Said in CommitteeBeta

Exactly as spoken.

Joint Education Committee

September 30, 2019 ·ASR Room A ·1:28:47
Video Transcript

Transcript

Transcript available Whisper ✓ SliQ live captions: not yet available Download .txt
Machine transcript

May contain errors. Verify important quotations against the official video.

About transcript accuracy
Source
Whisper
Model
ggml-large-v3-turbo.bin RTX5060
Processing date
October 8, 2026
Unknown speaker 0:00
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 6:00
Good morning or afternoon. see how far behind I am today I guess we're ready to get started everybody here knows what we're here for this is going to be a presentation of the procurement of education adequacy consultant services and we're going to let miss Thayer and miss Bowen tell us
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 4 6:53
a little bit about what we have you're were
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 5 6:58
recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Jill Thayer, Bureau of Legislative Research. You all have
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 7:03
in front of you, or you should, a binder that has the two proposals that we received, and I'm going to go over with you quickly. I'm going to go over with you the contents of these binders and then answer any questions you have and Lori Bowen from our research division is also here she checked all the references for these entities and we'll be able to talk to you about those so as you know on August 23rd the second RFP was released we published it on the OSP website and in addition to that I emailed it to the three entities that it was sent to with the first one as well as seven additional entities at the request of a member of this of these committees the deadline for proposals was September 20th and I received three proposals by that deadline and I'm going to go over those with you and today you're going to hear the summaries of what we received their references and then it's up to y'all to make the determination of who you want to bring back for your October 8th meeting to give oral presentations to you whether it's all of them or none of them that's up to you so let me talk to you a little bit about what you have in your binder you all have a copy of the RFP that was released you also have the a response checklist which looks like this this is at the front of your binder and then you have a price comparison table up there also and then you have the two you have two of the three proposals the APA proposal and the Schulz and Associates proposal and those are separated by tabs so that you can see what those are and the pricing proposal for each of those is at the very beginning of those tabs so I'm going to talk to you a little bit about this response checklist and this is my preliminary look the first thing I do when I get the proposals is I go through them to see if the bids are even responsive to the RFP and if they're not then I contact the chairs and let them know but that's what this first table is and you can see on here that there was in addition to APA and Schulz we received a third proposal from a company called total employee sourcing and I have indicated that that is a non responsive bid the chairs have already permitted me to go ahead and let that company know that and the reason that it was non-responsive primarily is we did not receive an original bid from them at all they sent me an email I never received original documents the RFP requires that original documents be submitted signed originals including original pricing and we just didn't get that. In addition to that, there were some other issues with their bid. I went ahead and looked through it and indicated for you what else was missing from it. So today you're going to look at APA and Schulz and Associates. There are varying levels of what would cause a bid to be considered non-responsive and it's up to these two bodies, this committee, to make that determination. You will see that the Shulls and Associates proposal had some red marked on here. I'm going to go over with you what was missing from their initial submission. The RFP has its first two pages look like this. And there are blanks they're supposed to fill out with their company information. And the second page requires them to give us their tax identification number and says in bold and caps that failure to submit a taxpayer identification number may result in proposal rejection. I did not get this from Shul's at all. I have received it now because I asked them for it and I got it this past Friday. So I got that. One of the reasons that the taxpayer identification number is important before we even enter a contract with someone is that I use that number to search in the DFA website for whether or not they have certified that they won't contract with illegal immigrants which is one of the requirements under the law for any contract that we enter and they've also submitted that certification to me so I do have that information now they did correct that but I needed to bring it to your attention because it wasn't submitted prior to the deadline the other issue with their bid is that section 1.3 of the RFP requires that all pricing information be submitted separately sealed from the proposal this is a technicality it's something that's lived in this RFP since we started it six seven years ago but it is something that's in there what they submitted to me was their proposal with no pricing information and then I also received a proposal that had pricing information so there was no just separate price but they did do two separate submissions so that's up to y'all whether or not that matters to you APA did not have any initial issues with their with their proposal um for the price comparison table on this I went through they both use the same official price proposal sheet to fill this out and I just went through and pulled out for you so that you could see side by side the personnel that they're planning to use the hourly rates for that personnel the number of hours they anticipate they'll need for that and then also the travel costs that they anticipate that they will incur and finally on the back page both companies are planning to use not only a partner but also subcontractors and they have listed here the the amounts that they would like to charge for those