The City of Dade City has chosen a host of firms to serve as general planning and engineering consultants, for the next five years.
Elected officials selected firms that include Lakeland-based Wood Environment & Infrastructure Solutions Inc.; Lutz-based Johnson Engineering Inc.; Tampa-based Halff Associates Inc.; and Tampa-based CPH Inc.
Tampa-based Tierra Inc., also was selected to provide geotechnical services to the city.
The Dade City Commission made the selections on a 5-0 vote on Dec. 14, giving city staff the authorization to prepare a general consulting agreement for each firm to be considered at the next available city commission meeting.
Dade City Public Works Director Bryan Holmes detailed the city’s selection process.
A request for qualifications (RFQ) was solicited in September, for interested firms to submit their qualifications for providing planning and engineering services and geotechnical services to the city on a continuing consulting agreement.
Fourteen firms responded to the city’s solicitation.
The submitted RFQs included:
- Firm qualifications: That includes the number of years the firm has been in business; references and past performances; willingness to meet time and budget requirements; recent, current and projected workloads; volume of work previously awarded to each firm by agency
- Experience and qualification of assigned staff: That includes the staff’s experiences, qualifications and technical abilities
- Approach and delivery of services: That includes an understanding of the scope of work, ability to comply with the full scope of work, technical soundness of the proposal
A panel of city staffers reviewed the RFQs. The panel was made up staff that is knowledgeable about the planning and engineering projects the city will be doing in the next few years.
To further narrow down the list of would-be consultants, staff focused on evaluating the specialty services and focus areas offered by the firms that submitted.
Some of these specialties and focus areas tracked upcoming planning and engineering projects anticipated and programmed in the city’s five-year capital improvement plan. These specialties include the development and implementation of traffic calming programs, neighborhood planning, round-about design and engineering, stormwater management engineering and design, local government planning services, and GIS and mapping training services.
Wood generated the best score in the engineering evaluation criteria matrix with a 93 average, followed by Johnson Engineering (92.3), Halff Associates (91), and CPH (87.3). Tierra generated a score of 98 in the geotech evaluation.
Published December 22, 2021
