Definitions

For purposes of this section, "construction services" includes: construction-manager-at-risk construction services, design-build construction services, and job-order-contracting construction services. These may or may not contain a professional services component.
For the purposes of this section, "professional services" includes architect services, engineer services, landscape architect services, assayer services, geologist services and land surveying services and any combination of those services, provided by a registered professional.

RFQ or Request for Qualifications means a solicitation with an intended response that includes initial data about a firm or individual such as experience, references, and approach to the project. For purposes of this section, pricing may not be required in the initial solicitation.

RFP or Request for Proposals means a solicitation with an intended response that is fairly detailed. For purposes of this section, it will supplement an initial RFQ response. Also, for purposes of this section, the technical and financial portions of the proposal response will be provided at the same time, but in a separately sealed manner, to enable the committee to review the technical response separately and prior to the review of the financial proposal.

For procurement of construction services relating to the alternative construction procurement methods, two thresholds apply:

Procurement of All Alternative Construction Services.

For procurement of construction-manager-at-risk, design build and job-order-contracting, the District shall follow these procedures:
The District shall announce and issue the solicitation according to its normal procedures.
Subject to review by Purchasing at their option, the College President or Vice President of Administrative Services shall initiate an appropriately qualified selection committee. The selection committee shall contain the Facilities Planning and Development (FPD) Project Manager and no more than six additional members selected from college administration, Facilities/Maintenance and Operations, and representatives of the project’s user groups. A non-voting representative of Purchasing will observe all meetings and selection committee activities.

For projects that include construction with selection made on a qualifications basis, the selection committee shall have at least one person who is a senior management employee of a licensed contractor and one person who is an architect or engineer registered to practice in the State of Arizona. The contractor or design professional may be an employee of the District and will not count against the six college representative limit.

Outside architects, engineers or contractors serving on a selection committee shall not receive compensation for performing this service. A person who is a member of a selection committee shall not be a contractor under a contract awarded under the procurement or provide any professional services, construction, construction services, materials or other services under the contract awarded through this selection.

The selection committee shall:

1. Independently evaluate and score the written proposals and qualifications submitted by the firms or individuals.
   
   
2. If outlined in the solicitation, shall attempt to conduct discussions with at least three of the highest scoring firms or individuals. If only two firms or individuals respond to the solicitation, the committee may proceed with the selection process or Purchasing may re-solicit for additional proposals. If only one firm or individual responds to a solicitation for professional services, the selection committee may choose to proceed with the process with that firm or individual if Purchasing determines in writing that the fee negotiated as a result of the process if fair and reasonable and that other firms and individuals had a reasonable opportunity to respond, or if there is not adequate time for a re-solicitation.

The One-Step Competitive Process.

Purchasing shall enter into contract negotiations with the highest qualified firm or individual for the professional services or construction services as a result of following the processes outline in section 508.2 or section 508.3. Negotiations shall include fees as well as other contractual terms and conditions deemed fair and reasonable and important to the District. Purchasing shall take into account the estimated value, scope, complexity and nature of the procurement.  If Purchasing is unable to negotiate a satisfactory agreement with the firm or individual considered to be the most qualified, then Purchasing shall terminate those negotiations and undertake negotiations with the next most qualified firm or individual in sequence until an agreement is reached. If a construction contract is entered into as a result of this process, construction shall not begin until Purchasing and the contractor agree in writing on a price for the construction portion of the contract.

The Two-Step Competitive Process.

For design-build construction services or job-order-contracting, as an alternative to the one-step competitive process outline in Section 508.3 above, Purchasing may utilize the following process:

1. Purchasing shall issue a Request for Proposals to those firms or individuals short-listed as a result of the process outlined above.

2. The selection committee make up shall remain the same as outlined in sections 508.2 or 508.3 above.

3. For design-build construction services and job-order-contracting construction services, the Request for Proposals shall include:
   
   1. Specifically for design-build construction projects, the project schedule, project final design and construction budget or life cycle budget.

   2. For both types of services, a statement that the contract will be awarded to the firm or person whose proposal receives the highest number of points under a scoring system.

   3. A description of the scoring method, including a list of factors in the scoring method and the number of points allocated to each factor. Those factors may include:
      1. Proposer's qualifications
      2. Proposer's financial capacity
      3. Proposer's proposed compliance with the District's project schedule
      4. Proposer's quality management plan
      5. Any other evaluation factors as determined by Purchasing.
      6. For design-build construction services only, demonstrated compliance with the design requirements.
      7. For design-build construction services only, if the Request for Proposals specifies the District will spend its project budget and not exceed that budget, and thus is seeking the best proposal for the project budget.

   4. A requirement that each proposer submit separately a technical proposal and a price proposal and that the proposer's entire proposal is responsive to the RFP. For design-build construction services, the price in the proposal shall be a fixed price or a guaranteed maximum price.

   5. A statement that the selection committee will separately evaluate the technical proposal and the price proposal, and that they will evaluate and score the technical proposal before opening the price proposal.
      
