A-E Shortlist Region 8 and 10PNW-IITF Firm Session MAR 2026.docx

Transcript March 19, 2026, 6:02PM

Alves, Steven - FS, KY started transcription

Alves, Steven - FS, KY 0:03 So hopefully what I'll do is I'll watch the chat and I'll try to answer questions a little bit as we go.

I try not to answer too many of them during the briefing because I tend to get sidetracked because I'd like you to know the full answer on why things are done. So for today, I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna get started.

What we're going to do today is I'm going to brief you on the region 8.

Shortlist process.

Under far 36, that's construction, architect and engineering. I'll briefly touch on what gives us the authority to create a shortlist.

And then I'll go through the steps on how the process works and then a quick note on how contracting negotiates.

So a quick introduction.

The Southern region eight team leads are myself and jalisa Sims.

So for Region 8 it falls under CSA 11 and 12. For administration. The contracting officer that runs this has to be warranted for architect and engineering.

So what exactly is a short list?

You'll hear it a lot of people refer to it as a contract.

The short list is not a contract under 36602 Dash 5.

It is a prequalified vendor pool, so these are vendors that have submitted their SF 330 and they've gone through a vetting process and they become part of a pool for projects specifically under the acquisition simplified threshold.

So for reading ahead that.

Limit has been increased recently from 2:50 to $350,000. So the size of the projects that can be handled has been increased.

Min Lee 2:20 Please.

Alves, Steven - FS, KY 2:26 Under 366025, there's two different processes that can be done. If you all could please mute your mic's.

One is selection by a board. The board will review and evaluate the firms. They will make a recommendation to the contracting officer and the Co acts as the it's not a source selection authority.

They act as the approving official for the board.

The other way under 36602 is that a chairperson simply selects a firm and they proceed with it that way.

The reason this is important is because internally to your agency you're dealing with, they may have specific signatory authorities for each process.

In the case of the Forest Service, if it's simply a board chairperson signing off that actually has to be approved.

By our mission area senior contracting Officer in Washington.

So how do you find a short list call for qualifications?

In our particular case, we issue a call, umm, every year. I've given you a link for the updated one for 2026.

What the short list does not do is advertise for individual projects.

So we put out a call for a general grouping of different architect and engineering needs throughout the Forest Service that we see throughout the year.

But we do not advertise for individual projects.

So the architect engineering total value of the effort has to be less than $350,000.

So one of the questions that's often asked is, is it worth our while to put our name on the short list process?

Well, it's kind of like playing the lottery.

You can't win if you don't buy a ticket.

So your firms often put together SF Three 30s for other agencies.

So in some cases, the amount of time and effort put into submit for the Forest Service could be minimal.

So what?

Do what does the Southern region 8 do in business wise?

1st for short list vendors.

First I want to answer the question on where you can find future projects.

So this is a new.

Page that has shown up on acquisition, Gov.

If some of you aren't watching it, this may have slipped you.

So if you just type in procurement forecast, I got a spelling misair up there.

It'll bring up this page, which is really kind of cool because in the past you used to have to hunt.

Through individual agencies to try and find their procurement forecast.

In this case, it lists the agency off on the left hand side.

You can click on that and it'll give you information about the agency, their mission.

And just details about the that particular agency off to the right is the actual link to their procurement forecast.

So when you click on that, depending upon the agency, some of them have it set up a little bit different. You may see an Excel spreadsheet.

Some of them, like the Department of Defense, have it broken down by.

Umm, the branch of service Army Air Force. Navy.

So this is a really good project project research tool.

What I tell try to tell people for short list is don't narrow your search solely to architect and engineering NYX codes and I'll show you why here in a second.

Mainly because a lot of your design build projects will show up on the future forecast.

So if you narrow it to A5.

41 knakes code versus a construction when you could be limiting the opportunities your furnishing.

One thing that is new is.

A lot of people used to research via FPDS and G.

Some of you may have dabbled for procurement forecasts. Sam.gov now has incorporated a research tool.

