RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - Instructions to Offerors.pdf

Office of Acquisition and Grants Management

Instructions to Offerors

Request for Proposals (RFP) No. 693JJ320R000012

“National Tribal Symposium Support Services”

January 17, 2020

1.0 GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS

This Request for Proposals (RFP) is being issued by the Department of Transportation (DOT), Federal

Highway Administration (FHWA) to obtain services in support of its Center for Local Aid Support

(CLAS). These support services shall include, but are not limited to the branding, sponsorship, marketing, planning and execution of the symposium in accordance with Attachment 1 to this RFP.

The Government intends to award a single contract as a result of this RFP, consisting of both Firm Fixed

Price (FFP) and Time & Materials (T&M) Contract Line Items (CLINs). It is anticipated that the resultant contract shall consist of one (1) 12-month Base Period and two (2) 12-month option periods.

Please note that the Government reserves the right to make no award depending on the quality of the proposals, changes in Government requirements, or if the Government otherwise determines that it is its best interest to not make an award. Proposals will be evaluated in accordance with the evaluation criteria stated in Section 3.0.

This is an 8(a) set-aside acquisition solicited in accordance with FAR Subpart 19.8-Contracting with the

Small Business Administration (The 8(a) Program).

The Government anticipates selecting the best-value proposal from an Offeror’s initial proposal, without engaging in exchanges with Offerors. Offerors are strongly encouraged to submit their best technical solution and price in response to this RFP. Once the Government determines the proposal that represents the best-value (i.e., the apparent successful Offeror), the Government reserves the right to communicate with only that Offeror to address any remaining issues with their proposal, if necessary, and finalize a contract with that Offeror. These issues may include elements from the Offeror’s technical or price proposal. If the parties cannot successfully address any remaining issues, as determined pertinent at the sole discretion of the Government, the Government reserves the right to communicate with the next best-value Offeror based on the original analysis and address any remaining issues in that Offeror’s proposal.

Please note that funds are not currently available for this requirement but are expected to become available prior to award.

Note: The Government estimates, but does not guarantee, to make an award from this RFP by March 1, 2020.

2.0 INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE SUBMISSION OF PROPOSALS

2.1 RFP QUESTIONS

Questions concerning the solicitation will be submitted via e-mail to the FHWA Contract Specialist. In submitting questions in response to this RFP, Offerors must utilize RFP Attachment 4 - (RFP) No.

693JJ320R000012 Q&A Model. Further, each question must include the appropriate citation to the RFP

Attachment, section #, page # and paragraph # in question.

The following FHWA contract specialist is the primary point of contact for this RFP:

Ryan Buck, Contract Specialist

Federal Highway Administration

1200 New Jersey Avenue SE

Washington, DC 20590

Phone: (202) 366-4229

Email: ryan.buck@dot.gov & HCFA-32SRI@dot.gov

In order to maintain the integrity of the competitive process, communication regarding this solicitation shall be with FHWA contract specialist only. Communications regarding this solicitation with FHWA staff other than the FHWA contract specialist is strictly prohibited. Questions regarding this solicitation shall be submitted in electronic format to ryan.buck@dot.gov, no later than 10:00 AM (EST), January

27, 2020.

2.2 SUBMISSION OF PROPOSALS

Proposals shall be submitted in an electronic format (Word, Excel or PDF) to ryan.buck@dot.gov &

HCFA-32SRI@dot.gov. Proposals submitted under this RFP shall be valid for a period of no less than

150 days from the closing date of the solicitation. Proposals shall be submitted no later than 2:00 PM

(EST), February 3, 2020.

