HRD127-HR-6548 Employee Relations Case Management Software and Services.pdf

Rev. 3/2026- Services

Request for Proposal No. HRD127-HR-6548 Employee Relations Case Management

Software and Services

San Bernardino County Human Resources

175 W 5th Street San Bernardino, CA, 92415

October 2026

Purchasing Department

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

No. HRD127-HR-6548

I. INTRODUCTION

A. Purpose The San Bernardino County, Human Resources Department (County), is seeking Proposals from interested and qualified Proposers to provide employee relations case management software and services. The number of awards will be determined by the quality of the proposals received.

B. RFP Contact All correspondence, including Proposals and questions (not bid questions), must be submitted to the person identified below (RFP Contact):

San Bernardino County Human Resources Department Attn: Alejandra Castorena 175 W 5th Street San Bernardino, CA, 92415

(909) 387-6189-Phone Alejandra.Castorena@hr.sbcounty.gov - Email

E-mail address may only be used to submit questions (not bid questions). Proposals will not be accepted by email. Proposals must be submitted electronically through the County Electronic Procurement Network (ePro). The completed and signed proposal must be received by the Deadline for Proposals specified in Section II – Proposal Timeline. All Proposers must register with the ePro system prior to the date and time to submit the proposal or they will be disqualified.

C. Reserved.

D. Contract Term

Services to be provided under this Request for Proposals (RFP) are outlined under Section V, Scope of Work. The Contract period will be for a 3-year term beginning in March 2027 and ending in March 2030 with the option to renew for two additional one-year terms.

E. Location of Services Location(s) where Services are to be provided, completed and managed is/are at San Bernardino County.

The Proposer must include in Proposal, Attachment E - Cost, all transportation, lodging, and per diem costs sufficient to pay its personnel and travel to the aforementioned locations.

F. Assistance to Proposers with a Disability

Proposers with a disability may request accommodation regarding the means of communicating this RFP or participating in the procurement process. For more information, contact the RFP Contact no later than ten (10) days prior to the Deadline for Proposals.

II. PROPOSAL TIMELINE

Release of RFP October 26, 2026 Deadline for Submission of Questions November 9, 2026 at 5:00pm Deadline for Proposals December 14, 2026 Tentative Date for Presentation/Demonstration January 2027 Date for Tentative Contract Award March 2027 mailto:Alejandra.Castorena@hr.sbcounty.gov%20-

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

Questions regarding the contents of this RFP must be submitted in writing in ePro on or before the Deadline for Submission of Questions. All questions will be answered, and both the question and answer will be posted as an Addendum to the RFP in ePro.

III. DEFINITIONS

Capitalized terms used in this RFP shall have the meanings given to them in the RFP and as defined below:

Board: The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors.

Contract: The Contract between the County and the Proposer resulting from the award issued pursuant to this RFP to the successful Proposer.

Contractor: Any individual, company, firm, corporation, partnership or other organization to whom a contract award is made by the County.

Facilitator: A County Purchasing Department buyer or designated individual tasked with managing the processes of the evaluation panel.

Proposal: The offer to provide specific goods or services at specified prices and/or other conditions specified in the RFP.

Purchasing Agent: The Director of the County Purchasing Department.

Request for Proposal (RFP): The request for an offer from Proposers interested in providing the identified services sought to be procured by the County. The RFP specifies the evaluation factors to be used and contains or incorporates by reference contractual terms and conditions applicable to the procurement.

Services: The requested services described in this RFP.

Subcontractor: An individual, company, firm, corporation, partnership or other organization, not in the employment of or owned by Contractor who is performing services on behalf of Contractor under the Contract or under a separate contract with or on behalf of Contractor.

IV. PROPOSAL CONDITIONS

A. Authorized Signatures

All proposals must be signed by an individual authorized to bind the Proposer to the provisions of the

RFP.

B. Term of Offer

Proposals shall remain open, valid and subject to acceptance anytime within nine (9) months after the Proposal submission.

C. Required Review Proposers should carefully review this RFP for defects and questionable or objectionable material.

Comments from Proposers concerning defects and objectionable material in this RFP must be made in writing and received by the RFP contact prior to the deadline for submission of questions identified in Section II or at least ten (10) calendar days before the Deadline for Proposals (whichever occurs last).

This will allow issuance of any necessary amendments or addendums to the RFP. It will also help prevent the opening of a defective RFP and exposure of Proposals upon which an award could not be made.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

Protests based on any omission or error, or on the content of this RFP, may be disallowed if not submitted in writing to the attention of the RFP Contact, prior to the deadline for submission of questions identified in Section II or at least ten (10) calendar days before the Deadline for Proposals (whichever occurs last).

