MACPAC Survey Data RFP FY26-35.pdf

MACPAC Analysis of Survey Data on a Task Order Basis

1. Introduction

1.1 Purpose

This procurement will fund a contractor to provide computing and data analysis services to the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission (MACPAC) on a task order basis, using data from nationally representative surveys, as described below.

Background. MACPAC uses many different data sources in its analyses of Medicaid policies and programs, including data from nationally representative surveys, usually those collected by the federal government, but also surveys conducted by professional associations and data vendors. These surveys allow for comparisons of populations with coverage under Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) to populations with other sources of coverage and the uninsured. Most of these national surveys also contain a wealth of data on respondent characteristics that are generally unavailable in administrative data, such as demographic characteristics, self-reported health status, different types of insurance coverage, and past use (or non-use) of health care services. Some national surveys are limited to a subpopulation, such as children or individuals with disabilities, or a particular topic, such as substance use, to focus on areas specifically of concern to populations served by the Medicaid program. A list of surveys that have been used in the past are listed in Table 1.

TABLE 1. Selected Data Sources Previously Used by MACPAC

Survey American Community Survey (ACS)

CDC WONDER vital statistics databases

Current Population Survey – Annual Social and Economic Supplement (CPS-ASEC)

Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP) databases

Medical Expenditure Panel Survey-Household Component (MEPS-HC)

National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) Nationwide Adult Medicaid Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (NAM

CAHPS)

National Electronic Health Records Survey (NEHRS)

National Health Interview Survey (NHIS)

National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH)

National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH)

Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS)

Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP)

Examples of data analysis tasks that could be issued as task orders under this contract include the following:

using the NHIS to analyze health and demographic characteristics, measures of access to care, and service use for Medicaid and CHIP enrollees compared to uninsured and privately insured populations;

using the NSDUH to examine the prevalence of substance use disorder, including opioid use disorder, among Medicaid enrollees in comparison to individuals with other coverage; and using the NSCH to examine and compare demographic and health characteristics, access and quality of care, and transition of care planning between children and youth with special health care needs (CYSHCN) and non-CYSHCN and between CYSHCN with different types of insurance coverage.

The contractor will not be required to analyze Medicaid administrative data such as data from the Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System (T-MSIS) and expertise with programming administrative datasets will not be considered in scoring of proposals. Most programming tasks will consist of simple cross tabulations using survey data; however, more complicated multivariate analyses may be requested at times. The contractor must have the ability to add and utilize staff with expertise needed for specific projects on short notice and in peak activity periods.

1.2 Scope

This contract shall include tasks and activities related to data acquisition and transfer, analysis, staffing, project management, MACPAC trainings, technical assistance to support MACPAC analytical work, and written reporting.

The contractor shall, upon request, obtain, transfer, and document changes in data files and content, conduct statistical analyses, document analyses so they can be replicated, and perform other tasks related to data analysis as requested.

1.3 Contract objective

MACPAC will select a contractor capable of analyzing a broad array of survey data to conduct the activities and analyses needed to meet MACPAC’s statutory obligations. The contractor will be available for quick turn-around as well as longer-term analyses. The contractor shall also be available for exploratory work, such as reviewing data and devising an analytic plan based on sample size and other constraints, in response to a particular policy question. MACPAC will select a contractor that documents:

a sufficient pool of statistical programmers available on an as-needed basis to perform the necessary work;

extensive staff knowledge and use of surveys that could be useful in MACPAC analyses;

staff knowledge of survey design and methodology, including experience analyzing surveys with a complex, multi-stage design that must be considered when computing standard errors;

expertise in SAS, STATA, or other programming language(s), including expertise programming complex design survey data;

ability to conduct analyses in a Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP)-certified environment or equivalent, if required data are not publicly available;

procedures designed to ensure quality control of work performed by the contractor’s staff;

experience serving as a task order contractor with the ability to reallocate staff to complete quick turn-around projects; and ability to summarize data runs and identify key findings in a clear and concise manner in both tables and written reports.

