GGI BASE SOW - DRAFT.pdf

For Official Use Only (FOUO)

Boundaries and Sovereignty Encyclopedia

Operation, Maintenance and Sustainment

Performance Work Statement

Office of the Geographer and Global Issues

Bureau of Intelligence and Research

Department of State

XXXXX, 2026

I. Background

The Boundaries and Sovereignty Encyclopedia (BASE) is the U.S. Government’s (USG) official repository of geography and foreign policy information pertaining to the depiction and description of international land boundaries as well as disputed territories and sovereignty issues. BASE is maintained by the Department of State’s (DOS) Office of the Geographer and Global Issues (GGI) within the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) and hosted on the StateToday site. BASE serves as the authoritative source of information on historical and contemporary boundary and sovereignty issues for cartographers, analysts, diplomats, and policymakers. GGI relies on BASE to fulfill the responsibilities given by OMB

Circular A-16 and the Federal Geographic Data Committee. The Encyclopedia is the companion to the

Department’s only National Geospatial Data Asset, the Large Scale International Boundaries (LSIB) dataset.

II. Objective The function of BASE is to provide access to the most recent geographic policy guidance, background information, and historical documentation of policy origins of the USG’s views on the alignment of the world’s international land boundaries and the status of geographic sovereignty disputes. The background information includes narrative text describing the specific boundary, a standard set of metadata, historical documents describing the policy context, as well as reference materials, including geospatial datasets, treaties, maps, news articles, and photographs.

This document outlines the operation, sustainment and ongoing feature enhancement needed for BASE, which resides on the StateToday site, to remain operational and in step with ongoing technological advancements.

III. Required Functionality

For this project, we are seeking the following services for a base plus four (4) option years as follows:

BASE must be able to accomplish the following:

1. Manage and display changes in the boundary alignment/spatial geometry and attributes associated with boundary lines and segments through space and time through the proper handling of the

SpaceTimeID concept.

2. Manage and display the hierarchical assembly of constituent line segments into international boundaries, through implementation of SpaceTimeIDs.

3. Build and maintain linkages between geographic line segments and the various relevant artifacts.

4. Provide visualization, search, and access functions for boundary lines, segments, and relevant documentation.

5. Be accessible to anyone with valid USG credentials. The platform should be hosted in such a way that it provides stability and complies with security best practices, such as being hosted in the AWS

GovCloud (US).

IV. Technical Requirements

1. Infrastructure

BASE should be built upon a modern infrastructure that complies with all Department of State technical and security requirements (e.g., Authority to Operate (ATO), security patches, vulnerability monitoring, etc.).

2. Quality Control

BASE should have a reliable system uptime of 99% or higher, detailed notification of system outages, information on site traffic and cost metrics, robust documentation on its operations, and accessible management and user guides.

3. Technical Support

BASE will also require dedicated technical support from a team that will assist in tasks including, but not limited to:

a. Software maintenance.

b. Permissions management (both platform and infrastructure).

c. Security testing, monitoring, and patching.

d. Scheduled and emergency maintenance.

e. Platform testing and helpdesk support.

f. Training of INR staff on functionality/usage of BASE

g. Data extract, transform, and load (ETL) tasks and other backend functionality not accessible via the platform’s web user interface, up to two (2) times/year.

4. Layout

The layout of the BASE platform should address the following needs.

a. Homepage/Landing Page: The main navigation page should quickly direct the user to the appropriate workflow/location they are seeking.

b. Supporting Pages: These are static pages that provide additional context/help to the user (e.g., FAQs, Glossary, Training, etc.).

c. Admin Pages: Pages related to the administration of BASE content and user management.

These should not be directly accessible from the homepage or without additional logging.

d. Artifact Page Templates: A series of templates for each type of artifact (e.g., sources and source subtypes, commentaries, policy positions, cartographic guidance bulletins, etc.). These should clearly provide navigation to linked content/groupings.

e. Entity Page Templates: Templates for geopolitical entities (e.g., countries, dependencies, etc.)

that clearly link to relevant boundaries, sources, commentaries, and guidance.

f. Boundary Pair Page Templates: Templates for boundary pairs between two entities that show the specific commentary for this boundary pair. These pages should link to related content, specifically, all segments that make up the boundary pair.

g. Boundary Segment Page Templates: Templates for the atomic unit of boundary analysis.