So when you go in, you have to be logged in. If you search for contract opportunities and down the right hand side, you can drill down into not only the the department.

But you can go to particular agencies and then you can start pulling out particular nakes codes. You may be looking for and it'll show you those opportunities.

And then you can you can export this into an Excel spreadsheet.

So this is new.

This is just coming about within the last few weeks.

You can also use this same tool to review contract awards.

So, for example, if you're.

Is in design build.

You can go in to do market research on past contract awards with an FPDS report, which is what Congress uses to track money that the federal government obligates.

So 2 new changes within Sam Gov.

In fact, when I briefed this last month, I didn't have this.

So what have we done so far in our in our three-year cycle?

So I say three-year cycle because.

SF Three 30s are generally good for a three-year period.

They say three years because it costs your firms a lot of money to put together an SF 3:30.

So unless things are drastically changed.

If it's been done within three years, they don't work. Generally speaking, they don't require you to update it.

So we do the same thing with the Forest Service.

That's why some of you may have received a. Please just verify everything is correct.

Send back the certification and you're still good to go.

Some of you may have returned page inserts or page updates which works just as good.

But within our three three-year cycle 2020, this one coming up starting in May will be the last of the three-year cycle for the three 30s that we currently have on file.

So far, we've done roughly $7,000,000 compared to $5,000,000 on the previous three-year cycle.

There's some things that contribute to that and I'll go over that here in a second, but this just gives you kind of an idea of where those awards were generated from and the dollar values.

So normally we see a lot of.

Survey and mapping, especially after a.

A natural disaster where we have to go back out and reaccumble markers. So that's where you see a lot of the survey efforts.

Engineering services within the five 41330 group, we have a lot of road construction Rd. design.

Bridge inspections are a big portion of the five 41330, and we go through those every few year cycle for bridges.

Architectural services is on kind of the low end.

Sometimes you'll start seeing some of the of these other ones drop in.

It just depends on what's going on in particular areas, but this just gives you an idea of what we did in year #2.

Going back to 2024, this gives you an idea of, umm, where what states money was allocated in on certain projects.

So you can see for region 8 a lot of the ones in play were Arkansas and then North Carolina is is a large state that's always in play.

Coming up and I've got a slide next here.

See this one, this one.

Reflects kind of a a a transition from.

A traditional daily workloads of projects coming in where this was the this was caught on the back end of Hurricane Helen.

So we're starting to see more disaster response disaster fundings along the Gulf Coast and eastern seaboard states.

So that's why you saw an uptick in Alabama, Louisiana, North Carolina.

Became heavy in play, and that's disaster money that's starting to go into those states.

So last year I briefed this towards the end that you kind of have two groups and this is this was this is Steve thought, this is not official USDA policy.

You have the normal designs as usual. This would be funded out of our out of our normal.

Procurement dollars. But then the USDA also received large amounts of disaster funding.

So these are the state states that are receiving disaster funds. If you could go ahead and please mute your mic.

Morgan Long 12:33 Just can't find it as a book.

Yeah.

Is it spelled like it sounds?

OK.

Well, I think I'm just curious.

Alves, Steven - FS, KY 12:48 So you have the disaster funds and this shows again inspection services, boundary surveys, a lot of roads and bridges.

We're also starting to see an uptick in sanitation projects, wastewater treatment plants, sanitation field.

Wastewater field redesigns and a lot of that is connected to the disaster funding. So that gives you a little idea there.

So.

I've given you a little bit of a preview of what I think money wise, where we'll be going in 2026.

Generally, annually we do about $2,000,000.

I would say that's probably gonna hold true for 2026 into early 27.

It might even possibly tick up a little bit higher than that.

Do I have a forecast that says that no, it's just.

Based on trends and based upon general policy or funding allocations from Congress.

That's where I see us going. So.

It's beneficial for your firm to be on the short list for the potential to receive some of those those awards.

So what?

I'm going to do now is give you just kind of some hints on preparing your SF 330 and where all of that information goes.

So the shortlist package.