D. Incurred Costs

The County is not obligated to pay any costs incurred by Proposer in the preparation of a Proposal in response to this RFP. Proposers agree that all costs incurred in developing a Proposal are the Proposer’s responsibility.

E. Amendments/Addendums to RFP The County reserves the right to issue amendments or addendums to this RFP if the County considers that changes are necessary or additional information is needed.

Changes to a Proposal or withdrawal of a Proposal will only be allowed if a request is received prior to the Deadline for Proposals. No amendments or withdrawals will be accepted after the Deadline for Proposals.

F. Best Value Evaluation As established in this RFP, the County realizes that criteria other than price are important and will award contract(s) based on the Proposal that best meets the needs of the County. The County seeks the optimal combination of quality, price, and various qualitative elements of the required Services that will provide the County the greatest or best value for its money.

G. Right of Rejection Offers must comply with all of the terms of the RFP, and all applicable local, state, and federal laws, codes, and regulations. The County may reject as non-responsive any Proposal that does not comply with all of the material and substantial terms, conditions, and performance requirements of the RFP.

Further, the County may reject a proposal from any entity that is a parent, affiliate, or subsidiary, or that is under common ownership, control, or management with any other entity submitting a Proposal in response to this RFP.

A Proposer may not qualify the Proposal nor restrict the rights of the County. If Proposer does so, the Proposal may be determined to be a non-responsive counter-offer and the Proposal may be rejected.

No Proposal shall be rejected, however, if it contains a minor irregularity, defect or variation. If the irregularity, defect or variation is considered by the County to be immaterial or inconsequential, the County may choose to accept the Proposal.

Minor irregularities may be waived by the Purchasing Agent when they are any of the following:

1. Do not affect responsiveness;

2. Are merely a matter of form or format;

3. Do not change the relative standing or otherwise prejudice other offers;

4. Do not change the meaning or scope of the RFP;

5. Are trivial, negligible, or immaterial in nature;

6. Do not reflect a material change in the work; or

7. Do not constitute a substantial reservation against a requirement or provision.

In such cases the Proposer will be notified of the deficiency in the Proposal and given an opportunity to correct the irregularity, defect or variation or the County may elect to waive the deficiency and accept the Proposal. The decision to provide a waiver shall in no way modify or compromise the overall purpose of the submittal, nor excuse the Proposer from compliance with all requirements if awarded a Contract.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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This RFP does not commit the County to award a contract. The County reserves the right to reject any or all Proposals if it is in the best interest of the County to do so. The County also reserves the right to terminate this RFP process at any time.

H. Local Preference

The San Bernardino County has adopted a Local Preference Policy. A local preference of five percent (5%) shall be applied in the cost evaluation of proposals or bids for goods, services, equipment, or a minor public work project, unless an exemption applies. In a price-based bid, five percent (5%) will be deducted from the local vendor’s proposed cost for the purpose of comparison when the local vendor’s proposed cost is not the lowest. If the local vendor’s bid is equal to or lower than the price of an otherwise successful non-local vendor after the 5% preference is applied, the local vendor will be given the opportunity to match the lowest quoted price. In a best value evaluation, five percent (5%) of the awardable points for cost will be added to the local vendor’s score. If the local vendor’s overall score is equal to or lower than that of an otherwise successful nonlocal vendor, the local vendor will be recommended for award.

“Due to the evaluation of qualitative elements along with cost in a best value evaluation, application of local preference for cost proposals may not result in award to a local vendor with the lowest cost after applying local preference.”

Local Vendor - A local vendor is any vendor, contractor or consultant (hereafter “vendor”) that meets all of the following requirements:

1. Vendor’s main office (headquarters) or a major regional office is located within the County;

2. Vendor employs a minimum of 25% of the vendor’s full-time management employees and 25% of its full-time regular employees working from the San Bernardino County location(s);

3. Vendor employs one full-time or two part-time employees with primary residence in the County;

4. Vendor’s “point of sale” for purposes of reporting sales tax to the State Board of Equalization is within the boundaries of the County. The payment of any local share of sales tax must go to the County or a city within the County. If the local business has more than one sales office in the State of California, the office located in the County shall be the point of sale for sales tax calculation;

5. Vendor is not delinquent in any taxes or other payments to the County;

6. Vendor possesses a valid and verifiable business license (if required);

7. Vendor has been open and established for at least six months prior to the issuance of the solicitation;

8. Vendor can demonstrate on-going business activity in the field of endeavor on which they are proposing from that office during the preceding six months;

9. Vendor has not within five years prior to the solicitation admitted guilt or been found guilty by any court or state or federal regulatory enforcement agency of violation of any criminal law or any law or regulation regarding fraud;

10. Vendor is not federally debarred; and

11. Vendor is not suspended or debarred from participation in doing business with the County, in the scope of work that is the subject of the solicitation.