1.4 Contract type

This is an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract subject to firm-fixed price (FFP) task order assignments. Time and materials (T&M) task orders may also be issued under this contract when conditions warrant their issuance. The contracting officer (CO) will determine task order type on a case-by-case basis.

Services will be defined and priced through individual task orders. MACPAC reserves the right to fund multiple tasks but does not guarantee any set level of funding or number of tasks to the awardee.

1.5 Period of performance

The period of performance for this contract is a base period of five years and five one-year option periods, covering fiscal years 2026 through 2034 (Table 2). The period of performance, including all options, is as follows:

TABLE 2. Period of Performance

1.6 Fully Burdened Labor Rate Schedule and Other Direct Costs for Base and Option Periods The offeror shall propose fully-loaded, fixed hourly rates for all personnel potentially assigned to tasks under this contract for the five-year period of performance. Each offeror's rates will depend on how personnel and positions are classified within each offeror's human resources structure or classification system. The rates must be included in a separate business proposal.

1.7 Travel

Contractor-furnished domestic travel required as part of a task order will be reimbursed, in accordance with MACPAC’s travel policy and supported by invoice. Economy class air fares will be reimbursed at actual cost up to amount listed under the City Pair Program fare. Lodging and/or per diems for meals and incidental expenses will be reimbursed, as appropriate, in accordance with the General Services Administration's (GSA) per diem rates available on GSA’s website. No fee or profit will be paid on reimbursements for travel and per diems. In the performance of task orders designated as T&M, the contractor shall propose a total cost estimate using loaded labor rates agreed to in the contract and other direct costs on an actual cost basis. Travel in association with any future task order will be at a not-to-exceed amount and only actual and allowable travel expenses incurred by the contractor will be reimbursed.

Period Start End

Base period October 1, 2025 September 30, 2030

Option year 1 October 1, 2030 September 30, 2031

Option year 2 October 1, 2031 September 30, 2032

Option year 3 October 1, 2032 September 30, 2033

Option year 4 October 1, 2033 September 30, 2034

Option year 5 October 1, 2034 September 30, 2035

1.8 Expected quantity of task orders

Under this IDIQ, the minimum number of task orders MACPAC may issue is zero. The maximum number of task orders expected under this IDIQ is not to exceed 75, not including option years. During any given option period, the maximum number of task orders is not to exceed 15.

2. Contractor tasks

2.1 Survey data acquisition and transfer

As part of this contract, the contractor shall conduct the following subtasks:

2.1.1 Acquisition of datasets. At the direction of MACPAC staff and to the maximum extent allowed under data use agreements (DUAs), other authorizations, and rules governing public use data files (such as those from federal surveys), the contractor shall directly obtain required data. If needed, MACPAC will also obtain required data files and provide them to the contractor.

2.1.2 Data use agreements. MACPAC anticipates that most of the datasets used under this contract will be public use files. If necessary, however, the contractor shall obtain, jointly with MACPAC, necessary DUAs and other authorizations such as memorandums of understanding necessary for the legal use of all datasets. For example, the contractor may be asked to obtain restricted NHIS data on geographic identifiers through the National Center for Health Statistics Research Data Center (RDC) and the contractor would be required to obtain access to the RDC through the RDC application process. The contractor shall maintain a historical catalogue of all DUAs and authorizations, past and present, in use during the period of this contract that can be provided to MACPAC on demand. MACPAC should be able to access these DUAs electronically or be sent electronic copies for reference purposes.

2.1.3 Checking and validating new datasets. The contractor shall provide programming services supporting file establishment, testing, and documentation of new datasets. This includes copying and creating data files received for use in analytic tasks, comparing file documentation with actual file structure to ensure that correct files and documentation were received, dealing with data owners to resolve potential problems with data files received, editing files in consultation with MACPAC staff, and preparing descriptive statistics on file variables to check data ranges and identify potential problems with file variables to be used in each task.