Consists of two main documents, the attachment a.

That's the cover sheet and then your actual SF 3:30.

On the website Sam Gov. You'll see some other things posted that give you an idea of things such as a design fee limitation, the size standards for different NICs codes.

And old example of an RFP this changes daily.

So. Umm.

Kinda look at it just as a reference document.

And then I've posted some questions from prior years that might answer some questions. If you have any, you'll find some answers there.

So what is the cover sheet?

So what this does is it tells us about your firm.

Points of contact your website, your taxpayer, your unique Sam ID number.

Do you, umm participate in any socio economic programs under far 19?

On page two, you'll see Block 5 where it talks about where do. Where would you like to work on projects?

What states do you want to start working in?

And you can put those up there in any specialties you may have in those states.

Those are free form fields that you can put information into.

You then check off what state.

You're interested in doing work in one of the questions people always ask is do I have to be licensed in that state?

The answer is no.

But some projects require you to have a license in that state, even if you're on federal property.

So it's hit and miss.

As to whether or not you have to have a license.

Problem is if you don't.

And they have to get an award in place quickly.

You may not have time to react to obtain a license in that state.

Can you do it through a subcontractor or partner?

Absolutely. Because we look at the total capability capacity of your firm, not just, you know, a single a single person.

What makes our short list unique?

I like to brag a little bit about it is that?

The Region 8 shortlist is open to all USDA agencies.

So NRCS world development, animal plant and health.

Can use this in any of these states listed.

One of the questions that you may ask is Steve.

You've got Washington state.

Uh. Let's see here. Alaska, Nebraska.

Yeah, Oklahoma.

Why do you have those on there?

This goes back to a time when.

The Southern Research Station had research laboratories in those states.

So we included the short them on our short list and I've carried them through as a legacy. Umm, the one thing we did do again is.

We've removed the restriction to just national forests, and any USDA agency can use this process for for a need that arises in those states.

We ask that you check off which NAICS codes.

You are licensed to work in.

Or have the capability to get a license and that's down here.

So check those off.

And I'll show you where all of this information goes to here in a minute.

So once you have completed your attachment a your cover sheet, you'll start working on your SF 3:30.

So.

Again, as I said at the very beginning, our call for qualifications is very generic in nature.

I've listed.

On this slide, all of the projects we tend to use on a routine basis and they're listed in the order in which the the dollar value reflects on that previous slide.

So this gives you a little bit better idea of when you start preparing your SF 330. These are the things that we kinda look for now you are and I tell this to our engineers, you're limited on how much room you have, so you aren't gonna be.

Able to answer every single one of these questions.

And I'll show you a place where we look to try to pull out that information.

Again, a quick overview of what the SF 330 looks like.

This is part one where you talk about.

Umm.

Where you live, the resumes of the people.

I brief our engineers.

We treat all of this information as PII personally identifiable information and it's non releasable outside of the selection committees and they go well. Why is that?

I go because they're telling me about people.

They're telling me about licenses.

I'm learning about how much money the firm generates and all of that should be treated as PII.

So we do not pass these around outside of the selection committee for specific projects.

Umm example projects, some PE. Some firms will give us.

I've seen.

Screenshots of different designs.

All of that can go in here and then down at the bottom is a matrix where you talk about the people, the projects that they've worked on, and the roles that they had within that particular project.

So again, very detailed information on part one.

Part 2. This is the one section where again what I brief our engineers is because they're limited on space in part one.

Part 2.

They talk about the financial, umm, where the firm has has made money from and that's on this block 10, Block 9, and more importantly, even down here on Block 11, it talks about whether the work was federal.

Are non federal.

Now some people might go well, non federal work.

You may not have federal work, but you may have state jobs where you've worked.

State.

Parks reservations. So this information down here is equally as important as federal jobs.

So what happens up here in Block 10? Again, you talk about the profile codes of the expertises that have been have made money for your firm and you talk about the experience in the middle through a standardized description.

And then out here on the right, you fill in a dollar value generated by that specialty from the chart below.

