Black Horizons; 2343

Shall we start? Hello and

welcome to Black Horizons, I'm Chris Moore. On today's show, we'll meet Artisahu Injai, who will show us some of his art and tell us all about what makes it so special. We'll also get a chance to see more art in the way of black nativity. That's the new production of the Wilkinsburg Arts Theatre and we'll see and hear what they're doing through the voice of some of their singers in just a moment. But first, let's turn our attention to the Crawford Roberts development that's going on in the Hill District. A lot of you have seen headlines that indicate that some minority contractors are unhappy with their share of what's going on as far as construction is concerned up there. Joining me now is Charles D. Conley, a contract's administrator with Oakley Industries Incorporated. Mr. Conley, welcome to Black Horizons, I must say at the start of this interview that we did try to connect with some of those minority contractors who were upset about the construction and the amount that's being shared with minorities, but we were unable to get them on this

program. Tell us a little bit about what Oakley Industries does so that we can understand your input into Crawford Roberts. Well, Oakley Industries is a construction management firm. What we do is we allow, we have small contractors who've been having problems getting large jobs and what we do is we provide a staff for them. We do all the staff work that a large contract firm would do. We have CPs, we have, we hire their supervision, we teach them management skills, we do management skills for them. So a guy might be the world's greatest foundation builder or electrician or any other kind of contracting work, but he might not have those managerial skills that can land the major contract that's really going to help his business. We do the negotiation for the contract and then we just sort of guide him through the contract

and monitor the contract, monitor the work even and allow him to spend his time doing what he knows what to do best. Okay, as far as minority contracts in your company, Oakley Industries, what have you been able to land in terms of Crawford Roberts' development? Well, so far we have, we've landed 1 .3 million dollar contract for Dwayne C. Hamburg company. A minority firm? A minority firm and we have done the hiring and in the contract, one of the things about this contract is it has, in the contract, 50 % minority participation. So that we're able to hire over 50 % of minority participation to see if the work gets done. What's different about this and so many other construction projects that we have seen, take place downtown with the second renaissance and what's going on in the airport as far as minority participation is concerned in Europe? Well, they've been given the contracts to the majority contractors as prime contractors and they've been saying that they have been able to get minority

participation. Well, in this particular contract, we have seen that there is minority participation. I keep seeing the figure bandied about up to 50 % going to minorities and to women. Is there any breakdown as far as Oakley is concerned? Well, the contract that we're handling right now, we have something like 70%. Minority participation at 1 .3 million dollars in contract, you ain't forget. Well, that sounds like a good figure. Why then, I hate to put you another person's shoes and I know that an agreement has almost been reached, but why then do you think some minority contractors are upset? Probably because they haven't got the information, communication problems. They don't know exactly how much participation has occurred so far. When they first were marching, they came to the site and they shut down our particular job and some were surprised to find that we had

about 70 % minority participation at the time they shut the job down. So all I can recall is what I read in the newspapers and several black contractors who were working on the job did say, hey, I'm trying to get earn a bucks pay too and I'm working. Minority contractors are working, so you would agree with that assessment? On this particular site, yes, minority contractors are working. Okay. What is it that you think needs to be done in order to get more, I don't know if more needs to be done, I mean given the statistics, you cite it sounds like enough is going to minorities and to women, but I guess more is always better in some people's eyes. Well, I think that the minority contractors have to concentrate on their skills and get firms like mine to do the negotiating for them and show that they can participate at some level. Your firm is minority owned? Our firm is 100 % minority owned. Okay, so that increases the share of the pie

that's coming to people and you're able to take care of all those technical, the contractual and other kinds of contract things that some contractors who might be excellence craftsmen just can't do. That's correct. How is it that your company came into being and where else are you working? Well, it came into being because there's a need and there are many skilled minority individuals in all different facets of work and this company was able to just pull them together and see that minority contractors were getting or are going to get part of the pie. And that's an important aspect of it. Is it that every minority contractor needs those kinds of services? Are there some that can stand alone? There might be some that can stand alone. There's some large minority contractors, but we're concentrated on the small minority