12. Local Vendor Self-certification – Documentation provided

Local Vendor self-certification form is required for any bid or proposal when a local preference is claimed affirming that it meets each of the above stated criteria, and signed by a vendor representative with the authority to obligate the company under penalty of perjury. (See Attachment)

I. Clarification of Offers In order to determine if a Proposal is reasonably susceptible for award, communications by the Facilitator for the evaluation panel are permitted with a Proposer to clarify uncertainties or eliminate confusion concerning the contents of a Proposal. Clarifications may not result in a material or substantive change

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services to the Proposal. The evaluation by the panel may be adjusted as a result of a clarification under this section.

J. Public Records Act All Proposals and other material submitted become the property of the County and are subject to release according to the California Public Records Act (Government Code § 7920.000). All Proposal information, including cost information, will be held in confidence during the evaluation and negotiation process.

Thereafter, Proposals are subject to becoming a non-exempt public record.

If a Proposer believes that any portion of its Proposal is exempt from public disclosure, it must indicate the specific portions believed to be confidential and not subject to disclosure on Attachment I - Public Records Act Exemptions. The Proposer also must include a brief description that sets out the reasons for exemption from disclosure. Each stated exemption must include a citation to supporting legal authority, including statutory authority or case law, to support exemption from the Public Records Act. Requested exemptions that do not meet the requirements of this section will not be considered.

The County will use reasonable means to ensure that such information is safeguarded, but will not be held liable for inadvertent disclosure of the information. Proposals marked “Confidential” in their entirety will not be honored, and the County might not deny public disclosure of any portion of Proposals so marked.

By submitting a Proposal with portions identified in Attachment I as “Confidential,” Proposer represents that it has a good faith belief that such portions are exempt from disclosure under the California Public Records Act. Proposer may be requested to obtain legal protection from disclosure should a Public Records Act request be received. In the event the County does not disclose the information marked “Confidential,” Proposer agrees to reimburse the County for, and to indemnify, defend (with counsel approved by County) and hold harmless the County, its officers, employees, agents, and volunteers from and against any and all claims, damages, losses, liabilities, suits, judgments, fines, penalties, costs and expenses, including without limitation, attorneys’ fees, expenses and court costs of any nature arising from or relating to the County’s non-disclosure of any such designated portions of a Proposal.

K. Employment of Former County Officials Information must be provided in Attachment G regarding former County Administrative Officials (as defined below) who are employed by or represent Proposer. The information provided must include a list of former County Administrative Officials who terminated County employment within the last five years and who are now officers, principals, partners, associates or members of Proposer and should also include the employment and/or representative capacity and the dates these individuals began employment with or representation of Proposer. For purposes of this section, “County Administrative Official” is defined as a member of the Board of Supervisors or such member’s staff, Chief Executive Officer or member of such officer’s staff, County department or group head, assistant department or group head, or any employee in the Exempt Group, Management Unit or Safety Management Unit.

Failure to provide this information may result in the Proposal being deemed non-responsive.

L. Iran Contracting Act of 2010 In accordance with Public Contract Code section 2204(a), the Proposer certifies upon submission that the Proposer signing the Proposal is not identified on a list created pursuant to subdivision (b) of Public Contract Code section 2203 (https://www.dgs.ca.gov/PD/Resources/Page-Content/Procurement- Division-Resources-List-Folder/List-of-Ineligible-Businesses)as a person (as defined in Public Contract Code section 2202(e)) engaging in investment activities in Iran described in subdivision (a) of Public Contract Code section 2202.5, or as a person described in subdivision (b) of Public Contract Code section 2202.5, as applicable.

https://www.dgs.ca.gov/PD/Resources/Page-Content/Procurement-Division-Resources-List-Folder/List-of-Ineligible-Businesses https://www.dgs.ca.gov/PD/Resources/Page-Content/Procurement-Division-Resources-List-Folder/List-of-Ineligible-Businesses

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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Proposers are cautioned that making a false certification may subject the Proposer to civil penalties, termination of an existing contract, and ineligibility to bid on a contract for a period of three (3) years in accordance with Public Contract Code section 2205. Proposer agrees that signing the Proposal shall constitute signature of this Certification.

M. Disclosure of Criminal and Civil Proceedings The County reserves the right to request the information described herein from the Proposer selected for Contract award. Failure to provide the information may result in a disqualification from the selection process and no award of Contract to the Proposer. The County also reserves the right to obtain the requested information by way of a background check performed by an investigative firm. The selected Proposer may also be asked to provide information to clarify initial responses. Negative information provided or discovered may result in disqualification from the selection process and no award of Contract.