This is important because it pulls out data that may not be reflected in the part one.

How do we determine what code to use over here when we get your SF 3:30? If it's you and a partner?

We'll look at both of these section twos and whichever number is higher from this code down.

Here is the number we use in our spreadsheet, so we treat you as a total capability and we use the highest number in our Excel spreadsheet and I'll show you that to you here in a minute.

So this is just some tips and discussion I just went over on that part too.

Again, Block 9 talks about employees and disciplines experience and then the average professional revenues is that block 11.

So.

With that being said.

You've got your SF 330 set up.

You understand what the shortlist?

Process is.

That's a pool and not a contract.

What I'm gonna do now is I'm gonna run through really quick. The slides that I actually train our engineers on how to go through their selection process.

So let me grab a quick drink of tea.

OK.

So when I first briefed this.

Umm.

I said I I briefed it like patches of hula hand from the movie Dodge Ball. I was dodged up **** diving and dodging. And when I got home at the end of the day, I absolutely hated the briefing because.

By not following through in a consistent manner it I think it caused more confusion in the selection process than it was helping the engineers.

So even though I liked patches of hoolihan, I started thinking.

About it.

And I came upon full metal jacket and Arley army, where he's yelling at private pile and he's telling him you will learn by the numbers.

And when I started thinking about it, the SRS shortlist is actually a four step process.

So as an engineer or as the firm, you need to understand our process because the better you understand it, then it makes it.

Makes more sense than jumping around.

So taking Arley four step process.

So.

Architect and engineering is the one still unique thing in federal contracting that is based upon best qualified. It is a best qualified process.

What I tell people is that the easiest way to think of it is we're funneling for success.

To find that best qualified firm.

Our steps one and two are based upon reviewing the nakes code of the firm. The 3:30's. Do we need to have a socioeconomic set aside?

Some other factors may come into play, such as the state where the construction is being taken place again, that licensing may come into play.

Sorry, do you need to have any kind of special skills?

So for example, umm wastewater treatment plant projects in Virginia, a lot of times the engineers have to have special licensing to get it through. The Virginia Department of Health for permitting processes.

And then the actual documentation of steps 1:00 and 2:00, we put all of those things into a funnel as part of our process.

And again, it leads to eventually that best qualified recommendation.

In steps three and four, again go through discussions.

Step 3.

We are required to hold discussions by the far.

How we do that is up to the Co and the board chairperson. It may be verbal interviews.

It could be letters.

It could be.

There's a lot of ways in which those discussions can actually be held.

And then in the final recommendation, they make a final recommendation and they document all of those steps.

So in each step as they go one through 4, they're learning something new about your firms.

So what happens in step one?

In step one, they fill out the top of the project form.

What that is is it's telling us about their requirement.

They'll talk about the nakes code.

They'll talk about the.

The.

Part 2 of the SF330 specialization skills that they may need.

More importantly, they tell the Co when they need this project to happen.

What I always tell people is these dates are critical because there's nothing worse than having construction dollars but not having your design.

So this is critical to helping us sequence the projects to where the design is completed when the construction dollars are showing up.

Down in steps one through 6.

They're talking about the five most or the six most common items that we use to select firms, things such as professional qualifications.

Past performance, any kind of specialized skills.

A real important one lately is capacity.

You may have all of the skill set, but your firm doesn't have the capacity for several weeks or months to take on an additional project.

And then location to the project may or may not be a critical factor.

And six is again that freeform flow.

So they put all of that into the form.

That's our step one where we go through and start using those initial filters.

All of the information that you provide to us in this part A.

And sorry, the attachment A and.

Part 2 of your SF 330 are put into an Excel spreadsheet.

And we use those filters to start drawing down the firm, drawing down the firms for potential consideration. Right now, there's approximately 100 firms in the region 8 pool.

So again, we pull over from that step one, we look at NAICS code, Part 2 details, the socioeconomic consideration due.

And other factors.

So all of those filters come into play and I'll show you that as a live demo here at the end.

