Although one speaker said that he regularly “irritated the bejesus out of important people,” a parade of important black politicians, lawyers and contractors came to today’s funeral of Arnold M. Jolivet.

The longtime managing director of the Maryland Minority Contractors Association died suddenly last month at 71.

More than 300 people crowded into Union Baptist Church on Druid Hill Avenue to pay their respects to a man who was frequently a thorn in the side of Baltimore mayors, starting with William Donald Schaefer and continuing through the current officeholder, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake.

Considered an expert in procurement laws governing minority and women business enterprises (M/WBEs), Jolivet regularly protested awards before the Board of Estimates and drafted numerous civil lawsuits to try to safeguard and extend the rights of minority and women firms.

Two members of the spending board, City Council President Bernard C. “Jack” Young and Comptroller Joan M. Pratt (both who sometimes sided with Jolivet), attended the services.

They were joined by former mayor Sheila Dixon; Maryland Attorney General Doug Gansler; City Council members Bill Henry, Helen Holton, Nick Mosby and Carl Stokes; state Senator Cathy Pugh; “superlawyer” William “Billy” Murphy Jr.; demolition and street contractors Pless Jones and George P. Mahoney; and University of Maryland law professor Larry S. Gibson, among others.

Speakers at the service included state Sen. Verna Jones Rodwell, Wayne Frazier of the Maryland Washington Minority Companies Association, James Coleman of Helping Hand Circle, Rev. Dr. Alvin C. Hathaway Sr., and Robert M. Bell, retired chief judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals.

Our appreciation of Jolivet’s life and accomplishments was published here. A native of Louisiana who came to Baltimore on a Morgan State University football scholarship, Jolivet was to be buried later today at the Garrison Forest Veterans Cemetery.