2.3 PROPOSAL CONTENT AND CONFIGURATION

The Offeror’s Proposal shall be broken out into two (2) separate volumes, as tabled below:

Table 2.3 – Proposal Volumes

Volume Section Page Limitations

Volume 1 –

Technical

Proposal

I – Cover Letter 1 Page

II – Non-price Related Exceptions No Limit

III –Technical Proposal 20 Pages

Appendix A - Resumes

Appendix A Total: No

Limit

Each Resume: 2 pages

Volume 2 –

Business

Proposal

I – Price Proposal

II – Other Financial/Organizational Information

III – Past Performance

No Limit

Formatting: The maximum length of the Volume 1 - Technical Proposal shall be limited to twenty (20) pages, including all tables, figures and appendices. Resumes shall be provided in Appendix A to the

Volume 1 - Technical Proposal. Appendix A, in totality, has no page limit but no resume submitted shall exceed 2 pages. The Volume 2 – Business Proposal does not have a page limit.

Both the Volume 1 – Technical Proposal and the Volume 2 – Business Proposal shall be submitted on 8

½" x 11" pages, using no less than ten (10) point character size and no less than an average of 3/4" around each page for margins. Page numbers shall have no less than a 3/8" margin from the page edge. Tables and figures shall use no smaller than ten (10) point character size and must be clear and readable. The following items are excluded from the above stated page limitation: cover letter, non-price related mailto:ryan.buck@dot.gov mailto:HCFA-32SRI@dot.gov mailto:ryan.buck@dot.gov mailto:ryan.buck@dot.gov mailto:HCFA-32SRI@dot.gov exceptions, table of contents and blank pages. Offerors are required to adhere to all of the aforementioned page limitations. Information found on pages that exceed any page limitation will not be considered. All pages in excess of the page limits specified in this solicitation will NOT be evaluated. The Proposals shall be readable by the software in use by the Government (i.e., Microsoft Office 2016 or later or Adobe

Acrobat). Proposals submitted in software formats not readable by the Government may be determined to be non-responsive to the solicitation and removed from consideration for award.

2.4 VOLUME 1 - TECHNICAL PROPOSAL

The Technical Proposal shall discuss the Offeror’s approach, capability and understanding to meet the

Contract objectives and accomplish the requirements stated in the Statement of Work (SOW). Offerors shall provide sufficient information for the Government to determine its level of confidence in the ability of the Offeror to perform the requirements of the RFP. The Offeror shall provide the following information in the technical proposal for the evaluation of technical merit:

1. Technical/Management Approach:

• Offeror’s demonstrated understanding of the contract objective, vision, and requirements.

• Offeror’s demonstrated approach for meeting the requirements of each task. The technical proposal shall address each of the SOW tasks separately with a complete discussion of the issues and proposed approaches to meet those requirements.

• Documentation of any team/sub-contractor plans and agreements, if applicable. Copies of the team/sub-contractor agreements are not included in the Volume 1 page limitation.

2. Staffing Proposal / Resumes:

Offerors shall provide a Master Staffing Matrix, which denotes those key personnel and the staffing levels proposed, and capabilities/credentials. The Offeror’s submission must include the following information:

• Name, title/labor category, and a description of the role and duties of all the personnel proposed to work on the order.

• For proposed staff, including subcontractors, submit resumes that provide information concerning academic background; technical qualifications; project management, subject matter expertise; relevant project level experience; and professional affiliations, licenses, designations or national committee appointments. Resumes must clearly demonstrate how the proposed personnel’s experience holds relevance to previously completed efforts and for ongoing efforts in which their performed duties were similar in scope to the requirements of this RFP.

• A detailed staffing plan that dictates how the Offeror will manage employee retention and, in cases of a vacancy, recruitment and onboarding in a timely manner in order to avoid adversely affecting performance.

2.5 VOLUME 2 – BUSINESS PROPOSAL

The Offeror shall provide a price Proposal that reflects their proposed solution to the

Government’s requirements.

i. Pricing Chart & Supporting Documents

In providing its Volume 2 price proposal, the Offeror must include a completed Attachment 2 –

693JJ320R000012 Contract Pricing Chart. Additionally, the Offeror shall provide a task-by-task breakdown of its proposed labor mix to include its basis of estimate in terms of labor categories, hourly rates, and estimated hours. Any information submitted must support the price proposed.

Offerors must include sufficient detail or cross-references to clearly establish the relationship of the information provided to the price proposed.