The selected Proposer may be asked whether the firm, or any of its partners, principals, members, associates or key employees (as that term is defined herein), within the last ten years, has been indicted on or had charges brought against it or them (if still pending) or convicted of any crime or offense arising directly or indirectly from the conduct of the firm’s business, or whether the firm, or any of it partners, principals, members, associates or key employees, has within the last ten years, been indicted on or had charges brought against it or them (if still pending) or convicted of any crime or offense involving financial misconduct or fraud. If the response is affirmative, the Proposer will be asked to describe any such indictments or charges (and the status thereof), convictions and the surrounding circumstances in detail.

In addition, the selected Proposer may also be asked to disclose whether the firm, or any of its partners, principals, members, associates or key employees, within the last ten years, has been the subject of legal proceedings as defined herein arising directly from the provision of services by the firm or those individuals. “Legal proceedings” means any civil actions filed in a court of competent jurisdiction, or any matters filed by an administrative or regulatory body with jurisdiction over the firm or the individuals. If the response is affirmative, the Proposer will be asked to describe any such legal proceedings (and the status and disposition thereof) and the surrounding circumstances in detail.

For purposes of this provision “key employees” includes any individuals providing direct service to the County. “Key employees” do not include clerical personnel providing service at the firm’s offices or locations.

N. Debarment and Suspension; California Secretary of State Business Entity Registration.

Proposer certifies in Attachment D that neither it nor its principals or subcontractors are presently debarred, suspended, proposed for debarment, declared ineligible, or voluntarily excluded from participation in this transaction by any federal department or agency. (See Attachment D and the following United States General Services Administration’s System for Award Management website https://www.sam.gov). Proposer also certifies in Attachment D that if it or any of the subcontractors listed in the Proposal are business entities that must be registered with the California Secretary of State, they are registered and in good standing with the Secretary of State.

O. Unsatisfactory Performance Proposer affirms that it has no record of unsatisfactory performance with the County in the twenty-four

(24) month period immediately preceding the date of issuance of this RFP.

P. Final Authority The final authority to award a contract(s) as a result of this RFP rests solely with the County Board of Supervisors, or as delegated by the Board of Supervisors.

Q. Reserved.

https://www.sam.gov/

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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V. SCOPE OF WORK

A. BACKGROUND INFORMATION

The San Bernardino County Human Resources (HR) Department is seeking qualified proposers for an employee relations case management system that will provide functionality for complaint intake, tracking, investigation management, collaboration tools, accommodation tracking, and reporting capabilities. The Employee Relations (ER) team consists of several teams who help support HR functions for the over 20,000 employees across the County’s 40+ departments. The teams consist of:

• HR Business Partners (HRBPs): Support the County’s 40+ departments in all HR functions.

• Central Investigations (C.I.) who support departments and HRBPs in conducting investigations

• Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Team: Manage County EEO complaints and investigations

• Return to Work (RTW) Team: Manages a caseload that includes modified duty and conducting

Interactive Accommodation Process (IAP) meetings, and job searches in compliance with ADA/ADAAA (Americans with Disabilities Act and Amendments) and FEHA (Fair Employment and Housing Act). The RTW team administers the County’s Return to Work Program for occupational (County Policy 06-02) and non-occupational injuries/illnesses; and ensure compliance with Federal and State laws regarding permanent accommodations.

Today, complaints are received by EEO, C.I., and HRBPs via email, phone, in-person, or through a third-party hotline service. When a complaint is received, it is logged into a Microsoft List managed by the different teams. Case material is stored on the Microsoft List. Case status is updated through the Microsoft List and outcomes are reported through it. All collaboration is done via Outlook and Teams.

Today, the RTW team receives inquiries when an employee submits a doctor’s note to their supervisor or manager (who then notifies the assigned RTW team), and/or when a Notice of Medical Evaluation is issued for an employee with work restrictions. Employees themselves can initiate the Reasonable Accommodation Process as well, and the RTW team walks the employee through the ADA/Reasonable Accommodation process and necessary documentation. Cases are entered and tracked via a Microsoft List. All collaboration is done via Outlook and Teams.

B. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

Project goal and objectives

1. Modernize and Centralize Employee Relations Case Management

Implement a secure, employee relations case management system that standardizes complaint intake, case tracking, investigation management, accommodation tracking, and reporting across all Employee Relations teams within the County.

2. Improve Operational Efficiency and Collaboration Replace manual spreadsheet tracking and decentralized document storage with automated workflows, centralized case records, and collaborative tools that improve coordination among HR Business Partners, Central Investigations, EEO, and Return-to-Work teams.

3. Enhance Accountability, Compliance, and Data Security Ensure all complaints, investigations, accommodations, and related activities are managed with complete audit trails, role-based access controls, and configurable workflows that support County policies, legal requirements, confidentiality standards, and records management practices.

4. Strengthen Reporting and Data-Driven Decision Making

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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Provide robust dashboards, analytics, and reporting capabilities that enable the County to monitor complaint trends, investigation outcomes, workload distribution, response timelines, and organizational risk indicators.