2.1.4 Transfer of datasets. The contractor shall obtain the required datasets, either through mail, online file transfer or other methods. Files requested by MACPAC shall be transferred in compliance with all federal and other relevant requirements. The contractor shall provide mechanisms for providing MACPAC staff or contractors working for MACPAC quick and ready access to source and analytic files when requested via hard drive, file transfer protocol (FTP) site, or a secure internet website.

2.1.5 Maintenance and management of data analysis tools. The contractor is responsible for licensing of, at a minimum, a current version of SAS, STATA, or other programming language statistical software and other licenses necessary to analyze survey data as requested by

MACPAC.

2.2 Data analysis

2.2.1 Construction of analytic files. The contractor shall create analysis files using a current version of a statistical analysis software program (e.g., SAS, STATA, or other program), other software (such as geographic information software or spreadsheet software such as Excel), or programming languages as decided in consultation with MACPAC staff. Files may be used by MACPAC staff or by contractor staff in subsequent analyses specified by MACPAC.

2.2.2 Statistical analysis. The contractor shall be responsible for working with MACPAC analysts through all stages of project work. This may involve assistance in developing analytic specifications, creating analysis files, analyzing data, programming bivariate statistics and multivariate models (logistic regression, ordinary least squares regression, hierarchical modeling, survival analysis, etc.) and developing and maintaining statistical and simulation models. Data specifications range from simple cross tabulations to complex statistical modeling;

however, most tasks will consist of cross tabulations. MACPAC project analysts will provide written and verbal requests for empirical analysis with specifications such as the data files to use, calculations to perform, procedures to use, tables to generate, and statistical tests to conduct. The contractor shall discuss questions, assumptions, problems, and suggestions with the project analysts prior to conducting the analysis.

The contractor shall ensure that output is provided accurately and on time. This includes ensuring that programs are debugged, proper denominator criteria and weights are applied to the data, and the final product represents what MACPAC staff has requested. The contractor shall provide mechanisms for maintaining efficient and accurate computer programming that minimizes MACPAC’s total expenses and have in place quality improvement mechanisms that will ensure analyses are conducted accurately and efficiently and with minimal errors. Code and tables should be reviewed by another member of the contractor’s team prior to submission.

Results should be compared to benchmarks where available. The contractor must also have procedures to correct programmers’ errors without MACPAC incurring additional costs for the extra time required to reproduce analysis results.

2.2.3 Data interpretation and policy analysis. The contractor shall have staff committed to the project who can interpret the results of the data analyses. On occasion the contractor will be asked to provide interpretation of data runs by providing bullets or text highlighting important findings. The contractor must also be available by phone and email to answer staff questions regarding the specifics of the data analysis (e.g., denominators), limitations of the analysis, and interpretation of the results.

2.2.4 Documentation of data analyses. The contractor shall document all data runs by providing annotated programming code. Documentation shall be designed and written to support replication of analyses in future years. The programming package submitted shall allow MACPAC or an external contractor to replicate the same estimates using the same or future years of data. The program shall employ efficient methods for updating the program so that it will accommodate changes in variable and file names (e.g. “search and replace” commands).

Complex analyses with multiple programs shall meet the following design specifications:

The programming package shall apply a common structure to assign file names and variable names.

The internal organization of the programs shall include section headers and subsection headers and additional brief documentation describing the task completed by each section of the program, and instructions to facilitate replication of estimates using future years of NHIS data.

The package of programs shall be uniformly written either in the latest version of SAS, STATA, or other programming language.

Documentation shall include all variable recodes and manipulation, and methodology necessary to understand how the variables were created and analyzed.

Simple data runs may require somewhat less complete documentation, but should include sufficient documentation so that the analysis can be replicated. The contractor may also be required to update the statement of work for a particular task to reflect any changes so that a record of analytic and programming decisions is available.

