SOW_-_Congressional_Reporting_Services.pdf

Requirements and Evaluation Factors for: Subscription for an online news and congressional monitoring service – from October 1, 2015 through September 30, 2016. The subscription should include access to the sources, tools and features outlined below for up to 14 authorized and licensed users.

Requirements

1. Federal Legislative Tracking with Alerts:

A. Bill Tracking, with online historical archive access – Ability to follow bills online in real-time as action is taken on the Hill, including hearings, markups, new amendments, cosponsors, and other major actions. Ability to create bill alerts by keyword, bill number, committee or subcommittee, sponsor or co-sponsor, chamber, legislative stage, section of US Code, etc. Bill alerts should include option for notes/tags. There should also be the ability to create custom bill reports summarizing activity on user-selected legislation.

B. Committee Markup Coverage, Hearings and Rosters, with online historical archive - Access to coverage for every open committee and subcommittee markup. Reports should be delivered within 24-48 hours of the markup’s conclusion and include a detailed summary, links to amendments and vote breakdowns. Access should also include listings of past committee hearings, including agendas, witness lists submitted testimony, and detailed committee rosters complete with jurisdiction overviews, subcommittee breakdowns and staff contact information. All content should be searchable and alertable.

C. Member Profiles and Staff Listings - Searchable database of every member of Congress. Each profile should include detailed information about staff (including email and phone numbers), state and districts, member biographies, voting and electoral histories, committee assignments, caucus affiliations, legislative priorities, speeches, interest group ratings, positions on key issues, social media handles and more.

D. Government Documents – Access to an online repository of government documents, with a historical archive. Content should be full-text searchable and alertable. Access should, at minimum include: Bill Text, Committee Reports, Congressional Records, CRS, GAO, and CBO Reports, and OMB documents.

E. Budget Tracker with online historical archive access – Access of all year-round budget and appropriations related activities through daily updates, detailed reports, and other searchable online features. Analysis should include activity from Congress, the CBO, GAO, the White House, and others, including schedules, news and background, charts and bill texts, line items, floor speeches, etc. Coverage should include the appropriations process from the drafting stage through final conference reports of all regular spending bills, CRs, supplementals, etc.

2. News & Analysis (with online archive access to past news/analysis)

A. Daily Legislative News and Insights – including articles on important (social welfare related) congressional action including floor activity, markups, hearings conference committee negotiations and a wrap-up of the previous day’s Hill activity.

B. Online transcripts – Coverage of important (social welfare related) committee and subcommittee hearings, including access to transcripts of hearings (testimony and Q&A) and mark-ups. Included access to past transcripts. For events not automatically transcribed, the ability to request a transcript with 3-5 day turnaround.

C. Online publications/analysis – Publications on policymaking process, providing perspective on how particular legislation is shaped, who is shaping it and how the process could affect varying interests. Publications should include a comprehensive wrap-up of Hill activity from the previous week, vote breakdowns and a look at the week ahead. Additional publication on legislative and policy news in an objective and non-partisan manner.

D. Bill Analysis – Access to expert summaries and analysis of major bills before Congress, including background information and prospects for passage, synopsis of major amendments, and links to related bills in the current Congress. Reports should be updated after major action occurs in committee or on the floor. Analysis should also include comparisons of related bills on the same issue area, if there is a prospect for movement/consolidation.

3. Schedules, Alerts, and other Tools and Support:

A. Schedules – calendar of current and future events for Capitol Hill, the White House, Federal

Departments & Agencies, Federal Courts, leading policy groups/think tanks, and other newsworthy events available online and via daily/regular emails. Listings should be downloadable to Outlook, with automatic email updates for any changes that may occur. Event listings should include dates, times, locations, agendas, contact information and witnesses as available. All content should be full-text searchable and alertable allowing users to received customized email alerts and updates on events of interest to them. Should include access to historical archive of the Congressional calendar.

B. Custom Search Lists – Ability for each user to easily save commonly used search criteria to run future searches, setup custom email alerts and run reports. Lists should be created based on keywords, phrases, bills, laws, members, votes and committees, with Boolean (and/or..)

functionality.

C. Custom Email Alerts – Ability for users to receive new information pertinent to their interest areas as it posts to the site, or on a scheduled basis as desired by the user. Alerts should be customizable at the user-level so each person can receive unique content based on their delivery preferences, and built using Boolean features (and/or/near/not) on user selected keywords, phrases, bills, committees, subcommittees and members. Emails should provide an excerpt showing where the keywords are in the legislative language within the body of the email alert itself, links should also direct the user to the pertinent sections of texts based on their customized keywords.

D. Training and Support – Ability for users to access telephone and online support for assistance in developing alerts, searching for specific documents, training for new employees, etc.

ACF Legislative Focus Areas: In the requirements above, “important”, “major”, “pertinent”, “newsworthy”, etc. relate to social welfare issue areas within the ACF purview. These include, but are not limited to, the following issue areas: family assistance, poverty, healthy marriage, TANF, community services, LIHEAP, community and economic development, child support enforcement, child welfare, adoption, child abuse, foster care, runaway and homeless youth, domestic violence, human trafficking, child care, head start, early childhood development, refugee resettlement, unaccompanied minors, and tribal social welfare/human service issues.