Coral Reef Decision Support System

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is seeking competitive proposals for the development of a collaborative Coral Reef Decision Support System (CRDSS) to support coral reef conservation efforts in southeast Florida. The CRDSS must span the entirety of Florida's Coral Reef, inform decisions at local and reef-wide scales, be programmed to address emerging issues, and be mobile-optimized. The selected vendor will be responsible for designing, developing, and implementing the CRDSS per the detailed specifications outlined in the Request for Proposal (RFP). Key deliverables include the ability to aggregate data from various sources, provide spatial planning and GIS analysis tools, and enable stakeholder engagement in the decision-making process. The contract will be effective for a period of five (5) years from contract execution, with an option to renew yearly for up to an additional five (5) years. Responses to the RFP are due by February 20, 2024, and a mandatory pre-proposal conference call was held on January 30, 2024.

The RFP encourages participation from certified minority, woman, and service-disabled veteran business enterprises. The total budget for the project is $850,000, and the selected vendor will be required to host the solution in a cloud environment, potentially utilizing Microsoft Azure. The CRDSS should comply with data security standards such as 256-bit encryption and role-based access controls, while remaining open-source and accessible to a wide range of users without licensing requirements. No specific incumbent vendors or contractors are listed, but the project involves the state of Florida, Leon County, and the city of Tallahassee.