and I I would ask, with regard to this, whoever you do decide to bring back in, whereas APA did provide hourly rates for their WestEd personnel, which is their partner, neither they nor Shul's provided hourly rates for their other subcontractors. They've just given us a flat amount of their total fee that would go to those entities. for the Bureau's purposes and for our auditing we need them to invoice us actual work that they performed actual hours that they worked and hourly rates so and I've asked the chairs of any motion that y'all do today would also ask them to provide that to you before the next meeting and then you'll have that to make your final decision but you can see that APA who is the company that submitted the previous bid to you, their total max bid is $659,580, which is approximately $300,000 less than their bid that they gave you back in May. And then Shul's max bid is $499,236. dollars. So now I would ask you to turn to the APA tab in your binder and you'll see some documents at the very front of your tab that Lori and I have created for you and these proposals are long and they're comprehensive and so we've attempted to go through and I have summarized some of the main points for you to pull that out and then Lori has created reference tables for you where she went through and called the references for each of these entities and she has put summarized their answers so that you have that there. So APA Consulting I'm just going to briefly go over with you some of the highlights for them you heard from them a couple of months ago but they're a consulting firm based in Denver, Colorado they have 36 years of experience in the area of education systems and policy consulting and analysis and they state that they have worked with 23 different states in analyzing their education resources and adequacy needs they did make a few changes from the proposal that you saw before and in addition to their price they acknowledge that they know that this study is not intended to produce specific adequacy numbers and don't plan to include that in their in their work and they did also mention that they have worked to diversify their project team in response to the committee's previous concerns and have a better understanding of the Lakeview decision and have also identified a local partner that they will work with on this project. So the main parts of their project plan begin on page 23 of their proposal. And what they have done this time is go through the various parts of the scope of work in the RFP and have shown how they're going to tackle each part of it. They do mention that they plan to perform fiscal and performance data analysis, case studies, literature and document reviews, as well as working with educators personally and stakeholders. They plan to do surveys of the school districts, And then they do mention that they plan to provide monthly updates and access to these committees. So APA this time has changed the personnel that will work on this project a little bit. They removed three of the subcontractors that they had previously. And they're now planning to propose four primary staff from their own company, three from WestEd, who will be their partner. And then they have three additional subcontractors listed who are all in the field of education. In addition, and they spoke to you about this last time, some of their comparable work. They've worked with the Maryland Department of Education conducting their adequacy study, which legislation resulted from. They've worked with the Wyoming legislature, looking at their school finance system and educational programs. And then they have worked with the Kansas State Legislature. And they also listed several additional states. They've worked with other General Assemblies and Departments of Education, and that's all throughout their bid. That's the summary. You've got all of this on the table to look over. Lori can go over the references for APA if you'd like
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 7 18:59
to hear what she learned. If not, I'll go on to Schulz. You
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 19 19:16
do? thank you madam and mr. chairman I did speak to three actually Nell Smith joined on these conversations and we talked with three references for APA I'll refer to them it's Augenblick, Palich and Associates I'll just kind of hit the high points on each one of the questions that we asked and then be happy to go further or deeper if there are questions. In response to the type of work that they had completed for these three references Wyoming indicated that they do they had been engaging in an every five-year recalibration of their education funding formula and that they found because of some unforeseen funding needs they had to do an additional one more quickly and in 2017 they contracted with APA to recalibrate their school funding. Maryland completes a statutorily required re-evaluation of educational adequacy and they completed one for them. Kansas contracted with West Ed which is the partner group for it with APA in 2017 to do a study on their k-12 finance system and they contracted with they had a subcontractor Dr. Lori Taylor that did a good bit of the work for them as well and they had them review their school finance system overall they did some econometric work to produce an education standards a system that would meet the Rose standards which I understand is the another education legal action that was taken and in the state of Kentucky that they were seeking to meet. And so that kind of concludes, just to give you an overview of what they were doing for these other states. Question two asked about their responsiveness, accessibility, and availability to these states. And all of them indicated that that had been fine, that they had done well, and that they were very responsive. Under question three, it asked about the satisfaction of the work that had been performed. in Wyoming. He said that he thought that they had, you know, he was satisfied with the work that they did. He did make one observation that there was some difficulty in pending down exact recommendations, and he would just, he said it could have been partially due to the fact that they have a very small student population, only 93,000 students, but that was something that he did point out. Maryland indicated that they were satisfied