Offerors shall submit, under a separate tab, all (if any) assumptions or conditions upon which the

Price Proposal is based. Submissions must contain sufficient explanation and/or supporting rationale as needed to permit the Government to evaluate the documentation. Such information is not considered cost or pricing data and will not require certification in accordance with FAR

15.403.

Note: The Contractor shall provide the services under Contract Line Items No. 00003, 10003, and

20003 - as described in Section 4.6 of the Statement of Work, at no-cost to the Government. Any resultant fees collected or earned from the event planning services under this section of the

Statement of Work is the consideration to the Contractor in exchange for these services. All pricing provided in the Contractor’s business proposal shall exclude any pricing associated with the event planning services described under Section 4.6 of the Statement of Work.

ii. Other Financial / Organizational Information

• Standard Form LLL - Submit a completed Standard Form LLL, Disclosure of Lobbying

Activities, included as Attachment 5.

• Terminated Contracts - List any contract that was terminated for convenience of the

Government within the past 3 years, and any contract that was terminated for default within the past 5 years. Briefly explain the circumstances in each instance.

• A completed copy of the Offeror’s Representations & Certifications in accordance with FAR

52.212-3 (DEC 2019), if the offeror is not registered and completed their representations and certifications in the System for Award Management.

• Conflicts of Interest - The Offerors shall provide a brief statement in its proposal that describes in a concise manner all past, present or planned organizational, contractual or other interest(s), which may affect the Offerors' ability to perform the proposed contract in an impartial and objective manner. The Contracting Officer will review the statement and may require additional relevant information from the Offerors. In accordance with FAR

Subpart 9.5, all such information, and any other relevant information known to DOT, will be used to determine whether an award to the Offerors may create an actual or potential conflict of interest. If any such conflict of interest is found to exist, the Contracting Officer may (a) disqualify the Offerors, or (b) determine that it is otherwise in the best interest of the United

States to contract with the Offerors and include appropriate provisions to mitigate or avoid such conflict in the contract awarded.

• The offeror must state that they agree to all terms and conditions contained in Attachment 3 to this RFP that are incorporated therein by reference and made a part thereof or provide an explanation for any exceptions.

3. Past Performance

• The Offeror shall describe the firm’s relevant prior experience within the past five (5) years with work of similar size, scope and complexity to the work required under this SOW.

• The Offeror shall provide the following: a short description of the work performed, monetary award value, the dates of work performance, the name of the client and a contact phone number and email address. The Offeror shall list a maximum of five projects for the prime

Offeror. The Offeror may include up to three additional references for proposed subcontractors, as applicable.

3.0 EVALUATION FACTORS FOR AWARD

Proposals received in response to this RFP will be evaluated in accordance with the instructions contained herein. One (1) award will be made to the contractor whose proposal is determined to provide the best value to the Government, all evaluation factors considered. For this procurement, best value is defined as the proposal that results in the most advantageous acquisition decision for the Government as determined by trade off analysis among the non-price and price factors.

Although not rated, overall price to the Government may take on more significance as proposals are determined to be more equal based on the other non-price factors. In the event that two or more proposals are determined not to have any substantial technical differences (i.e., are substantially equivalent with respect to the non-price factors), award may be made to the lower priced proposal. It should be noted that an award may be made to other than the lower priced proposal if the Government determines that a price premium is warranted due to technical merit. The Government may also make an award to other than the highest rated proposal, if the Government determines that a price premium is not warranted.

The Government intends to make an award upon the basis of initial proposals. However, the Government may request revised proposals from only those offerors submitting the most highly rated proposals.

Additionally, the Government may reduce the number of proposals considered for purposes of efficiency, in order to permit an efficient competition among the highly rated proposals. Further, offerors are cautioned that each initial proposal should contain the offeror’s best terms from a technical and price standpoint.

Technical Factor Notes:

The Technical Proposal (Volume 1) must not contain any pricing information but may reference resource information such as data concerning labor hours, labor categories, travel, subcontractors, scheduling, deliverables, performance measures, etc. Any Technical Proposal that contains pricing information will not be considered for award.