This is the Part 2 of your SF 3:30. So we pull all of those numbers off of that chart and we put it in here.

Here is the 158 categories that show up on that sheet.

So we go through it and we take the highest number you have for that particular category and we load it into this column.

Yes, it is an eyesore, but by doing this, we're actually seeing a broader.

Expanse of consideration for firms that normally this this allows us to focus on firms with the experience from money generated.

Versus just random luck of picking people out of a pile of 100.

This allows us to draw down and I'll show you how this works.

Again, this is that field that we're talking about.

This is the experience categories.

Do they always line up 100%? No.

So what?

I tell our engineering group is when they're going through this, this is not a catch all.

It's merely a starting point to start pulling your SF Three 30s and.

Having a more focused search versus random luck.

So once we get our initial drawdown.

We go on to Step 2.

This is where we actually start documenting what we are seeing in your SF 3:30.

What we tell people is you need to have at least three generally up to five, but you can have more than that.

We actually had it once where we sent it out to approximately 20 different firms to get additional information.

So this again is a starting point that they can always add people in.

What we do is we look at your SF Three 30s.

We fill out the right hand column where we talk about strengths and weaknesses we see within your SF 3:30.

Since the three 30s are generic in nature, I always tell people that you may or may not see details. Make a note of that here, because you can always ask those questions during Step 3.

But once you've done your documentation from the 3:30, you go to what I call the Lollipop chart.

So this is those those five categories that were listed or six categories that were listed up at the top of the form when we first started.

What this is is a confidence rating.

So this is kind of the gut check.

How do you feel about the firm on the 1st go round?

Green or blue is like a lot of confidence.

That looks great. Green is.

They're good.

Yellow is we're not quite sure in Step 2 what I tell people is a yellow is not bad because a lot of times you have to go to Step 3 to get a clarification.

So for example, how would you gauge a companies capacity to do the work without talking to them?

So that's why I always say a yellow is not bad. It's just information that you need to gather at some point along your journey.

Need to best qualified.

And I always tell our engineers down here, one sentence does not work.

This block rolls over, so fill it up.

So they start looking at your SF 3:30.

They pull information from all the different sections and again you can read up on these.

I'm going to start picking up the pace so I can show you a live demonstration.

They pull all the information from here.

I showed you this earlier and then Part 2 and any kind of attachments such as C pars and all those. They will also potentially look at those.

This is where they pull that information when they're looking your SF 3:30. If they didn't already look at this on the Excel spreadsheet.

Now in step three, they've looked at your your SF 330 in two in step #3. Now they're going out for discussions.

You know, do they have the capacity?

Did they have any kind of unique skills that you're looking for potentially unique licenses that may be required?

So all of those are answered in step #3.

This is not a cut and paste from step #2.

This is new information what I tell our CEOs when I train them is.

In Steve's personal opinion, it's a process file to request your firms to read, to resubmit your SF three 30s because it costs you a lot of money to put together an SF 3:30.

Generally, a better method is to request cut sheets where they ask for specific questions. Specific information that can be answered in a couple of pages versus providing a new 100 page SF 3:30.

I've been told that it's actually more difficult to put together a cut sheet.

But I think it's actually more beneficial 'cause. It allows you to focus on the particular project.

When we ask for this information, we may give you copies of the statement of work. We may give you copies of.

Geotechnical report that may be essential to you providing back.

Statement of your capabilities to do this particular work.

Again, this is discussions on executing how you would execute.

Our project, so we've taken you from the generic SF 3:30 call for Qualls to actually specific data.

And then the board again completes all the discussions.

What have they learned?

And now they go back and they update the confidence rating.

So you may have gone from a yellow to a blue. You may have dropped from a blue to a green.

So all of these are updated for this particular step.

It's not an average of what you've received along the way.

So once they this is an example of a letter they may send to you.

Again, they might list the SF or the statement of work.

Maybe a geotechnical report?

They may provide you, for example, a land survey.

They'll show you where monuments used to be, and now it's all gone.