and did not really elaborate. Kansas said that on the contractual side they were very pleased with WestEd. They did say there were some political issues they had encountered where there was not uniform agreement among all legislators in the work that was performed. There was also some concern about one of their subcontractors, Dr. Taylor, that had been secured to do some of the work. On question four, the question was about the strengths and weaknesses of APA. Wyoming indicated that their strengths were they conducted themselves very professionally, they presented well to committees, interacted well with all those involved in the study, and were willing to get help from outside experts when they found that their expertise was not up to that whatever question had arisen. A weakness that they mentioned was that they would caution us not to allow them to just give us canned recommendations, but that whatever they provide to the committees would be meeting Arkansas-specific needs. For Maryland, they indicated that the strengths of APA were they were very knowledgeable, good at data analysis, they intersected the data with the research that's available on education. The weakness that they pointed out was not a substantive weakness, but they said they do need to hire an editor, that they did observe somewhat consistently some typographical type errors in reports, but that the substance was not really impacted by that. Kansas indicated the strengths were communication abilities were very good they kept the interested parties informed and the weaknesses they said primarily were related to the subcontractor Dr. Taylor because there was some concern about her selection and the work that she did but there was another piece of this that involved peer review and they were pleased with that On question five, we asked specifically if any problems were encountered on more processed contractual issues or billing issues, and none of them had any issues with APA on that type of thing. On question six, we asked if they would recommend APA to other entities for this work, and would they use them themselves again? They all responded that they would recommend them. these were primarily state government folks so there would be some process associated with selecting a vendor again so they could not really commit or say yes we would use them because of those procedural maryland would have to have a that was the department of ed that was speaking and they would have to go through an rfp process similar to what we do and the others would be legislative decisions but that they felt that there was overall a positive opinion so last we asked if they just had anything to add and that for Wyoming they said that we should not be terribly surprised if the results that came back would recommend additional resources additional funding for education that that had been their experience and that he did recommend an in-depth review of Arkansas specific data and information and relate that to high-performing states and he also recommended the use of an economist whereby we would look at competing states in our competitive market relating to teacher salaries. Marilyn said there was nothing else they really wanted to add other than that APA was well aware of their strengths and weaknesses and that they were very, very good at this type of work. Kansas said they were pleased and just reiterated that I guess because of their recent experience that they anticipated there might be some pro and anti-individuals, and so depending on where you sat as to how you would receive a report, and that they had been very accessible. They reiterated that they had been accessible and had only had one time they had to have interaction with them by phone as opposed to in person. So it's kind of just an overview of what I learned from those three. Do you want questions on that,
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 26:21
or do you want to wait until the whole thing is over? You want to wait until it's
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 26:34
all over? Okay, we'll continue on. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Next, we have Schultz and
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 26:39
Associates. That's your next tab. And again, the first document is your summary of their proposal, and then you have the references tables right behind that. Shules and Associates stated in their cover letter that they are a new firm that was organized specifically for the purpose of responding to this RFP. However, Dr. James Shules is an assistant professor of educational leadership and policy studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and as an individual has been used as an educational expert by many states for this type of work. He's proposing to partner with the Office for Education Policy, which is part of the University of Arkansas system, and then also has, I believe, three additional, four additional subcontractors listed that are experts in the field of education. So Dr. Schultz has taken the scope of work from the RFP and broken it into what he calls 14 different projects. and
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 27:47
he indicates which parts he will tackle and which parts OEP, the Office for Education
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 27:56
Policy, will tackle. And he has them conducting parts 1, 2, 6, and 7, which number one you'll see on the timeline, Timeline, which is on page 23 of his report, is number one was the funding formula analysis and recommendations. That's the part that OEP will do. They will also do analysis of the relationship between funding and performance, poverty and proxies, and then evaluating assessment and tax policies. So that's how he has broken that work up. With regard, we always ask them to list comparable work and the references that Lori checked. Dr. Schultz did list that he has a current contract for his new firm, Schultz & Associates, with the Schindler Law Firm, which is based in Missouri, and that is to conduct an analysis of Missouri's funding formula for education. He also listed two previous projects that he had done individually. The Maryland Public Policy Institute hired him as an individual education expert to conduct an independent analysis of Maryland's commission on innovation and excellence in education, their recommendations that came out of the legislation that Maryland had passed regarding their adequacy for education. And then he also listed the Show Me Institute, which is an institute in Missouri that he provides public policy analysis for. the bid for him again is $499,236 he proposes that the OEP will provide three personnel in addition to him himself and then he has the four other subcontractors listed and then Lori can go through what she found when she contacted his references Thank
