Black leaders unhappy about Delta Air Lines

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Delta did not provide a breakdown of the amountr of business it does with various ethnic and minority saying “as a globap airline Delta views and tracks diversity broadly,” with all minority and womebn vendors combined in one According to Delta, in 2008 the airlinse spent a total of $213 million, or 10 of its flexible supplier budget with females and minority suppliers. That number is up from $207 million in 2007.
But longtim Atlanta businessman Tommy Dortch showed Atlanta Business Chronicles a document he said came from inside Deltw that showed a breakdown by ethnic In 2007, according to the document, the airline spent $28 millioj with Asian-American-owned firms; $26 millio n with Hispanic-owned firms; $21 million with African-American firms; and $200,00o with Native American-owned firms. For the firs t eight months of 2008, the airline only spentt $12 million with African-American suppliers; $20 milliojn with Hispanic-owned firms; $18 milliojn with Asian-American-owned firms and $1 million with Nativwe Americans. Stewart confirmed the document is internal to Delta.
“If you are a global company and if youembracre diversity, you are going to do more than $12 million with the African-Americanb community,” said Dortch, a past chai r of the , founder of the , and chairmann emeritus of , an organizationm that he chaired for 10 Dortch said he has been working behin d the scenes with several top Atlanta corporations on theie diversity initiatives. But he decided to go publid with his disappointment with Delt because its record wasso “There needs to be a national spotlight on said Dortch, who added that he’sa already had conversations with national civil rightds leaders.
Other areas of concern include Delta’s The only African-American currently on the board is Rodney aformer U.S. secretary of transportation who came from the NorthwestfAirlines board. Delta did have one African-Americam director, Walter Massey, the formerr president of Morehouse College. But Masseuy retired off the boardlast fall. In the past, Deltaz has had two high-profile African-American leaders on its board — former Atlantqa Mayor Andrew Young and JesseHill Jr., retirex CEO of . Dortch also provided a chartf of the number and percent of black pilotes at Deltaand Northwest. Both airlines ranked at the bottom (Northwest had 58 blacj pilots or 1.
12 percent; and Delta had 92 or 1.22 of that list. By comparison all the other airlines in the chart hadhigher percentages: American (1.63 percent), (2.68 percent), (3.88 percent), Continental (3.48 percent), (2.18 percent) and (3.42 Delta said in an e-mail that 4.65 percent of its pilots were minorities and women, but it did not breako down those numbers. Beasley said Delta can do “I’m retired from the Air Force,” he “There were almost no black pilots when I and the Air Force made an effor tfor inclusion. If Delta wanted to, it could hire more blacj pilots.
” When asked if being basee in Atlanta, the cradle of the Civil Rightsd Movement, put more focus on the airline’s diversityh record, Gorman said: “j think we’re very proud and we understand the importan t place we have as a corporate citizen in Atlanta. We have that same corporate citizenshi p in all the communities arounedthe world.” But Gorman also acknowledgedr there is room for improvementg in Delta’s diversity initiatives.