2.3 Staffing

The contractor should demonstrate that a sufficient pool of experienced statistical programmers shall be available to respond to tasks on an as-needed basis. Under this task order, there may be multiple concurrent tasks, a single task, or no ongoing tasks. As such, the contractor must be able to increase available staff during peak times. In addition, the contractor must have programmers who are willing and able to meet the required criteria for accessing data through a research data center (RDC) or other secure channels as dictated by the requisite dataset. While the contractor can demonstrate staff eligibility for RDC access, additional consideration will be given to contractors with staff that already have obtained Special Sworn Status (SSS). Last, the contractor must have staff experienced in facilitating staff trainings. Examples of trainings could include facilitating an annual training on how to use survey data to support policy work, and other ad-hoc trainings on requested topics (e.g., types of statistical analyses, developing table shells for analyses, etc.).

These programmers should have experience with many of the surveys listed in Table 1 (or other relevant surveys). Each programmer is not expected to have an in-depth expertise of all possible survey datasets that may be useful to MACPAC; however, in-depth knowledge of multiple health surveys is required.

2.4 Project management

The contractor shall manage the contract to ensure high-quality, timely, and accurate work, while ensuring efficient use of management, programming, and computer resources to minimize costs to MACPAC.

2.4.1 There shall be a designated project director (PD) who is the key liaison to MACPAC; this PD shall oversee the management of the contract, serve as the focal point for identified issues or problems, and direct all contractor staff who are part of this contract.

2.4.2 The contractor shall schedule and conduct a project kick-off meeting. The kick-off meeting shall be held virtually to discuss the purpose, goals, and timeline for this project. It should also include a discussion of MACPAC’s project management approach and expectations, communications, risk mitigation strategies, and next steps. The contractor shall provide a proposed agenda to MACPAC in advance of the meeting and summary notes following the meeting.

To ensure close communication between MACPAC and the contractor, when there are ongoing tasks, the contractor shall schedule and participate in biweekly check-in conference calls with MACPAC staff to discuss deliverables, timelines, next steps, and any concerns. The contractor shall schedule the calls, provide an agenda in advance, and share notes on key decisions and follow-up items after each meeting.

2.4.3 The contractor shall deliver detailed budget estimates for each task.

The contractor must first submit a preliminary scope estimate to the MACPAC contracting officer’s representative (COR) when developing the statement of work (SOW) to ensure the scope of the task aligns with expected costs. This estimate is not binding or final, but employed in ongoing development of the SOW in coordination with MACPAC.

After the MACPAC COR reviews and approves the preliminary scope estimate, the contractor shall develop an official budget estimate. This estimate shall include estimated staff hours and costs required to complete various phases of a task order (including data development, specific analytic subtasks, project documentation, and project management). The official budget estimate shall be provided to the MACPAC Contracting Officer (CO) and the COR. The budget estimates for a task should be provided in advance of the issuance of the task order. MACPAC may require the contractor to work with staff to change the scope of a proposed or current task to reduce projected costs. MACPAC will use the budget estimates to inform the FFP for the Task Order.

2.4.4 For both FFP and T&M tasks, the contractor shall keep the COR apprised of the ongoing costs of projects and shall notify the CO and COR if costs are expected to exceed the initial budget estimate. The contractor shall provide revised budget estimates if the scope of a task changes.

Additionally, for the T&M task orders the contractor shall provide the actual costs, broken out by project, on a quarterly basis. Additionally, the contractor shall provide, with the fourth quarter costs, the total cost of each project completed as part of the T&M task order.

2.4.5 The contractor shall ensure review and quality control of work performed by the contractor’s staff on each task. The contractor shall detail this quality control process in its proposal. The contractor shall ensure that analyses are conducted accurately and efficiently and with minimal errors. This includes ensuring that programs are debugged, specifications have been carried out correctly, and the final product represents what MACPAC staff has requested. Datasets should be validated for completeness and accuracy and results should be checked for reasonableness by comparing to benchmarks when available. The contractor shall have a mechanism in place (approved by MACPAC) to identify challenges quickly and to elevate for resolution as appropriate.

