May 25, 2018

Save the Date: 2018 Procurement Conference

Mark your calendars for the third annual State of Wisconsin Procurement Conference October 31, 2018 at the Alliant Energy Center’s Exposition Hall. The theme for this year's conference is "Harvest Procurement Innovation." Join other public procurement professionals for a day filled with information, practical tools and opportunities to network with peers. Stay tuned for further updates and registration information, or contact Jessica Vieira at (608) 266-5452 with any questions.

 

Construction in Downtown Madison

If you’ve travelled to the Department of Administration (DOA) building in downtown Madison in recent months, you’ve undoubtedly noticed the Judge Doyle Square construction project taking place across the street. According to an article from the Wisconsin State Journal, plans for the project include a hotel, housing, retail and commercial space, in addition to providing a 560-stall underground parking ramp that will replace the public parking stalls that will be lost by the demolition of the Government East ramp.

Please keep this construction project in mind when travelling to the DOA building for the foreseeable future. Expect traffic congestion and plan for delays and occasional street and sidewalk closures. If parking in the Government East ramp, which will remain open until the new parking garage is ready to be used, please know that you must enter and exit via East Wilson Street. For more information about this project, visit the City of Madison’s page for the Judge Doyle project.

 

New Policy on the Procurement of Signs

On March 28, 2018, 2017, Wisconsin Act 146 was signed into law modifying certain provisions of Ch. 16, Wis. Stats. related to the procurement of signs. The State Bureau of Procurement posted a new policy, Procurement Information Memorandum (PIM) 18-002, to provide updated guidance to agencies and campuses for the procurement of signage. This policy affects only signage procurements. Thresholds and procedures for bidding in all other commodity or services areas have not changed. Contact doawispro@wisconsin.gov with questions related to this PIM.

 

Updated Forms

A new form, DOA-3831 STAR Piggybacking Request, is available on VendorNet. This form should be used by agencies who wish to piggyback an existing State agency contract. Questions related to this form should be sent to doawispro@wisconsin.gov.

 

Contract Spotlight

Remanufactured Toner and Office Supplies Contracts. The remanufactured toner contract (505ENT-M13-REMANTONER-01) with Buy On Purpose (formerly known as EIS) has been extended to March 31, 2019 to align with the expiration of the office supplies contract (505ENT-M14-OFFSUPPLY-01) with Staples, which is the contract agencies use to purchase new toner. SBOP is exploring the possibility of issuing one procurement to cover both new and remanufactured toner in an effort to create processing efficiencies and generate savings. SBOP has been conducting market research to support this effort and recently issued a Request for Information to potential bidders to further determine the feasibility of this approach in Wisconsin. If you or someone in your agency is interested in participating on the RFB development, please contact Cathy Neidner at (608) 266-3620.

 

Strategic Sourcing: Tips and Tricks 

Bid Factors That Don’t Apply to All Bidders: When creating a bid factor that only some bidders will need to respond to, be sure to uncheck the box labeled “Response Required.” If this box is left checked, all bidders will be required to provide a response before being allowed to submit a bid. For example, if the bid factor states, “If your company is bidding on Lot 1, attach a list of tests provided.” In this example, only bidders submitting a response for Lot 1 should attach a list. With “Response Required” checked, all bidders would need to attach a response to submit their bid.

Make Bid Factors Work Harder for You: When creating a solicitation, there may be several types of bid factors that would work for each question and some options can make it easier to review the bidders’ responses.

For example, instead of using "Yes/No," consider selecting "List." This type of bid factor offers several additional features at the bottom of the page, including "Pass/Fail" and "List Answer Type." Checking the "Pass/Fail" box allows you to indicate which answer in the list is the correct or preferred answer. Selecting "Multiple Answers" for the "List Answer Type" will allow you to indicate multiple correct answers. Later, when reviewing the bidders’ responses to this bid factor, the system will flag any responses that don’t match the correct response indicated, allowing you to easily see which responses will require careful review.

Looking for additional resources for Strategic Sourcing? STAR agencies can access a variety of job aids, tools and resources on STARConnection (STAR Connection > Resources > Finance and Procurement > Job Aids > Search for “Strategic Sourcing”). If you would like to share a Strategic Sourcing tip or trick you’ve learned, please email your ideas to Jessica Vieira.

 

WISBuy

Are you moving? Is your office moving to a new location? If so, remember to contact your WISBuy Business Unit Administrator to submit the address change to WISBuy. Please note that the addresses may take a few days to be activated in WISBuy as the updates must be made in some vendor systems as well. Please contact doawispro@wisconsin.gov with any questions.