contractors who need that type of service and we provide it so that they can get a large portion of it without and allow them to to participate at the level where they're skierful. You've been very successful in terms of the Crawford Roberts project. Was that because there were set of sides there? What about the airport? The midfield construction there? I wasn't involved at the airport so I mean I can't speak of that, but on this particular contract one of the things that we did was when the 1 .3 million contract came about, there was a concern whether the small company could do it. Well we broke it down into small segments and say that we're putting in 23 foundations. Well if he can build one foundation he can do it 23 times and that was one of the things that showed that even a small contractor can participate in this project. But I guess there are construction schedules to be concerned with too. Maybe they

need 10 of those 23 to be going in at the same time. Well that's the reason they're concerned about small contractors. It's okay if you can do one but can you do 10 at a time? Well we can also get participants where we can train or get trained participants so that we see that the need is filled. If they want to rebuild at the same time we provide the managers to see that it gets done. And so thereby you help the companies, the small minority companies meet the time tables, the construction deadlines and everybody's happy. People have always talked about the problem with bonding on minority contractors. How have you assisted there? Well in this particular contract the prime contractor is bonded and didn't require bonding for the minority contractors. That's unique in itself. Are there other problems that you run into when you're working with minority contractors in terms of getting them ready and in the position to receive a successful bid? Yes. Well one of the problems

we run into is financing and because they're being managed by construction manager the companies who provide the services are now more inclined to say well we like the idea that you're being managed and you're not just a small guy out there and they're given services that some of the small contractors have a hard time getting. I mean cash flow has always been a problem with small contractors. How have you been able to alleviate that those kinds of problems? By going to the companies and sayings to them that this is a large contract we're going to manage it and we will see that when the prime contractor pays that you would get your invoices paid and they believe us. Okay and so far you've been able to carry that out? I've been able to get credit where the small contractor wasn't able to get before. Okay well thank you for being here with

us Mr. Conor perhaps you've shed some light on this situation. Again we did try to make contact with several of the minority contractors. We understand that by the time that this program airs there will be an agreement set and that perhaps even they will be satisfied. We hope so. If not stay tuned to Black Horizons and we'll certainly report to you more about it. We're going to look now at Black Nativity. It's the new production of Black Nativity that's put forth by the Wilkinsburg Arts Theatre and they're again doing it this year. It's Langston Hughes. It is best and it's music at its best. Here's an example of what I mean. It's just like a tack clip. Tonight

disco may be dead but big band music is alive and better than ever. Tonight at Rosebud you can dance the night away to the area's biggest little band swing fever or if you're a jitterbug and it's a little rusty you can just sit back and relax to a mix of popular tunes from the 30s and 40s that will keep your toes tapping. Call 261 -222 -1 to find out more. Don't open your holiday season jockeying for parking spaces and standing in line at the mall. Head on down to the Manchester Craftsman's Guild instead for a fine jazz concert with the Louis Belsam Jimmy Heath quartet and Pittsburgh's finest jazz artist. Put off fighting the Christmas frenzy for another day and treat yourself to some fine jazz music. Call the guild at 322 -0800 for more information. If you can't wait for the carlers to come to you go to the carlers. The Greater Union Town Correll is presenting a welcome all wonders concert at the Asbury United Methodist Church. Get

caught up in the excitement of the holiday season and call 437 -2709. Finally get out your favorite pen or pencil input you're thinking cap on. It's time for the second annual August Wilson writing contest. This year's theme is family. You need to apply by December 16th and note that the entry deadline is January 6th 1992. You can express yourself through fiction non -fiction or poetry. What more could you possibly need to know about the telephone number? It's 2 -8 -1 -3 -1 -4 -1 and we told you all about black nativity. As a matter of fact you just saw some fine singers from the show. It's December 19th through the 22nd at the Fulton Theatre downtown. Call 2 -4 -1 -4 -6 -7 for more information. Also if you have any arts events please write to us at Black Horizons WQD -13 -480 -25th Avenue Pittsburgh PA -15213. Well that's our tenor calendar. Hope that you will be hearing from you soon with your

arts event. And speaking of art, one of my fine friends, Sahoo Injai joins us today. I love that hat brother. Thanks. You wear that. Yes indeed. Sahoo you know sometimes we know people and we think we know them and we really don't. I've known you in your photography over the years for about eight or nine years perhaps even more than that and I've known you for that but in fact you are a fine artist also. Where does all God in the first place that's who gave it to me and I'm using it to the max. I believe in empty when you fill up a vase when it's full you have to empty it for it to retain some more water. So I've been doing photography over those years that I've known you and it's about time that I empty photography and fill up with art.

