Description
This second edition of Contracting for Services in State and Local Government Agencies provides state-of-the-art tools for best practice in the procurement of services at state and local levels, from initial stages through to completion. Including lively case studies and research conducted with state and local agencies across the United States, this book provides management advice and tips on compliance to reduce costs, select the best-qualified contractors, manage contractors’ performance, and prevent corruption and waste.
Utilizing the results of new research in all fifty states, author William Sims Curry offers updated best-practice documents, methodologies, and templates including: a Request for Proposal (RFP), a scorecard for proposals to select the best-qualified contractor, a toolkit for meeting socioeconomic contracting goals without compromising price, quality, or on-time delivery, and a Model Services Contract (MSC). Special consideration is given to obtaining services and products in states of emergency. Several additional resources for practitioners are available online, including sample contracts and a straightforward, inexpensive tool for tracking contractors’ progress and cost management.
The roadmap and templates contained in this book and available online to readers will prove essential to state and local government agency contracting professionals and other officials and employees called upon to participate in the drafting of solicitations, writing sole source justifications, writing scopes of work, serving on advance contract planning and source selection teams, recommending award of contracts, or assisting in the management of those contracts.
Table of Contents
1. The Contracting Cycle and Advance Contract Planning 2. Competition and Socioeconomic Contracting 3. Solicitation Documents: Information for Prospective Contractors 4. Solicitation Document: Proposal Requirements and Preparation Guidelines 5. Management of Pre-Proposal Communications and Evaluation of Proposals 6. Protests 7. Contract Negotiations, Ethics and Conflicts of Interest 8. Contract Document 9. Contract Terms and Conditions 10. Short Form Contracts, Short Form RFPs, Emergencies and Letter Contracts 11. Contract Review, Execution and Audit 1 2. Contract Administration and Closeout Appendix A Glossary of Terms Appendix B Best-Practices Research Project Appendix C Best-Practices Request for Proposals (RFP) Appendix D Best-Practices Model Services Contract (MSC) Appendix E Proof of Anomalies in Formulas for Weighing Objective Values and Subjective Scores Appendix F Estimate at Completion Appendix G Sole Source Justification/Approval Form Appendix H Reference Checklist Appendix I Short Form RFP with Short Form Contract Appendix J Form for Evaluation of Proposals in Response to RFP Appendix K Formulas for Weighing all Criteria Including those with Optimal or Suboptimal Values Appendix L Sample Show Cause Letter Appendix M Sample Letter Contract Appendix N Contract Amendment Appendix O Short Form Contract Amendment Appendix P Contractor Performance Report