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 19 30:10
you. In response to question one regarding the type of work that they had done, Jill's kind of covered a little bit of that. For the Show Me Institute, Dr. Schulz had actually been a former employee. He had been their education policy director. And when he left to go teaching full time, the director had asked that Dr. Schulz consider becoming a fellow for the institute, which he agreed to do. And so he continues to do research for them under that status. And again, as she mentioned, he also has an ongoing, he has provided them a report, according to Mr. Schindler, who I spoke with, but that he has been looking at the state's foundation formula in Missouri. And specifically, Mr. Schindler mentioned that the formula is based on a 2004-based tax rate. And he had asked Dr. Schultz to evaluate the impact of that over time and the future potential impact of that. The Maryland Public Policy Institute indicated that he had done extensive research on reviewing the recommendations of the commission that Jill made reference to. It's the title or the name of that commission is the Kerwin Commission. and he also asked them to do a historical analysis of K-12 funding and finance in Maryland. In response to question two about responsiveness, accessibility, and availability, all of them, without exception, were very favorable and said that he absolutely was responsive and available to them. Under question three, regarding the satisfaction with the work performed, all of them were very satisfied with his work. One of which the Maryland respondent said that that would be an understatement, that he was, that found his work very helpful. Under question four, under what, excuse me, the strengths are for Schultz and Associates, under the Show Me Institute indicated that Dr. Schultz was very thorough and careful, an excellent writer, communicator, person of integrity, and follows through on commitments. she did not have any specific weaknesses to point out for Dr. Schulz the Schindler law firm indicated that the strengths were met all deadlines was affable a nice guy said he did not really see any weaknesses either he said his reports are readable without grammar problems or glaring errors and that he came in under budget which he had found to be unusual in his line of work. For Maryland, the strengths mentioned were that he could only make comments about strengths. He said that this was not due to bias because it was his first encounter or opportunity to work with Dr. Shules, but that Dr. Shules had met every deadline, had engaged in good conversations with them, was accessible, nonpartisan, and he did a good job of showing the history of Maryland's investment in education under question five regarding problems with contract or billing issues none of them had any issues to report under question six regarding whether they would recommend shuls and associates for similar work they all indicated that they would and the show me institute of course because they are still cooperating with him in this fellow status is continuing to work with him the Schindler law firm he's while they're still in the mid process if they're nearing the completion of that work but he said there's possibility that he might need some supplemental help and that he would definitely use him and then Maryland said yes they would both recommend and that he would use him again in the last question regarding just any other observations only Mr. Schindler from the Schindler law firm had any additional comments to add and he commented that he it was his recollection that Dr. Schultz had been an elementary school educator and that he had thought that that might have lended some human element to the report and work that Dr. Schultz had done for them and just generally observed that he was rock solid he said and that he would hire him and would recommend the state of Arkansas to do likewise And that was a general summary of what
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 34:45
we learned. I would just conclude my part by saying that there are a couple of things in both proposals. One, both entities state that they would like to have a November 2020 date for a final report to these bodies. That's up to you all to decide whether or not that works for you. but that would leave only one month remaining on the contract with them to work with you on any proposed legislation or recommendations that you might come up with. The other thing I would point out is that the RFP does state clearly in the scope of work that you would require any consultant that you hire to come to monthly meetings with you, provide you with monthly status updates, and to work with you on any additional research requests that members of these committees may have. there's not really much mention of that in either one of the proposals so that might be something you would want to know more about to make sure that that's included in the price that you've been quoted from each of them again the decision here and if any action is taken would be whether or not to bring anybody to your next meeting and then at that meeting is when you would determine whether or not you would award a contract right now the policy making subcommittee of legislative council is scheduled to meet on october 16th and if there is a contract they would hear that and make a recommendation to the full legislative council at its october 18th meeting and if council approves a contract your consultant would then be ready to be in working as of that day we would sign the contract and move forward so i'll take any questions thank
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 36:38
you mr. chair for APA I was trying to I heard I think that they have hired a local subcontractor now those folks that are listed under are they listed on here and I'm not finding them no and i actually did a
