Executive Speeches

Remarks of Eugene W. Zeltmann, president & chief executive officer of the New York Power Authority, at the Power Authority Purchasing Exchange for Minority- and Women-owned Businesses, Utica, New York.

October 21, 2002

Good afternoon and thanks to all of you for joining us.

It’s my pleasure to welcome you to the Power Authority’s first Upstate New York purchasing exchange for minority- and women-owned businesses.

We’re honored to have with us Senator Ray Meier and Assemblywoman RoAnn Destito. They and their staffs contributed a great deal in helping us to organize this event and get the word out to prospective participants.

The Power Authority has been playing host to these events for the past 12 years now—and they’ve been enormously successful. But they’ve all been in the downstate area—mostly in our White Plains office building.

We’d been planning an upstate exchange for some time—and today’s excellent turnout shows that Utica was a great choice as the location.

I don’t know if all roads lead here, but it sure seems that way. We have representatives of nearly 100 minority- and women-owned firms from throughout upstate New York. And—as potential customers for them—a diverse group of businesses and state agencies.

These purchasing exchanges are all about opportunity.

First, the opportunity for some very qualified minority- and women-owned businesses to match up with the companies and government entities that can use their products and services.

And ultimately the opportunity to translate those personal contacts into concrete business relationships.

At the Power Authority, we’ve found these exchanges to be a very effective part of our overall Supplier Diversity Program.  But we do a number of other things as well.

We advertise our proposed contracts in the New York State Contract Reporter—so that’s a good place for you to see what we’re looking for.

When we award our contracts, we try very hard to select vendors from the list of minority- and women-owned companies certified by the state.

We advertise in minority business publications and also promote our Supplier Diversity Program at trade shows, seminars and conferences for minority- and women-owned businesses.

And we work on an ongoing basis with business associations and purchasing councils representing such firms.

Each year, we set goals for purchases from minority- and women-owned companies.  In most years, we exceed them—sometimes by a wide margin. And over roughly the past dozen years, we’ve done close to $300 million worth of business with minority- and women-owned firms. The contracts range from work on our energy-efficiency projects, to printing and office supplies, computer services and airline charters.

This helps the companies. It helps the economy. And it helps the Power Authority. With more vendors competing for our business, we’re better able to obtain the best goods and services—at the best price. And that, in turn, benefits our customers—the people and businesses of New York State.

We’ve seen over the years that all that many minority- and women-owned firms ask and need is a chance.  A chance to show what they can do.

Events like today’s help to provide that chance—to create that opportunity. I know the people in this room will take it from there.

Thank you.

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