Will tell you exactly what it is we're looking for, and then up at the top they should highlight the kind of skill sets that they're looking for.

And this is again copied from the very first step when they started out on this journey.

And the one thing I do is I always tell our CEO's always work with the CEO or and the board on this because what we don't want to do is have the firm say, well, let me just come out and look at it because then you're Inc.

Costs. So we want to do it in the most efficient and cost effective manner.

So we try to avoid having actual formal site surveys if we can.

We carry all of that information, so in steps one through three, we gather up all of that information.

We again document down on the right hand end strength weaknesses.

Other information that we've gathered and we do a final dot lolly back up the Lollipop chart update.

This is also the first time where the firms are actually ranked one through 3 is in Step 4 before in all of the previous slides, I could click back and show you there are no numerical numbers out on the left hand side.

That's because at those points, we don't know who is going to be rated best qualified. And then second.

Word.

Once they get through step four and they've documented it, they fill out the final recommendation.

The board chairperson signs along with all of the people that sat on that board recommendation board.

And the CEO will either accept or reject the recommendation from the board.

There can be instances where the CEO will send it back to them and ask for additional supporting information once the Co is happy with that, they'll sign off and that's when we send out a request for proposal to you to actually price.

Out the project and will hold negotiations.

The one thing.

If they do not come to an agreement with firm number one, they will formally cease negotiations. They will say we are ceasing negotiations with you and we're moving on to firm number two. They will try to come to an agreement with firm #2. If that doesn't happen.

They move on to firm #3.

What I tell our engineers is once you break off negotiations with a firm, you cannot go back to them.

So if you go to firm #2 and you start negotiating with them, you can't go back to firm #1 because they have a lower price.

Price is the very last thing that is considered in architect and engineering.

And once you break off negotiations, you cannot go back to them. So that's the.

Hard, fast.

Rule on A&E.

You cannot go backwards.

Keep going forward.

OK.

So what I'm gonna do?

Do all firms that submit get added to the short?

I'll just do quick run through. OK. What I tell firms are our goal is to include you because every firm will have some capability to provide some service.

So unless you have had your licenses revoked, you have some kind of federal issue going on.

If there's problems with licensing.

We are going to try to include you.

We don't.

Again, it's a. It's a. We're gonna try to include you whenever possible.

The only ones that I have excluded and I have not excluded them.

They're just red on.

There are the ones that don't have their Sam Gov registration current.

So it's kind of a self eliminated.

If USA wants to work with an AE firm that's not on the list, can they be added there any time or do they have to wait?

They have to wait for the annual call.

So do we.

Again, generally we do it every year for our US right now, we we will advertise starting in January and then the app list becomes active in, in May.

Do we give you a little bit of leeway here and there like a week, two weeks?

Yeah, I'll admit it.

I've taken companies that have submitted stuff a couple of days late after I think the deadlines like May or March 30th.

I'll. I'll go ahead and include them, but if they come in in June, July, August, no, they have to wait until the next cycle comes into play.

So in that the reason for that is.

Umm.

We need some kind of stabilized stabilization on on the list in the selection process versus.

A.

Rotating rotating list so it needs to be stable throughout the year.

So what?

I'm going to do now.

I'm going to shrink this down.

Actually, I'm just gonna pull it off the side here.

I'm gonna do a really quick umm.

This is this is how, umm the list actually works.

So say for example our our.

Engineers come in and they tell me we need umm.

They'll give me a cost estimate.

They'll give me a project location.

They'll give me a statement of work.

So it might look like this. Everyone's a little bit different.

We're having trouble opening stuff up, so it'll come in. It'll give me details about it.

So the first thing I do is I have.

The engineers download those.

Two forms, the Excel spreadsheet and then the list of capabilities.

This is what the form actually looks like. I got to be careful.

Make sure I don't have somebody elses information on it.

So this is this is my stunt slide here.

So again, just like you saw before, we give the project name, the description, the names code.

So this is a list of all of the nodes codes that we currently have on our. Our call for qualifications.