C. FUNCTIONAL AND TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

The County is seeking a configurable Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solution that supports the functional, technical, security, and operational requirements identified below.

Proposers shall describe how their proposed solution satisfies each requirement and identify whether each capability is provided out-of-the-box, through configuration, through customization, or through a third-party integration.

1. Complaint Intake and Case Creation The system shall:

• Allow manual case creation by authorized users.

• Provide an online self-service complaint intake form for employees and the public, including an option that allows document uploads and anonymous complaints. The ER teams require customizable forms that can be adjusted based on the type of complaint received (e.g. one form for EEO, one form for ER).

• Allow cases to be created from email, web complaint intake forms, or integrated systems.

• Generate unique case numbers automatically.

• Support configurable templates for case types and subtypes.

• Allow attachments of documents, emails, photos, PDFs, audio, video, and other files.

• Allow linking related cases.

• Allow confidential or restricted case designations.

• Provide embedded artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities that assist authorized users throughout the complaint and case management lifecycle by improving efficiency and reducing administrative effort.

o Where AI functionality is proposed, the AI capabilities shall include, at a minimum, support for drafting case summaries, generating investigative report narratives, summarizing interview notes and documents, suggesting next steps based on workflow, identifying related cases or similar historical matters, and enabling natural language search across authorized case records.

o AI-generated content shall be editable by authorized users prior to finalization and shall not replace required human review or human decision-making.

o AI retrieval, summarization, search, similarity matching, and recommendation functionality shall enforce the same user, role, case, department, sensitivity, privilege, recusal, and other authorization restrictions applicable through the application's standard interface.

o AI-generated content shall be clearly identified as AI-generated and shall remain subject to authorized human review before becoming an official case finding, investigative conclusion, disciplinary recommendation, accommodation determination, or other employment-related decision.

o County data, prompts, outputs, embeddings, and derived data shall not be used to train, fine-tune, improve, evaluate, or otherwise develop any AI/ML model or service without the County's express written authorization. County data shall not be used for public, shared, or cross-customer model training under any circumstances unless expressly authorized by the County.

o Proposer shall identify all AI models, model providers, subprocessors, hosting services, retrieval services, and other third parties used to provide AI functionality that may process County information.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services o County administrators shall be able to disable individual AI capabilities or AI functionality generally without disabling core case-management functionality.

o The solution shall maintain audit information sufficient to identify use of material AI functionality, including requesting user, case/context accessed, date/time, AI function invoked, and disposition of AI-generated content, consistent with applicable access and retention requirements.

2. Case Management and Workflow

• Support configurable workflows without custom programming.

• Route cases automatically based on predefined business rules.

• Assign cases to individual users or workgroups.

• Allow reassignment while maintaining assignment history.

• Support escalation rules.

• Allow managers to reassign cases.

• Support approval workflows where required.

• System shall allow for multiple complainants to be added to the same case.

• Support collaboration between users and workgroups on cases.

• Maintain full audit history on case.

The system shall automatically:

• Send reminders

• Escalate overdue cases

• Notify supervisors

• Notify HR leadership

• Generate follow-up tasks

• Allow reassignment of tasks

• Close inactive cases

• Archive completed cases

• Allow for re-opening of &/or linking to closed and archived cases

The system shall send configurable notifications for:

• New case assignments

• Upcoming deadlines

• Escalations

• Document requests

• Approval requests

• Case closure

Notifications shall be configurable by administrators.

• Create tasks within a case.

• Assign due dates.

• Send reminders.

• Track completion.

• Allow recurring tasks.

• Display overdue tasks.

• Notify managers of overdue tasks in identified categories.

3. Investigation Management

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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The system shall support investigations including:

• Complaint intake

• Witness tracking

• Interview scheduling

• Skelly meeting tracking

• Investigation timelines including tracking of paid administrative leave dates

• Evidence tracking

• Corrective actions

• Findings documentation

• Final determination documentation

• Final determination appeal tracking

• Support configurable templates for case types and subtypes.

Examples of case types include:

o Designation of informal or formal disciple o Misconduct o Grievances o Harassment o Discrimination o Retaliation o Workplace violence o Performance counseling o Investigations o Attendance o Policy violations o Union matters

4. Case Documentation and Records Management

• Allow unlimited chronological case notes.

• Timestamp all entries.

• Record the author of each note.

• Allow alteration of historical notes but maintain a record of the changes.

• Allow rich text formatting.

• Allow internal notes and external notes.

• Allow case notes to shared with the user’s leadership via notification within the system.

• Allow emails to be attached to the case record as a note.

• Support drag-and-drop uploads.

• Maintain document version history.

• Store multiple document types.

• Allow document preview.

• Support OCR (optical character recognition).