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 36:55
document search to make sure i wasn't missing it but what they do state is that they plan to work with a local university but that uh entity is to be determined so they haven't chosen them yet they have allotted an amount in their price
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 37:10
though okay and do you know what uh dr shules is it shules am i saying it correctly um what what do you know what his final findings were some kind of snapshot of the Maryland innovation report is that the current report I believe appendix
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 42 37:30
e to his proposal has his his findings his work samples
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 37:36
and he I believe that's one of the ones that he did provide. Okay.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 37:45
And so, and also for Dr. Shules, he, and he is, he's the one that is going to partner with OEP, and okay, and he's a graduate of University of Arkansas. Do you happen to know, or did it, does it say, and I'll just have to find it later, if he's a graduate of the school, Is he a graduate of the School of Education, OEP, blah, blah, blah? Because that just almost sounds a little too incestuous for
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 38:12
mine. I will have to look. His resume is included in here. I'll go back. You just go
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 38:17
ahead to the next question. I'll go back and look at it. I know we're just getting it.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 38:25
It looks like he got his Ph.D. from the University of Arkansas in 2013. his elementary education master's was from Missouri State University in 2007 and his bachelor's in elementary education was Missouri Southern State University in 2004. Okay, all right, thank you. Representative Silvett.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 53 38:55
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The process in this is that these groups come up with a list of recommendations and then we as a political body decide which of those. Did any of the people that you talked to say that we took eight of their recommendations and as a result of that we've seen great things happen? I mean, they say they're nice people and they work well and they attend meetings, but I didn't hear anybody nor see anything in the reports that said as a result of their analysis and recommendations we follow the x recommendations and as a result of that things are a lot better i don't see that anywhere i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 19 39:41
don't think that we got that type of a comment from from them necessarily other than a couple of the remarks they were pleased with the results and they had thought that they had been helpful for the purposes that they had laid out in their individual request for help. But I don't know that any of them commented on how public education had either improved or, you know, been impacted by their work. Okay, thank
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 58 40:18
you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Representative Lowry.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 59 40:22
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have two specific questions but the first one be in looking at the references or reading out on the references on APA there were two different states that specifically mentioned and I thought it was unique that they would mention a specific person that they had problems with this Dr. Taylor uh would we if we were to choose apa would we have the flexibility the the authority to be able to stipulate or to suggest to apa that they not use a particular i know i looked up dr taylor and he's part of west ed so he's part of their staff he's not a subcontractor would we have that flexibility to be able to say that based on those previous recommendations we would ask that dr taylor not be part of this uh this
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 41:19
process absolutely yes and it's stated in the rfp that the committees have final approval over any personnel
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 41:25
used on the project including subcontractors okay um follow-up mr
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 59 41:33
chair the other question i have i know we referenced the submittal of the final report by November of 2020 and I've spoken with the chair about hoping that we would have the flexibility to be able to target some specific areas that we as a committee have been talking about for some time so that whoever we hire might be able to prioritize looking at those areas would we have the flexibility of asking for preliminary reports on those targeted areas so that we would maybe have even more time to propose legislation in the
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 67 42:12
the 21 session yes what we
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 42:17
usually do with our consultants is they do come to whichever body they are working for every month and provide updates in the form of small reports but you can also ask them to come to you and give you information on specific topics that's what those additional requests are as long as it stays on topic with the scope of work, and we're not going outside of that. And we didn't put anything in there as far as a big preliminary formal type of report. It's possible that you could ask the entities that you bring back whether or not they feel that's something that's included. If not, it's something we could probably negotiate with them before a
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 63 42:59
contract's entered. Okay. Actually, I'd like to be back in the queue of... Pardon? Do I have one more question? Okay. um
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 59 43:07
would they have uh and i know we get a lot of the we we get the matrix numbers from blr of um you know where recommendations might actually come up with a dollar figure will they have access to working with blr on providing those same for instance let me just give a hypothetical if we were to make a recommendation of say pulling transportation out of the matrix and making it categorical, would they have access to all of those numbers to be able to show us what the net effect would be dollar-wise? They