This page should show linkages to all related content.

h. Search Pages: Pages to construct search queries and view results in a sortable table. Searches should be possible via text and spatial queries using data already loaded into BASE.

i. Editor Pages: WYSIWYG page allowing for creating, editing, or reviewing commentaries.

j. Metadata Pages/Panels: A page or panel template that displays a formatted list of metadata and/or attributes associated with an artifact or geometry.

k. Versioning Pages/Panels: A page or panel template that displays all previous versions of the artifact or geometry currently being viewed.

l. Map Elements: Map elements using BASE and LSIB data should feature prominently in the above pages, serving as a unifying navigation point for both geopolitical entities and boundary pairs/boundary segments.

5. Administration and User Management

GGI requires the ability to interact with the platform at an admin level to:

a. Manage user roles and permissions.

b. Approve, edit, and remove pages available to users by role/group.

c. View and restore historical versions of artifacts and pages.

d. View, create, and modify linkages between artifacts (e.g., sources, commentaries, policy guidance, boundary segments, boundary pairs, etc.).

e. Bulk download content in an appropriate archive format.

f. Initiate an ETL of updated versions of LSIB and World Polygons.

g. Create, tag, and add new content and data.

GGI admins should be able to accomplish these functions via a dedicated admin portal (i.e., StateToday) and/or an application programming interface (API) to access all uploaded and generated assets on the platform.

V. Deliverables

Maintaining and supporting BASE is required for INR/GGI to fulfill its internal and interagency responsibilities for boundary information dissemination, as well as to provide interoperability with systems across the Department of State, the Intelligence Community, and the broader USG.

The contractor shall provide all deliverables, as applicable, in electronic format and shall bear filenames that clearly reflect the title of the deliverable. All information contained in the deliverable acquired shall become the property of the Government. If deliverables include patent, intellectual property, financial, personal, or other information that the contractor believes is proprietary or otherwise restricted, the contractor shall inform the Government before delivery.

The Contractor shall submit all deliverables to the COR or GTM to review and accept or reject. If a deliverable is rejected, the contractor shall make corrections as specified by the COR and resubmit the deliverable for review and approval to the COR and GTM within five (5) business days at no additional cost to the Government.

To this end, the contractor will:

1. Operate and support the BASE, meeting the requirements established by INR/GGI as described in the technical requirements section.

2. Host the BASE application and provide requisite management of the hosting infrastructure.

3. Maintain a State Department-approved access control strategy.

4. Manage content organization, upload, and update line data sets up to two (2) times per year.

5. Implement mechanisms to validate the currency of information and flag content in need of review and/or updating.

6. Provide monthly reporting on site use, statistics, and security issues.

7. Assist users in INR/GGI and across the USG with technical issues, including, but not limited to, password resets and account creation assistance.

8. Provide bug fixes as appropriate.

9. Implement feature enhancements pertaining to website functionality, data visualization, and applications for artificial intelligence in coordination with INR/GGI.

10. Provide the COR a monthly status report indicating:

a. Activities undertaken in the previous month

b. Risks identified

c. Any anticipated slippage in meeting milestones

d. The work plan for the upcoming month, and

e. The fraction of work completed

VI. Period and Place of Performance

The period of performance shall be a base period of a year with four (4) option years. The place of performance shall be at the vendor’s facilities.

VII. Key Personnel

There are no key personnel required for this contract.

VIII. Personnel Clearance Requirements

The contractor will provide cleared staff, as appropriate, to perform the work at an offsite facility.

IX. Telework

The Government authorizes offeror personnel to work from vendor approved facilities with staff available

(0830-1700 EST).

X. Performance Standards

BASE requires 99% reliable system uptime measured on a monthly basis. We anticipate the website will be free from outages, technical incompatibilities, and other system crashes such that content management functions are not consistently impeded. The contractor shall propose specific performance standards and metrics.

In the event of unexpected downtime or system outages, INR/GGI requests notification of the outage during normal business hours (0830-1700 EST) as soon as practical. For outages occurring after business hours, the contractor will notify INR/GGI on the next business day. Other outage-related updates and summary reports will be provided to the COR, INR/GGI, the INR Office of Information Technology

(TIO), and Department of State’s Diplomatic Technology (DT) team as appropriate. A mean-time-to-repair performance standard will be established in consultation with INR/GGI.

INR/GGI requests one week notice of scheduled maintenance or implementation of upgrades.

Website design and content management features must be approved by INR/GGI during development and prior to deployment.

XI. Other Direct Costs

No other direct costs (ODCs) associated with performance of the requirements under the task order, such as travel, plugins, and other software tools, are anticipated at this time.