apply to every State or locale in the Nation. Thus, we reject appellants’
B. Is the Revised DBE Program Narrowly Tailored?
In addition to determining that a race-based measure serves a compelling government interest, a reviewing court applying strict scrutiny must determine if the measure is narrowly tailored, that is, whether “the means chosen to accomplish the government‘s asserted purpose [are] specifically and narrowly framed to accomplish that purpose.” Grutter, 539 U.S. at 333 (quotation omitted). Sherbrooke and Gross Seed have the ultimate burden of establishing that the DBE program is not narrowly tailored. See Wygant v. Jackson Bd. of Educ., 476 U.S. 267, 293, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 L.Ed.2d 260 (1986) (O‘Connor, J., concurring); Rothe, 262 F.3d at 1317. While our compelling interest analysis focused on the record before Congress, the narrow-tailoring analysis looks at the roles of the implementing highway construction agencies.
1. Appellants’ facial challenge to the DBE program requires us to look carefully at DOT‘s regulations to determine whether they may be constitutionally applied under any set of factual circumstances. See United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 746, 107 S.Ct. 2095, 95 L.Ed.2d 697 (1987) (standard for facial challenges). In determining whether a race-conscious remedy is narrowly tailored, we look at factors such as the efficacy of alternative remedies, the flexibility and duration of the race-conscious remedy, the relationship of the numerical goals to the relevant labor market, and the impact of the remedy on third parties. See United States v. Paradise, 480 U.S. 149, 171, 187, 107 S.Ct. 1053, 94 L.Ed.2d 203 (1987) (plurality and concurring opinions).
Under the revised DBE program, a State receiving federal highway funds must, on an annual basis, submit to DOT an overall goal for DBE participation in its federally funded highway contracts. See
The regulations expressly declare that the statutory ten percent provision “is an aspirational goal at the national level,” not a mandatory requirement for grantee States.
Like the district courts, we conclude that the DOT regulations, on their face, satisfy the Supreme Court‘s narrow tailoring requirements. First, the regulations place strong emphasis on “the use of race-neutral means to increase minority business participation in government contracting.” Adarand, 515 U.S. at 237-38 (quotation omitted). “Narrow tailoring does not require exhaustion of every conceivable race-neutral alternative,” but it does require “serious, good faith consideration of workable race-neutral alternatives.” Grutter, 539 U.S. at 339. The regulations also prohibit the use of quotas and severely limit the use of set-asides. See Croson, 488 U.S. at 496 (discussing quotas).
Second, the revised DBE program has substantial flexibility. A State may obtain waivers or exemptions from any requirement and is not penalized for a good faith failure to meet its overall goal. In addition, the program limits preferences to small businesses falling beneath an earnings threshold, and any individual whose net worth exceeds $750,000 cannot qualify as economically disadvantaged. See
Third, DOT has tied the goals for DBE participation to the relevant labor markets. The regulations require grantee States to set overall goals based upon the likely number of minority contractors that would have received federally assisted highway contracts but for the effects of past discrimination. See
Finally, Congress and DOT have taken significant steps to minimize the race-based nature of the DBE program. Its benefits are directed at all small businesses owned and controlled by the socially and economically disadvantaged. While
For these reasons, we agree with the district courts that the revised DBE program is narrowly tailored on its face.
2. Sherbrooke and Gross Seed also argue that the revised DBE program as applied in Minnesota and Nebraska is not narrowly tailored. As noted previously, because the revised DBE program affords grantee States substantial discretion, this contention requires us to examine the program as implemented by those States. Under the revised federal program, States “set their own goals, based on local market conditions; their goals are not imposed by the federal government nor do recipients have to tie them to any uniform national percentage.” 64 Fed.Reg. at 5102.
Minnesota. Following promulgation of the current DOT regulations, MnDOT commissioned National Economic Research Associates (NERA) to study the highway contracting market in Minnesota. NERA first determined that DBEs made up 11.4 percent of the prime contractors and subcontractors in the highway construction market. See
DOT approved this MnDOT program for Fiscal Year 2001. Sherbrooke presented evidence attacking the reliability of the data NERA used in determining its recommended overall goal. But Sherbrooke failed to establish that better data was available or that MnDOT was otherwise unreasonable in undertaking this thorough analysis and in relying on its results. The precipitous drop in DBE participation in 1999, when no race-conscious methods were employed, supports MnDOT‘s conclusion that a substantial portion of its 2001 overall goal could not be met with race-neutral measures, and there is no evidence that MnDOT failed to adjust its use of race-conscious and race-neutral methods as the year progressed, as the DOT regulations require. On this record,
Nebraska. To implement the revised federal DBE program, NDOR commissioned MGT of America, Inc., to conduct availability and capability studies of DBE firms in the Nebraska highway construction market. The availability study found that between 1995 and 1999, when Nebraska followed the then-mandatory ten percent set-aside requirement, 9.95 percent of all available and capable firms were DBEs, and DBE firms received 12.67 percent of the contract dollars on federally assisted projects. After apportioning part of this DBE contracting to race-neutral contracting decisions, MGT recommended that NDOR set an overall goal of 9.95 percent DBE participation and predict that 4.82 percent of this overall goal would have to be achieved by race- and gender-conscious means. NDOR adopted these recommendations in its submission to DOT for Fiscal Year 2001. NDOR required that prime contractors make a good faith effort to allocate a set portion of each contract‘s funds to DBE subcontractors. DOT approved this NDOR program for fiscal year 2001. Having carefully reviewed the trial record, we conclude that Gross Seed, like Sherbrooke, failed to prove that the revised DBE program is not narrowly tailored as applied in Nebraska. Accordingly, the district court properly entered post-trial judgment dismissing Gross Seed‘s claims.
The judgments of the district courts are affirmed.