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 43:48
would certainly have access to all past adequacy reports that have been done and adopted. I don't know that there would be the ability to work directly with our staff as they're conducting your current adequacy study. They could to a certain degree, but as far as if that changed how you wanted it done, that's already been set and scheduled out for this biennium. That would definitely be something that we would have to look at. But Nell Smith would probably have more information about that. But that's not what we have in the RFP or the scope of work.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 44:25
But, yes, all information that we have for all adequacy studies conducted previously would be something that they could use and look at. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 63 44:33
Chair. Senator Chesterfield. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Jill, did
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Linda Chesterfield Unverified 44:42
they say why, Schultz say why they wanted to create themselves to deal with this issue? That is not in their proposal. So they just created themselves to deal with this issue is all you have. Is that right?
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 44:56
That's what it is stated in their cover letter. Yes.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Linda Chesterfield Unverified 45:02
One of the things that we expressed to Augenblick was the fact that we wanted them to deal with the Lakeview case. Was that information shared with Schultz, and what was their response to the importance of Lakeview? No,
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 45:19
I have not. the only communication up to this point with these consultants is answering any questions that they had about the RFP which I received no questions from any vendor about the RFP and then since the proposals came in gathering any information that was missing but I have not gotten into the meat of their proposal or their purpose or how they would handle that that's for these committees to do if you would like for us to do that before they come here we can certainly ask
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Linda Chesterfield Unverified 45:49
them right And my final question, Mr. Chair, is what is the ethnic makeup of these companies? That I do
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 45:56
not know. It hasn't been stated, and that's not something that we looked into. APA was here previously, but as far as Shules and Associates, it's just Dr. Shules. He's a one-man show? Yes, ma'am. And this is to go across this state? Yes. But he has partnered with OEP and has four additional subcontractors listed. Thank you, Madam Chair. Representative Birch.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative LeAnne Burch Unverified 46:36
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My memory is not the greatest, so bear with me a second, please. Under APA's proposal on page two, it says, when talking about their weaknesses, they need to hire an editor. One of the only frustrations that the Department of Ed in Maryland had was that they needed better edited work. It required more staff time to review their work before it came before the legislature. I seem to recall that that complaint was in the earlier proposal or the earlier consideration whenever they had it. so they must have been at least on notice that another department of ed in that was being considered had said that about them is that too much to assume that they knew that complaint um well the references
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 47:23
that lori presented today are the same ones that you had previously so they we didn't update
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 47 47:28
those because they gave us the same ones so with the understanding that they
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative LeAnne Burch Unverified 47:36
probably knew that as the department of ed said that they can't do work without having extra staff that had to be paid for by the department or the state apparently before it went for the legislature did they offer any explanation or in any way address that in this proposal not that i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 48:08
So, no. Thank you. On the APA contract, under the references where they say there were differing opinions on whether Dr. Taylor was the best fit for the work, can we find out something I would like to know if it's not I guess too much of a surgical move to understand that better because I don't know that that means that person wouldn't be a good fit for us. It's on page 2 number 4 under the weaknesses Dr. Taylor made specific recommendations regarding K-12 adequacy funding using data provided by the Kansas Department of Education for all of their school districts and their special needs. I don't assume it would be here, but I can't discern what the problem was other than to say they had different views about subcontracting so if it's possible to get some more information without you know getting into too much of a privacy issue I'd like to understand that better because I don't want to assume this would be an issue for us just because it would be for somebody
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 75 49:33
else if we can't find out that's all mr. chair and I think Lori has some additional information on that
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 49:39
and I will point out Lori Dr. Lori Taylor was included on the first bid by APA as a subcontractor and has been removed for this one and would not be a subcontractor this time I just looked back at their first proposal and yeah Dr. Taylor was listed there but is not now so we don't know that whether it was
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 49:57
removed to I don't know if that's in
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 75 50:00
response to the questions that they received when they were here last time or not and
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 50:06
yeah I don't remember discussion about her okay all right well she's not gonna be on there I just don't don't waste your time
