It's time for Pittsburgh to start a new effort to give minority- and women-owned businesses a fair shot at city contracts, and Councilman Ricky Burgess wants to lead the way.

Last week he and a narrow City Council majority sidelined a slow-moving, 13-year-old push to get contracts into the hands of a more diverse set of firms. Council then gave its initial OK to his new approach, which involves updating an 8-year-old study on the subject, broadening the work of an existing city office and demanding regular reports on diversity in contracting. A final vote is set for tomorrow.

"How do I create a defensible program that helps women and minorities get their fair share of contracts from the city?" Mr. Burgess asked. Such programs "carry with them the need to be backed by accurate data."

Councilwoman Tonya Payne argued that the data is already in hand.

"I don't know how much more money we're going to spend to do more studies, and then nothing gets done with the studies," she said. "Use what you've got so you can start some progress."

It has been 19 years since the U.S. Supreme Court put strict rules on local governments giving special consideration to minority businesses. They have to show there has been discrimination, and then carefully craft their efforts solely to address the effects of the unfairness.

The city started toward that in 1995, when it hired Mason Tillman Associates of Oakland, Calif., to study discrimination in contracting.

In 2000, the firm finished a $450,000 report. It found that from 1996 through 1999, minority-owned firms missed out on $7 million in contracts for which they were qualified, and women-owned businesses missed out on $1.5 million in work.

The consultant's recommendations for fixing such disparity included creating a "sheltered market" program. It involves breaking big contracts into small pieces and setting aside some for minority- and women-owned firms. That was never implemented.

In late 2005, council passed legislation by then-Councilman Sala Udin to hire Mason Tillman for $45,000 to design a program around those recommendations.

On Wednesday, in a 5-3 vote, council shelved legislation to add another $4,500, which officials said Mason Tillman needed to start its work.

Mason Tillman's original findings are legally stale, Mr. Burgess said, pointing to U.S. Commission on Civil Rights guidelines holding that disparity studies expire after five years.

Anything done based on the 2000 study "would be more of a photo opportunity than a substantive program" and "cannot be defended in court," he said. He cited cities including Philadelphia and Boston that have had their programs thrown out by the courts, in cases that sometimes entail seven-figure payments to aggrieved white contractors.

Ms. Payne was on the opposite side of the vote.

"The same things that existed, that they found in the first [study], exist today," she said. So why study them again?

Council then voted up a new ordinance by Mr. Burgess, which includes a call for an updated disparity study, to be done this year. He said that would likely cost less than the first -- around $150,000 -- since the Mason Tillman study can be used as background.

He said he wants an open bidding process to pick the update's author, though Mason Tillman probably would be able to underbid other firms because of its previous work.

His legislation also would require the city's Equal Opportunity Review Commission to produce quarterly and annual reports on its efforts to get contracts to minority- and women-owned businesses. Mr. Burgess said he's only been able to identify one report from the commission, produced in 2006.

He also wants the commission to address city commodity and services contracts, whereas it has focused largely on city and authority construction work.

Ms. Payne said there are "people who want to participate [in city contracts], but can't participate, because they don't know how to participate. ... We don't need a bunch of studies. We need action."