That Part 2, SF 330 experience.

This is where they're all listed.

And then the state where the work is going to happen.

Socio economic programs.

The cost estimate of the particular program and when they need the project done so for the for our practice test today, what I'm going to do is I'm going to say OK, Steve, I want to do a recreation recreational facility.

Let me scroll back up here.

Recreation is like RO 4.

Recreation parks.

But I also want what I tell the engineers is you can use more than one if it's a critical part of your project.

So let's pretend that we got RO four, and I also want to do a water treatment system for it.

So if I come down water treatment and distribution is AW3.

So I can take that one and put it down here.

I'll leave this one up here as an RO 4.

The engineers fill in the type of project or type of standards they're looking for.

This pulls over now into the top of the sheet.

So what's filled in here?

Fills in up here.

So you're going, will, Steve, now you're, you know, you've got the little bits here, but where does that go?

So remember, I told you that we have.

Umm.

Excel spreadsheet.

I've hidden all of the company names over here. Is the company name.

But.

I've got it hidden.

So in this particular case, we're going to do umm.

I'm going to pick.

I'm going to change the state.

I'm gonna change it to North Carolina.

Let's see here. Right here.

I change it to North Carolina mainly because I know everybody has North Carolina on their list.

So what are engineers do?

Or this is what I this is how I train them.

Hide the things.

That are not relevant.

This light blue is.

Companies that are licensed or can be licensed to work in North Carolina.

So right off the bat.

You can see there's roughly there's there's 90 people on the list right now, but if I apply this filter.

See here. I'm gonna get rid of this one.

Bring more on here.

I.

OK.

So I'm gonna filter to just this North Carolina.

So now I still have.

What is that?

Oh no, 9090 companies.

So what kind of engineering firm did I say I wanted?

I wanted a general general engineering, so I'm gonna go back.

And I'm going to.

Get rid of the ones that I don't want to look at.

So you can see why using these filters.

Make your life better than just random luck at pulling firms.

Remember how I said our primary was on the specialty skills was an RO 4? So I'm gonna hide all of these. And yes, I sat down and chicken pecked all of these numbers into this spreadsheet.

So I want Parks and Recreation, but I also have that water treatment. So I'm gonna hide all of these.

I have not done yet. If you notice North Carolina 540-1330, I still have.

Approximately 8080 companies on this list.

So.

To allow us to be more focused, I'm going to pull up the primary.

Code which is RO 4.

Boom. When I apply that filter, you can see now I've dropped from 90 down to approximately 25 or 30 forms.

If water treatment is also a critical factor, I want to make sure that they've made some money somewhere in that, so I'm going to again draw down a little bit further so you can see I went from 25 or 30. Now I'm down to 10 potential FIR.

That's a starting place to start looking at SF 3:30.

Versus chicken pecking 90 or 100 and hoping for blind luck.

This is based upon again potential license.

Engineering the engineering type you said you had and then places were on your Section 2. You've actually claimed money.

The higher this number, the more dollars have been generated. In some cases, this could also disclose whether or not you have a partner.

It's a large business is because some of these get up into the ten $15 million.

I can't remember the dollar values, but the way I brief it to my group is this is again a starting point and a higher dollar number could be both good and bad because in some cases a higher dollar value could mean that.

Our small project becomes a small fish in a big pond. When you're talking some of these.

Whereas you may get a better response from some of the smaller firms with the same capacity.

So it's a.

This again is a starting point for discussions on both capacity capabilities.

But it's more focused than just random luck.

So once they get that, do we do we need to consider any socio economic set aside?

So for example, they may want the money. Umm, the area may be in a hub zone, so they want to use that as consideration or service disabled veteran.

Or a woman owned firm.

So this is how they take this spreadsheet and they save it into step #2.

And what they'll do is this is how I train.

You'll take firm number one. You come and you paste them here.

And you take firm #2 and you come in, you paste them here.

And you take firm #3.

And you paste them here.

Can you have more than five? Absolutely.

