Background Checks (application, jobs, hiring, illegal)

[GaBrownzFan]

Hi,
I'm new here and wondering if anyone can help clear something up. I am a construction consultant and sometimes I need workers to get background checks - a leader of a crew I recently was gathering info on said he can't give race or gender info - it's illegal - is this true? The problem is this construction project is on a school and the GC has a standard form that has:
Name
Soc Sec #
DL # & state
DOB
race
gender

The crew leader sent the form back with everything on it but race & gender - and the GC won't accept it - is this illegal??? Or legal???

[faabala]

The government collects that info all the time. I looked on the attendance sheet of my daughter's public Kindergarten and each child was described by Race. I thought it was pretty messed up.

[annerk]

If it's a background check for certain governmental jobs or jobs working with children, the elderly, disabled, or other "at risk" populations, it is completely legal to require that information be submitted by the applicant.

Tell the applicant very simply you'll send in the information for the background check without all the requested data, but if they can't perform the check as a result, there will be no job offered.

[Naturen]

As far as I know, that information should be kept separate from the application. The reasoning is that the hiring manager(s) does not need to know the demographic information - race, gender, age, but needs to know if the individual is qualified. Also, this will help prevent discrimination based on such attributes.