That's why you're saying my art out these days. Okay yeah that sounds great. I heard you tell a story about something once your father said to you about clouds in the sky. Yes I attribute also my painting to my dad because he couldn't draw a straight line. Sounds like me. But he saw the artisan me when I was very young at the age of six actually he sent me to learn how to draw and in fact to get started that's why I did this painting of this old man here. He used to ask me what kinds of things that I see in the cloud formations. You know in Africa you sit out in the courtyard and it's open skies. You never watch it in TV or better. That's right. So we look up in the skies and tell him, oh I see a lion's face or you know this and this and that. Yes I see that too but I see something else. Kind of suggesting you know encouraging me to be creative with

the things that I see. Well he did a fine job. I want to pull some of these paintings that we have around here. I'm gonna take this small one first and just pull it around here and see if we can get a shot of it and I'd ask you to describe it. First of all I don't know because I'm looking at it upside down from my position. I don't know what I would describe it but how would you describe this as it's creative? Well this is a different piece from the other pieces that I have here in that it's very reddish. It's like a sunset, a perpetual sunset and there are trees there without leaves and the landscape is just barren and dead. I call it this is the big question in terms of thinking about nature and how we are abusing our environment. How are we going to end up like dinosaurs? Our trees are going to assume dinosaurs, dinosaur shapes. So the big question. The big question. Well that's something definitely to think about. Next piece is a little bit large and I'm just going to move it out here. Bateek is this?

This is Bateek. Yes and I call this Grand Papa. Grand Papa. It's an old man. Yes and the pilot. Actually I did the sketch while my father was ill. He had Alzheimer's and when I showed him the sketch of himself he just smiled. I don't know if he understood what it was from him suffering from that disease or what but you know that was to show him that he did a good job helping me come up with it. And encouraging him. Okay we got a couple more and I sure want to look at the let's look at this one right here and see what we have here. Would you describe this please? I call this the bird dance. The bird dance. Yes. It's like winged

human beings dancing. There are drummers. There are calabashes. There are hands. My pieces I interpret them as I see my pieces but people are free to interpret them as they see them. Everybody has his own experiences. So they bring something to it also right? That's right. Okay we're going to look at one more. This very large one with some glass on it. Let's see if I can get the angle on it right here and this is. I call this suggestivity. It's also a group of dancers at initiation time in Africa. The boys or the girls are taken away from the home and out in the woods and taught what they should be in becoming a woman or a man. And coming back to the public, coming back

home they celebrate the beginning of life. And this is that celebration. So I call this suggestivity. When the elders take them out they tell them what it is but they only suggest things so they come up in each individual his own way. So it leaves that same kind of creativity that your father inspired and you open I guess to each individual so that they can interpret. That's right. Well I'm fascinated to learn of something that's been long standing. It's new for me but I'm sure old for you and that is your great artistic ability. Are you displaying anywhere now? Yes I'll in fact I'll be showing at the winner artist's market at the PPG winner gardens starting the 26th of November. Okay and if anybody is interested in obtaining any of your art how can they reach you? They can reach me at my studio 7 -8 -4 -8 -5 -18. Okay now when you feel this artist's face up are

you going to go back to photography or will there be something else? Yes I can always empty and fill out. Okay well thanks for being here we appreciate it and I think it's a lot Chris. Okay and thank you for joining us here on Black Horizons. We're glad you could be with us for this show. We'll see you in two weeks because we're off the next two weeks as a matter of fact. See you. Bye. you you

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