4. If determined by Purchasing and noted in the RFP, the selection committee or a subcommittee consisting of Purchasing and at least one other member may conduct discussions with any or all firms or individuals chosen. Discussions shall be for the purpose of clarification to assure full understanding of the project and responsiveness to the solicitation requirements. Information from proposals submitted and discussions held shall not be disclosed to competing proposers.

5. Best and Final Offer submittals may be requested of any or all finalists. These submittals shall contain both technical and financial information. The final technical proposals shall be evaluated and scored first before opening and evaluating and scoring final financial proposals.

6. Purchasing shall award the contract to the responsive and responsible proposer whose proposal receives the highest score.

7. For design-build construction services only, the District shall award a stipulated fee equal to a percentage of the District's project final construction budget, as prescribed in the request for proposals, but not less than two-tenths of one per cent of the project final construction budget to each short listed proposer who provides a responsive, but unsuccessful, proposal.

   If the District does not award a contract, all responsive short listed proposers shall receive the stipulated fee based on the District's estimate of the project final design and construction budget as included in the request for proposals. The District shall pay the stipulated fee to each proposer within ninety days after the award of the initial contract or the decision not to award a contract. In consideration for paying the stipulated fee, the District may use any ideas or information contained in the proposals in connection with any contract awarded for the project, or in connection with a subsequent procurement, without any obligation to pay any additional compensation to the unsuccessful proposers.

   Notwithstanding the other provisions of this paragraph, an unsuccessful short list proposer may elect to waive the stipulated fee. If an unsuccessful short list proposer elects to waive the stipulated fee, the District may not use ideas and information contained in the proposer's proposal, except that this restriction does not prevent the purchasing agency from using any idea or information if the idea or information is also included in a proposal of a proposer that accepts the stipulated fee.

Job-Order-Contracting Dollar Limits and Subcontracting

For job-order-contracting construction services only:

1. The dollar amount of an individual job order shall not be more than seven hundred fifty thousand dollars ($750,000.00) Requirements shall not be artificially divided or fragmented in order to constitute a job order that satisfies this requirement.

2. If the contractor subcontracts or intends to subcontract part or all of the work under a job order and if the job-order construction services contract includes descriptions of standard individual tasks or standard unit prices for standard individual tasks, then:
   
   1. The contractor has a duty to deliver promptly to each subcontractor invited to bid, a copy of the descriptions and the standard unit prices of all standard individual tasks on which the subcontractor is invited to bid.

   2. The contractor has a duty to deliver promptly the following to each subcontractor that has agreed to do any of the work included in any job order, a copy of the description, the number of units and the standard unit price of each standard individual task that is included in the job order.

Confidentiality of Process

Until award and execution of a contract by the District, only the names of each firm or individual on the short list may be made available to the public. All other information received by the District in response to the request for qualifications or contained in the proposals shall be confidential in order to avoid disclosure of the contents that may be prejudicial to competing proposers during the selection process. The proposals shall be open to public inspection after the contract is awarded and the District has executed the contract. To the extent that the proposer designates and Purchasing concurs, trade secrets and other proprietary data contained in a proposal shall remain confidential.

Cancellation of Procurement Process

Purchasing may cancel a request for qualifications or a request for proposals or reject in whole or in part any or all submissions of qualifications or proposals as specified in the solicitation if it is in the best interest of the District. Purchasing shall make the reasons for cancellation or rejection part of the purchasing file.

Registrations, Licensure and Project Definition

1. The successful contractor for construction-manager-at-risk, design-build or job-order-contracting construction services is not required to be registered to perform design services pursuant to Title 32, Chapter 1 of the Arizona Revised Statutes, if the person or firm actually performing the design services on behalf of the contractor is appropriately registered.
   
   
2. The successful contractor for construction-manager-at-risk, design-build or job-order-contracting construction services is not required to be licensed to perform construction pursuant to Title 32, Chapter 10 of the Arizona Revised Statutes, if the firm actually performing the construction on behalf of the contractor is appropriately licensed.
   
   
3. Each project under a design-build construction services contract or a construction-manager-at-risk construction services contract shall be a specific, single project. For the purposes of this paragraph, "specific, single project" means a project that is constructed at a single location, at a common location or for a common purpose.

Prohibition against Competing with Private Firms or Contracting with other Agencies for these Services

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this procedure, the District shall not:

1. Enter into a contract as a contractor to provide construction-manager-at-risk construction services, design-build construction services or job-order-contracting construction services to others.
   
   
2. Contract with itself, with another District, with the state or with any other governmental unit of the state or the federal government to provide construction-manager-at-risk construction services, design-build construction services or job-order-contracting construction services for itself.
   
   
3. The prohibitions prescribed in this section do not prohibit the District from providing design or construction services for itself as provided by law.

Reporting Requirements

On or before December 15 of each year, if the District uses construction-manager-at-risk, design-build or job-order-contracting to procure construction services in a calendar year, District shall transmit to the State Board of Directors for Community Colleges a report on the benefits associated with the use of construction-manager-at-risk, design-build or job-order-contracting to procure construction services. The report shall include the number of projects completed in the preceding calendar year using the procurement methods, the cost and description of each project and an estimate of any cost savings or other benefits realized through the use of the procurement method.