The first stage of Springfield’s rail relocation has started with groundbreaking last month on an underpass at Carpenter and 10th streets. Although funding for the full relocation project is still uncertain, the City of Springfield, Sangamon County and Hanson Professional Services of Springfield are working to ensure minority involvement in the rail relocation, with possible ramifications far into the future. The city and Hanson have been meeting with young people of color to extol the virtues of engineering and similar careers, in hopes that those young people will become the next generation of skilled workers designing Springfield’s future. Earlier this year, Hanson hired two African-American college graduates full time and took on three African-American students as interns over the summer to offer experience with real-life engineering projects. “It’s important for these individuals to see if this is a path that they would like to use for their future careers,” said Hanson CEO and president Sergio “Satch” Pecori. “Diversity is crucial to Hanson’s success in terms of our people, our projects and our services. We believe we must create opportunities for our children to stay in Springfield after college.” The program appears to have the ingredients for successfully including Springfield’s minority population in what may be a major project. Now let’s see the same level of effort on minority hiring with Springfield’s police department, fire department, CWLP and other city departments. –Fletcher Farrar, editor and publisher
This article appears in Sep 4-10, 2014.
