It might be more reliable, he said, to identify contracts awarded to minority- and women-owned companies by using records of city payments to contractors for work performed.

He abandoned the Dinkins practice of awarding contracts to qualified minority- or women-owned companies even if they bid up to 10 percent higher than the lowest bidder.

Last year the Energy Department changed the requirements for its national laboratories to subcontract with minority- and women-owned companies.

Administration officials also argue that Federal law passed by Congress in 1994 sets a goal that minority- and women-owned companies earn 10 percent of Federal contracts.

Ford Motor Company announced recently that it had exceeded its supplier diversity sourcing goal, purchasing $4.1 billion in goods and services from minority-and women-owned companies.

And last month, a new venture capital firm in San Francisco and a new lender in Tennessee, both owned by women, started making loans and equity capital to other women-owned companies.

At AT&T, spending with minority- and women-owned companies exceeds $1 billion.

Several, including the Big Three automobile companies, have started "second tier" programs that require their long-term suppliers to farm out some of their own business to minority-owned and women-owned companies.

The Shop at the Union, which closed in June 2004, carried gifts, cards, jewelry, apparel and specialty items, many of which were created by women artists and women-owned companies.

Agency officials are still reviewing the numbers for each set of preferences, and some minority business owners argue they should obtain preferences more generous than those given to women-owned companies.