• Support electronic signatures.

The system shall maintain a complete audit trail showing:

• Case creation

• Case edits

• Assignment changes

• Status changes

• Document uploads

• Downloads

• Note additions

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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• User access

• Report generation

• Failed authentication

• Authorization failures

• Privileged administrative actions

• Permission changes

• Account creation/deletion

• API activity

• Security configuration changes

Additionally:

• Audit logs shall be immutable.

• Audit records shall be retained for a County-configurable period consistent with applicable records requirements and shall remain searchable and exportable in a commonly usable format.

• Audit records subject to legal hold shall not be destroyed through routine retention processes.

• The solution shall provide the County the ability to export or integrate security and audit events with the County-designated security monitoring/SIEM platform through a documented API, syslog-compatible mechanism, or other mutually acceptable method.

5. Reporting, Dashboards, and Analytics The system shall include ad hoc reporting capabilities for:

• Case volume

• Average resolution time

• Cases by department

• Cases by user

• Cases by supervisor

• Investigation duration

• Employee relations trends

• Corrective action trends

• Cases with paid administrative leave o Reports shall be exportable to: Excel, PDF, CSV

The system shall provide configurable dashboards displaying:

• Open cases

• Closed cases

• Aging

• Cases by user

• Cases by department

• Cases by type

• Upcoming deadlines

• Overdue actions

• Pending approvals

• Cases with paid administrative leave

The system shall support searching by:

• Employee, both complainant and respondent

• Supervisor

• Case number

• Keywords

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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• Dates

• Department

• Case type

• Investigator

• Status

• Bargaining unit

6. Security, Privacy, and Compliance

• Restrict access by role & case sensitivity.

o e.g. restricting sensitive high-level cases to Managers and Senior Investigators. Also providing the ability for specific roles to view and access all cases.

• Restrict access by department/unit.

• Restrict access by case type.

• Support attorney-client privileged cases.

• Support sealed/confidential cases.

• Prevent unauthorized viewing.

• Support Single Sign-On & Multi-Factor Authentication consistent with County identity management standards.

o The solution shall support standards-based federated authentication such as using

SAML 2.0 and/or OpenID Connect (OIDC) and integration with the County-designated identity provider.

o The solution shall support enforcement of County identity-provider MFA and applicable conditional-access policies for federated users.

o Proposer shall identify any local, emergency, service, or other accounts that cannot use federated authentication and describe the security controls applied to such accounts.

• Encrypt data at rest & Encrypt data in transit o County data shall be encrypted in transit using TLS 1.2 or higher, with TLS 1.3 supported where available, and encrypted at rest using AES-128 or an equivalent industry-recognized encryption algorithm.

o Contractor shall maintain documented cryptographic key-management practices, including appropriate access controls and key rotation.

• Meet NIST standards o The Contractor shall maintain an information security program aligned with the NIST

Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) 2.0 and shall describe the security framework(s), standards, and control baselines applicable to the proposed SaaS solution, including any material exceptions relevant to the County's use of the solution.

• Maintain audit logs

• Support role-based permissions

• Support least-privilege access o Administrative privileges shall be separable from standard user privileges and shall not, solely by virtue of system administration privileges, grant access to confidential case content.

o Privileged administrative activity shall be logged and auditable.

o The solution shall support periodic review of privileged access and prompt revocation or modification of privileges when no longer required.

• Support configurable retention schedules.

• Automatically archive records.

• Automatically purge records when authorized.

• Place legal holds on records.

• Suspend destruction during litigation.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

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Vendor shall describe compliance with:

• California Public Records Act (CPRA)

• Records retention requirements

• ADA confidentiality

• HIPAA

• EEOC record retention

• Title VII documentation

• California Civil Rights Department documentation requirements

• Allow legal hold capabilities aligned with California public records and litigation requirements

Health and Medical Information Protection

• The proposed solution shall support the County's protection of health, medical, disability, accommodation, and other sensitive employee information in accordance with applicable federal and California law.

• Where the solution creates, receives, maintains, or transmits Protected Health Information (PHI) subject to HIPAA on behalf of the County, the solution and associated services shall support compliance with applicable requirements of HIPAA and HITECH, including the HIPAA Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Rules.

• The solution shall provide security and privacy safeguards for medical and disability-related information regardless of whether specific information constitutes PHI under HIPAA. At a minimum, the solution shall:

o Segregate medical, disability, accommodation, and Return-to-Work documentation from general employee relations case information through configurable access controls.

o Restrict access to such information based on authorized role, business need, and least-privilege principles.

o Prevent users without appropriate authorization from viewing, searching, reporting on, exporting, or otherwise accessing protected medical information.

o Maintain an immutable audit history of access to and actions performed against protected medical information, including viewing, modification, download, export, printing, and deletion where technically supported.

o Encrypt protected information in transit and at rest.

o Support configurable retention, legal hold, and defensible deletion requirements.

o Apply equivalent security and privacy requirements to backups, replicated data, test environments, integrations, exports, and other locations in which County information is maintained.

o Prevent County health, medical, disability, accommodation, or other sensitive information from being used to train shared or public artificial intelligence or machine-learning models.