Can you add firms to this sheet? Absolutely.

So this is just a starting point.

It's not the end. All end. All of the selection process.

Once they put the firms in here, they will then gather up the SF Three 30s out of your individual folder and they will upload them into folder #2.

So you can see right here I've got an example of an SF330.

We open that up and then over here we'll start cutting and pasting all of the information within the 3:30 that's applicable to our project. And then this chart, this one.

Is a little bit different. Well.

Give an initial rating on how we think it's reading and again capacity.

Maybe a yellow for all of them. That's not bad.

It's just, we don't know yet until we pull the field.

We fill up blocks over here.

And then in Step 3, this is where we go out, we hold discussions.

We learn more information.

We go up to a blue.

We might go up to a yellow capacity, might be in some cases.

In step three, we've actually had firms saying we'd love to do this, but we just don't have the time right now.

It's not bad.

It's just again, that capacity could come into play. So that's what happens in step #3.

Step 4.

We consolidate all of our comments, everything we've learned and then this is again the 1st place where you see their numbered one through 3.

They make their final recommendation.

They sign off, they send it to the CEO for potential negotiations.

So that is how all of the information you provide in the attachment A and within your Part 2 of your SF 330 are used for the selection process and to get to the best qualified firm.

So questions?

Have have I answered everything that you that you could possibly think of?

OK.

So just generalized comments for region 8 and region 9.

Are processes are generally the same?

The forms are a little bit different, but it still documents the same processes. If you're on another shortlist for the USDA, you do have to apply to be on those other lists one doesn't carry.

Over into another. Ours is kinda unique in that it's open to anybody.

So so when I say anybody, I'm talking to any USDA agency that wants to use it.

So if, for example, NRCS wanted to use it and they didn't have a short list for their group, they could still use this for projects in any of those states that are listed.

OK. So everybody's kind of quiet.

So either that's really good or really bad.

I'll turn on my camera so I'm not a mystery voice.

Let's see here.

I'm gonna. I'm gonna scroll up real quick, OK? I don't see any other questions.

Umm.

If for some reason your new firm and you can't have your SF330 done by the deadline, let us know.

If we know you're working on it.

We'll you know we can.

We can do whatever we can to get you included again.

Our policy is we're gonna try to include you unless there's something glaringly.

Glaring excluder so.

It benefits you to be on the list.

OK.

Well, it is now 3:00. Umm, if you have any questions or concerns, umm please let me know.

Umm, we'll do whatever we can to get those answers to you and the process works.

It works actually really good and.

We'll try to keep you updated as things change or potentially change within the new revolutionary far update. So far A&E has not seen a drastic change, but stay tuned that could happen again.

Sam.gov has been updated for different search tools now that if you log in you can get to those. If you're a design build firm.

Remember to look at the next codes for the construction group, not the.

Not the A&E group.

Because it's based upon, you know, the chances are located as a construction versus an A&E.

So keep your keep your filters broad.

So if you like, if you like working for the Forest Service, I always encourage people to look at the higher level.

So, USDA, so you can also pick up rural development. And NRCS also have a lot of really good projects.

So casting that broader net can catch you some some other fish too, besides just the Forest Service fishes.

OK.

Have a great afternoon.

I'll try to get the transcript posted up this afternoon or tomorrow morning, and I'll also post these these new slides for you.

You may see, I'll. I'll try to chop them off.

I had some other slides on here for contracting on how to get it posted in Sam, Gov, and all of that, but I'll get all of the other ones posted for you.

And yell if you have any questions.

Is there a page limit for projects in SF 3:30?

I had a page limit on and I can't remember it was 50 or 75.

Are we going to throw you out if you have 52? No.

Try to keep it as close to the limit as possible, but we won't.

We won't exclude you now if you give me a 500 page SF 330. You know, my eyebrow will go up a little bit.

But if it's a couple pages, we aren't.

We aren't going to.

Reject you.

The IT won't let me do an external link to the recording, but I can do a transcript which I'll post up.

I'm going to go ahead and turn this off.

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