Community Engagement Consulting Services

The City of St. Petersburg, Florida, in Pinellas County, is conducting a competitive Request for Quote (RFQ No. 26-177) to procure Community Engagement Consulting Services focused on financial empowerment topics. The selected vendor will be responsible for designing and implementing community engagement activities, conducting data collection through multiple formats (community meetings, pop-up events, focus groups, and key-informant interviews), and providing rigorous analysis of collected data. Specific engagement topics must address asset preservation, wealth extraction prevention, banking access, and financial education. Deliverables include a City-approved engagement plan, an interim community engagement summary report, a final written report not exceeding 25 pages (excluding appendices), one interim briefing to City leadership, and one final presentation. The contract term is one year commencing upon execution with no renewal options. Evaluation criteria are weighted as follows: Qualifications and Experience of Firm and Staff (35 points); Project Approach (30 points); Cost Analysis (20 points); and Business Enterprise Program Outreach and Utilization (15 points). The project manager must possess a minimum of five years of applicable experience completed within the past five years and hold a bachelor's degree or higher in related fields such as public administration, public policy, economics, finance, sociology, social work, community development, urban studies, urban planning, political science, statistics, data science, or business administration. Responses were due on March 24, 2026, at 3:00 PM, with a deadline for questions on March 18, 2026, and all submissions required electronically through the OpenGov Procurement portal.

The solicitation encourages participation from vendors certified with the City of St. Petersburg as Small Business Enterprises (SBE), Minority-Owned Business Enterprises (MBE), or Women-Owned Business Enterprises (WBE), with such certification status receiving consideration under the Business Enterprise Program evaluation criterion worth two points each for SBE, MBE, and WBE designations. Subcontractor participation is voluntary with no minimum participation threshold required for contract award eligibility; however, proposers must complete and submit a Subcontractor Utilization Plan demonstrating their strategies for engaging small, minority, women, and veteran-owned businesses operating in the Tampa Bay Region. All vendors must be registered with the Florida Division of Corporations and maintain commercial general liability insurance of $1,000,000 per occurrence ($2,000,000 aggregate), commercial automobile liability of $1,000,000, workers' compensation insurance as required by Florida law, and errors and omissions/professional liability insurance of $1,000,000 per occurrence, with the City named as additional insured. No incumbent vendor information or specific contract value is provided in the solicitation materials; however, the maximum annual price cap and contract amount are to be established in the Base Agreement (Appendix B) with any price increases during renewal periods requiring thirty days' prior written notice and mutual written agreement.