• The Proposer shall describe whether the proposed solution currently supports HIPAA-regulated workloads and shall identify any technical, architectural, licensing, hosting, configuration, or service limitations associated with the processing of PHI.

• The Proposer shall identify all components, subprocessors, artificial intelligence services, integrations, and hosting services that may create, receive, maintain, transmit, or otherwise access County health or medical information.

Security Incident Response

• Contractor shall notify the County-designated security contact without unreasonable delay and no later than twenty-four (24) hours after discovery of a confirmed or reasonably suspected Security Incident involving County data or materially affecting the confidentiality, integrity, availability, or security of the County's service.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

• Contractor shall promptly investigate, contain, mitigate, and remediate the Security Incident;

preserve relevant evidence and logs; provide the County with material information reasonably necessary to understand the nature, scope, affected data and systems, and impact of the incident; provide periodic status updates through resolution; and reasonably cooperate with County incident-response, forensic, legal, privacy, and regulatory activities.

• Following containment and investigation, Contractor shall provide the County with a written root-cause analysis and corrective-action report identifying the cause, impact, remediation performed, and measures implemented to reduce the likelihood of recurrence.

Vulnerability Management

• Proposer shall maintain a documented vulnerability-management program that includes authenticated vulnerability scanning where applicable, risk-based remediation, tracking of vulnerabilities through closure, and expedited remediation or mitigation of actively exploited vulnerabilities.

• Proposer shall describe its severity classification methodology and standard remediation targets for Critical, High, Medium, and Low vulnerabilities.

• Proposer shall maintain and adhere to documented risk-based remediation targets throughout the contract term and shall provide compensating controls or documented risk treatment when established remediation targets cannot be met.

• Proposer shall expedite mitigation or remediation of vulnerabilities known to be actively exploited.

• Proposer shall have the production SaaS environment and externally accessible application components undergo independent penetration testing at least annually and following material architectural changes when warranted.

• Proposer shall provide an executive summary or equivalent evidence upon County request, subject to reasonable confidentiality protections.

SaaS Architecture and Data Handling

• Proposer shall describe the SaaS tenancy model and mechanisms used to logically isolate County data from other customers, including how tenant-boundary controls are validated and tested.

• Proposer shall provide a solution architecture and data-flow description identifying application components, hosting provider(s), storage locations, integrations, APIs, AI services, subprocessors, backup/DR environments, and external services that store, process, transmit, or access County data.

• Proposer shall identify whether County production data may be copied to development, test, QA, demonstration, troubleshooting, analytics, or other non-production environments. Sensitive production data shall not be used in non-production environments unless authorized by the County and protected by controls equivalent to production.

• Proposer shall state committed Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) for the proposed service, describe geographic redundancy and backup frequency, and identify the frequency and scope of disaster-recovery testing. Proposed RTO and RPO values shall be subject to County evaluation and acceptance and shall become committed service requirements for the selected solution.

• All County data must remain within the Continental United States. Proposer shall identify the geographic locations in which County production data, replicas, backups, disaster-recovery copies, and other persistent copies will be stored or processed.

• Proposer shall identify material subprocessors that may host, process, transmit, or access County data, the service performed by each, the categories of County data involved, and applicable processing/storage locations.

• Proposer shall identify the countries from which Contractor and subprocessor personnel may remotely access County data. Contractor shall not materially expand remote access to County

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services data from additional countries without prior notice to and approval by the County where required by County policy or contract.

System Integration, Administration, and Performance

• Integration with the County’s Payroll system (PeopleSoft/Oracle Cloud) to pull baseline employee demographic and position data from to reduce manual entry.

o Examples of demographic data: Respondent(s)/Complainant(s) Name, Employee ID, Department, Classification, Supervisor, Work location, Employment status, Hire date, Bargaining unit.

o Maintain historical employee information.

o The integration shall transfer only County-approved attributes necessary for the identified business purpose.

o Proposer shall describe the proposed authentication and authorization method, encryption, synchronization frequency, error and retry handling, audit logging, historical-data treatment, and any proposed ability to write data back to County systems.

• Vendor shall provide open APIs and the ability to complete secure file-transfers.

o APIs shall be documented, supported, encrypted, authenticated using modern standards, subject to granular authorization, and auditable.

o Proposer shall describe API authentication, authorization scopes, rate limits, versioning/deprecation practices, and availability of API access in the test environment.