Each Proposal will be evaluated according to the following price and non-price criteria. The Technical factor is more important than Past Performance, and when the two non-price factors (Technical and Past

Performance) are combined, they are approximately equal to price.

Factor #1 - Technical

Technical proposals will be evaluated and assessed based on the following criteria:

Technical Sub-Factor #1 - Technical Understanding and Approach

Offerors will be evaluated based on their proposal’s ability to demonstrate:

• A thorough understanding of the scope, objective and outcomes of the project, as detailed in the

Statement of Work (SOW);

• Creative or innovative approaches to performing these requirements that are feasible in implementation and will result in high-quality performance and outcomes;

• An explicit understanding of the importance of schedule and completing the work within the prescribed period of performance (or sooner);

• Proposal is complete and sufficiently addresses all tasks and subtasks as described in the RFP.

Technical Sub-Factor #2 - Demonstrated Experience

Offerors will be evaluated based on their proposal’s ability to demonstrate an intimate understanding of and demonstrated experience with the nuances and requirements inherent to planning, facilitating, and supporting a conference designed for a Native American audience, 200+ attendees and complexity to those described in the SOW. In evaluating this sub-factor, Offerors will also be evaluated on their ability to cite specific examples of conferences they’ve planned and facilitated for the target audience to include a description of the purpose of the event, the number of attendees, and any problems encountered as well as their accompanying solutions. Offerors must clearly articulate the similarities between their previous event-planning experience and the requirements sought under this solicitation.

Technical Sub-Factor #3 – Technical Capability

Offerors will be evaluated based on their proposal’s ability to demonstrate that it has a secure system for storing personal information collected through registration currently in place.

Technical Sub-Factor #4 –Staffing & Management Capability

Offerors will be evaluated based on their proposal’s ability to demonstrate:

• A detailed staffing plan that described proposed staff utilization and the prioritization and distribution of hours across each task. The staffing plan must be consistent with the Offeror’s technical approach and shall provide sufficient detail to demonstrate that each task will be assigned sufficient staffing resources for their successful performance, how the Offeror intends to manage personnel recruitment upon award, replacement in times of personnel turnover, and employee retention to minimize unplanned personnel departures from this requirement.

• Proposed key staff has a track record of performance on similar projects.

Factor #2 – Past Performance

The Government will evaluate offeror's past performance based on an Offeror’s demonstrated record of performing services that are similar in size, content, and complexity to the requirements stated in the

SOW and have been performed within the past five (5) years. As a part of evaluating an Offeror’s past performance, the Government will consider data available for any given past performance record in the following areas:

• Timeliness – Delivery or Performance

• Quality of products or services provided

• Cost control

• Relevance of the prior work to the requirements of the solicitation including scope, size, and recency.

• Overall Management of the project

• General trends in past performance.

The Government will consider past performance information submitted by the offeror on its performance as a prime contractor, as well as its performance as a subcontractor performing major or critical aspects of a requirement.

The Government reserves the right to assess the past performance of any proposed subcontractors.

The Government will use its discretion to determine the sources of past performance information used in the evaluation, and the information may be obtained from references provided by the Offeror, the agency’s knowledge of contractor performance, other government agencies or commercial entities, or past performance databases such as the Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System

(CPARS).

In the case of an offeror without a record of relevant past performance or for whom information on past performance is not available, the offeror will not be evaluated favorably or unfavorably.

Factor #3 – Price

Proposed prices will be evaluated but not scored. The price evaluation will determine whether the proposed prices are complete, fair and reasonable in relation to the solicitation requirements.

Proposed prices must be entirely compatible with the technical proposal and consistent with the pricing requirements listed in this solicitation.

4.0 Applicable Clauses

All applicable clauses and provisions contained in Attachment 3 to this RFP will be applied to resultant Contract award.

RFP Attachments:

1. RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - NTS Support – SOW

2. RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - Contract Pricing Chart

3. RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - T&Cs

4. RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - Q&A Model

5. RFP No. 693JJ320R000012 - Standard Form LLL, Disclosure of Lobbying Activities