2.4.6 The contractor shall ensure programmers maintain sufficient concurrent and final documentation of work under each project task to allow other programmers to take over programming work when necessary, to call upon past programs for future work, and to allow MACPAC staff to review current and past tasks when requested. When similar data requests are made (e.g., recoded variables or an updated year of data for the same analysis) a new programmer should not recreate the analysis, as there should be sufficient documentation and a program library needed to update the analysis, thus reducing cost.

2.4.7 The contractor shall provide mechanisms that will allow the COR and other MACPAC staff to monitor the level of staff and computer resources for ongoing tasks and the progress being made on individual tasks. These monitoring mechanisms shall also provide sufficient information to allow for a review of work performed to ensure consistency with billing on invoices.

2.5 Reporting

The contractor shall deliver to the COR:

2.5.1 Monthly progress reports covering all work accomplished during the reporting period. These reports shall include the contract number and project title(s), a basic summary of the work performed and, for the T&M task order, the number of hours worked by labor classification for each active task request during the month. The accounting of hours by task request is also required when invoicing for services. As tasks are added or completed, the contractor shall include these tasks in the monthly progress report.

2.5.2 On a schedule to be determined with MACPAC staff, written documentation of compliance with security requirements. Within five days after a security incident is discovered, reports of any suspected or confirmed incidents that may impact MACPAC information or information systems shall be submitted to MACPAC, to include: the full details of the incident(s) with date and time stamps from a validated time source; the information and systems affected in the incident; the potential or confirmed data that was lost or compromised in the incident; full root cause analysis of the incident; and steps to remediate future incidents. Additional information will be required if data protected under the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was accessed.

2.5.3 As such changes occur, reports of major changes to datasets, data elements, and documentation that may affect past or future analyses.

2.6 Deliverables

Specific tasks to be issued under this IDIQ contract shall be priced separately on a FFP or T&M basis.

Examples of types of deliverables include: tables with interpretation narrative, code and documentation, summary of findings, methods summary for issue briefs, sample size analyses, trainings, and contractor reports.

For reports, upon acceptance of the final report or other final deliverable, MACPAC will determine whether it will be published on the Commission’s website as a contractor report. If MACPAC chooses to exercise this option, the contractor shall deliver a version of the final report/environmental scan that is copy-edited and compliant with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (P.L. 93-112, as amended). To the extent this requires additional expenses beyond what were included in the initial production of the final report (e.g., adding alternative text to figures), this task should be priced separately in the business proposal.

MACPAC will only accept final deliverables that incorporate previous feedback and that are clear, concise, and free of errors and typos. The contractor, at MACPAC’s sole discretion, may receive up to two additional rounds of revision to create an acceptable report if the initial final deliverable fails to meet MACPAC’s requirements. Final deliverables that do not meet MACPAC’s requirements when submitted in their final revised states (to the extent revision rounds are allowed by MACPAC), will not be considered accepted. In such cases, MACPAC may terminate the task order without further payment or, at MACPAC’s sole discretion, work with the contractor on a negotiated resolution. More information is available in Appendix A: Standard Terms and Conditions.

3. Proposal Submission and Evaluation Separate technical proposals and business management and cost/price proposals must be submitted in electronic format (either MSWord or .pdf) by no later than June 6, 2025, at 5:00pm ET via MACPAC’s secure submission portal: https://macpacgov.app.box.com/f/092654e7817344a7b7ab6269738077a8. Proposals received after this date and time will be deemed late and not considered for award. Emailed proposals will also not be considered.

All proposals will be kept confidential. You will not be able to view or access any other proposals in our submission portal. Each submission to our document storage system will be timestamped. Larger files may take longer to upload, so please plan accordingly. If you would like to set up a test of the submission process in advance of the submission date, please email contracts@macpac.gov.