The system shall also integrate with:

• Microsoft Outlook

• Microsoft Teams

• Microsoft Office

Administrators shall be able to:

• Create users

• Manage permissions

• Configure workflows

• Modify forms

• Create templates

• Configure reports

• Configure dashboards without vendor programming.

Performance Requirements The solution shall:

• Support at least 100 concurrent users.

• Maintain 99.9% uptime.

o The Proposer shall describe how monthly availability is calculated, exclusions from availability calculations, scheduled maintenance practices and notification periods, service availability reporting, and remedies/processes for repeated failure to meet the required 99.9% availability.

• Return search results quickly.

o Proposer shall state response-time targets for common searches, case retrieval, dashboard loading, and report generation at the County's anticipated workload.

• Produce dashboards quickly.

• Provide access to a test environment throughout the course of the contract.

Security Assurance

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

• Proposer shall provide evidence of independent security assurance applicable to the proposed

SaaS service, such as a current SOC 2 Type II report or equivalent assessment, together with identification of material exceptions relevant to County use. The County may request supporting security documentation subject to appropriate confidentiality controls.

D. DIVISION SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS

EEO

These requirements are in addition to — and, where in conflict, supersede — the general case management requirements described in the base RFP, given the heightened confidentiality and statutory obligations governing EEO case data.

Proposers shall describe how their proposed solution satisfies each requirement and identify whether each capability is provided out-of-the-box, through configuration, through customization, or through a

1. Complaint Intake and Case Creation

The system must accommodate the full range of EEO matters and multiple methods by which they are reported.

• Configurable, County-defined complaint category taxonomy, including at minimum:

discrimination (race, color, sex, age, disability, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information, etc.), harassment, retaliation, pay equity, and other protected-class matters

• Ability to record multiple, parties and distinct allegations within a single case and track each to its own resolution

• Automatic routing/flagging of matters that overlap with other divisions (e.g., workplace violence, labor relations, criminal conduct) for coordinated but access-controlled handling

2. Case Management and Workflow

• Configurable workflow stages reflecting the County's EEO process: intake, jurisdictional/timeliness review, assignment, investigation, findings, resolution or discipline referral, and closure

• Automated deadline and statute-of-limitations tracking tied to statutory and regulatory timelines (e.g., EEOC 180/300-day charge-filing windows, state fair employment agency deadlines, internal policy), with configurable alerts to case owners and supervisors

• Investigator caseload dashboards and workload/assignment management tools

• Ability to place a case on hold (e.g., Party on leave, pending litigation, criminal investigation) without losing deadline-tracking history

3. Case Documentation and Records Management

• Secure, versioned document repository for witness statements, interview notes, physical/digital evidence, and correspondence, attached at the case and allegation level

• Interview scheduling tools and standardized, configurable interview/statement templates

• Version control and change history on investigative reports and findings documents

• Support for redlines/markup or comment threads on draft findings prior to finalization

EEO cases frequently proceed in parallel with external regulatory bodies; the system must track this without duplicating data entry.

Request for Proposal Employee Relations Case Management Software and

Services

• Dual-filing tracking with the EEOC and applicable state civil rights/fair employment agency, including the ability to record and cross-reference external case/charge numbers

• Ability to generate, track, and store formal notices and correspondence (e.g., Notice of Right to Sue, position statements, determination letters, settlement agreements) with template-based generation

• Mediation and Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) tracking as a distinct process type, including scheduling, participants, and outcome

• Configurable correspondence templates that merge case data into outbound letters while maintaining a record of what was sent and when

4. Reporting, Dashboards, and Analytics

• Aggregate reporting must be possible without exposing individually identifiable case information to unauthorized users.

• Support for statistical reporting consistent with EEO-4-style workforce data needs

• Trend and pattern analysis by protected class, department, complaint type, and outcome, to support adverse-impact review

• De-identified, aggregate dashboards suitable for sharing with HR and County leadership that do not expose complainant, respondent, or narrative case details

• Custom, exportable report builder for use by legal counsel, auditors, and external regulators, with export formats including CSV and PDF

• Configurable metrics for average time-to-resolution, case aging, and investigator caseload

5. Security, Privacy, and Compliance EEO case data requires materially stricter access controls than general HR case types, since the same platform will be shared across divisions.

• Granular, role-based access control that restricts EEO case content to designated EEO staff only; general HR users, supervisors, and IT administrators must not have default visibility

• Segregated, more restrictive storage and access tier for medical and disability-related documentation associated with reasonable accommodation and ADA-related cases o Access restrictions shall apply consistently to application screens, search, reporting, dashboards, APIs, integrations, AI functionality, exports, administrative tools, and support access.

• Configurable conflict-of-interest and recusal controls, including automatic restriction of a case from any user in the subject's or complainant's reporting chain

• Immutable, exportable audit log capturing every view, edit, export, and print…