Is help on the way for R.I.’s Minority Business Enterprise program?

Nancy Lavin

07/22/2022

TOMÁS ÁVILA TOOK OVER as associate director for the R.I. Office of Diversity, Equity and Opportunity last August. / PBN FILE PHOTO/MIKE SKORSKI

THE STATE IS STILL STRUGGLING to overcome decades of dysfunction around tracking and enforcing its laws for contracting with minority-owned businesses, even after a $500,000 study published a year ago laid bare the problems and offered 22 recommended fixes. But Tomás Ávila, associate director for the R.I. Office of Diversity, Equity and Opportunity, which oversees…