Offerors must have two past performance questionnaires submitted via https://macpacgov.app.box.com/f/092654e7817344a7b7ab6269738077a8 by 5pm ET on June 6, 2025. The past performance questionnaire is included in Appendix B for this procurement. Offerors should send the questionnaire to previous or current clients (may include federal and state governments, think tanks, and academic institutions), to be filled out by the client and sent directly to MACPAC. Offerors should not pre-fill or otherwise influence the client’s assessment in the questionnaire in any way.

3.1 Technical proposal

To facilitate technical proposal evaluation, offerors shall submit a separate enclosure entitled, "Volume I, Technical Proposal.” To expedite evaluation of submitted proposals, each offeror's technical proposal shall contain the following major sections in the order listed below. In combination and excluding appendices, this volume should not exceed 25 pages in length.

1. Executive summary

2. Understanding of MACPAC’s mandate and scope of services

3. Technical approach

4. Mock task order proposal

5. Management plan

6. Proposed personnel qualifications

7. Organizational qualifications and past performance

8. Appendix A: Resumes for all proposed professional personnel

3.1.1 Mock Task

Using one of the surveys listed in Table 1, Offerors shall propose an analysis that MACPAC would use to examine access to care for Medicaid-covered individuals. For this section of the technical proposal, Offerors should include:

one sample table shell that includes notes on the denominator, exclusion descriptions, and description of conducted statistical analyses a description of the analysis, to include at minimum:

research questions;

an explanation of how this analysis will answer or address the research question; and a summary of included variables and how variables and comparison groups are constructed (e.g., if any were constructed differently than in the codebook or created for the analysis) a staff loading chart;

a project timeline for deliverables; and a project budget.

This section of the proposal should not exceed two pages in length.

3.2 Business proposal

To facilitate proposal evaluation, the offeror shall submit as part of the proposal a separate enclosure entitled "Volume II, Business Management and Cost/Price Proposal". The business proposal will be evaluated for compliance with the government’s requirements, reasonableness of the proposed rates, and financial capacity of the offeror. This volume shall consist of the following sections at minimum:

1. Fully Burdened Labor Rate Schedule and Other Direct Costs

2. Exceptions/Assumptions and Rationales

Fully burdened labor rates are defined as consisting of hourly base labor rates plus out-year escalations, applicable home office type indirect burden costs (fringe benefits, overhead, general & administrative), and profit.

All fully burdened FFP labor rates shall be rounded to the nearest cent. The contractual period of performance will begin October 1, 2025 and end September 30, 2035. The contractual period of performance for the base period will be October 1, 2025, and end on September 30, 2030, with option periods 1 through 5 beginning October 1 annually and ending September 30 annually. At this time, MACPAC is requesting fully burdened FFP labor rates only for the base period.

3.3 Questions concerning the request for proposals

Questions regarding this Request for Proposal (RFP) must be submitted via Google form no later than May 19, 2025, at 5:00pm ET via this online form. MACPAC will work to answer all questions as expeditiously as possible to assist offerors with preparation of their proposals. Responses to questions posed by offerors will be issued as an amendment to the solicitation and posted no later than May 23, 2025, at 5:00pm ET on https://sam.gov/.

3.4 Scoring

MACPAC seeks to award this contract to the offeror that represents the best value to the government. In other words, MACPAC considers both technical expertise and price in its source selection. Proposals will be scored based on the following criteria:

understanding of MACPAC’s need for and use of survey computing services (10 points);

qualifications of proposed staff, including programming staff, as well as a demonstration of sufficient staff to perform computing tasks on short notice and procedures for ensuring that staff will be able to work on several concurrent tasks (30 points);

management plan, including how the offeror plans to use project staff and corporate resources to complete task requests and ensure the quality of deliverables (20 points);

mock task proposal (20 points); and experience in conducting and managing similar programming IDIQ contracts, including an assessment of the Offeror’s past performance submissions (20 points).

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