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 94 50:27
and so represent Murdoch thank you chair this may be a question for the chairs in terms
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 50:32
of the disqualification of one company for being non-responsive but shows who also
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 50:38
had some things they did not complete initially according to the RFP but were deemed responsive between I guess BLR and you guys can you tell me the determination that was made whereby one was sorry you missed that you were late no i was listening to
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 97 50:58
it and i didn't hear it i heard everything but i didn't hear that
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 99 51:04
i didn't hear that definition why you determine one over
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 5 51:09
the other again and with regard
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 51:11
to total employee sourcing we did not even receive original documents from them at all so which means they were non-responsive in that sense we didn't get their bid we got an email but we did not get original signed documents did did
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 99 51:25
the email include everything no i did
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 51:28
go through the email and so what you see here are the things that were missing from their email i just wanted to make sure that even with that that um whether or not it was responsive
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 51:40
but so so they had several non-responsive items even in including not sending an original document so shows and associates go ahead and with shules and associates
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 51:52
there were a couple of of technicality issues missing i brought that here for the committees to determine because it wasn't a major with the other one it was as though we didn't receive it at all because we didn't get an original with these we did and it's up to y'all to decide whether or not you feel that makes their bid non-responsive or not um it's
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 52:16
uh so you conferred with the committee chairs and they made the determination that shuls was okay with
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 52:22
their they have not made that determination
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 52:24
they no i'm talking in terms of
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 52:26
non-responsiveness is what i'm calling right and they didn't
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 52:29
they determined that that was something that needs to come in front of this body to decide who determined then
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 52:38
that this is what I'm trying to understand is if someone did not respond properly then that can by itself be determined non-responsive period so in this particular case though only one of the two that did not respond properly have or one of those have already been determined non-responsive why wouldn't we have had both of these here to make the same decision or a different decision that's my question
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 53:06
and if this body would like to you can certainly consider the total employee sourcing uh bid as well but the uh the chairs determined that because it was such a severe omission and that there was no original documentation submitted at all um that they would be considered non-responsive with regard to the shuls um bid because it was not as clear-cut
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 53:30
it's here for this committee to just these committees right so that's what that was my
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 53:36
point you know that the chairs made that decision because of the severity of the response or like they're of they made a decision instead of the committee on one of them but not the other they choose so the chairs made the decision so my questions to the chairs then what was the reasoning for making that decision both of them were non-responsive to some degree why did you all versus just bringing them to us and
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 54:06
let us make that decision well i'll answer first the the third third bidder that really didn't send in anything hard copy at all as required so that showed me that they really did not pay attention or did not want to bid this job they just threw a bid in if they were the only bidder then we might would pick them and believe me being a contractor i know how that goes so uh i was not um i didn't even know what their bid was but i just knew it was a low bid so i just i told jill i said i'll use your discretion but i believe if they did not even throw anything out there hard bid then we would have nothing to stand on now we didn't find out until just a little bit later that there was us some other things on the other one but that's up to this committee today if which one you want to look at on the other two you can pick and choose or you can choose both to hear from us so that's up to you you will make that decision on the other ones
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Jane English Unverified 55:11
I'm sure I think but what Bruce is saying is is is we have talked about this and we looked at this and because there really isn't a proposal that we have received so So there's really nothing for us to look at to say yay or nay. We want them to come. There is nothing, no proposal. Right.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 55:34
And, again, I'm certainly not saying that what they sent is adequate and would have made it past this committee at all, but I just seen that with someone having a different level of lack of responsiveness that we made a decision. And probably this committee decision would have been exactly what you've done, but I just as a matter of process was asking the
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 104 55:54
question and now I have the answer thank you so
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Jane English Unverified 55:58
the committee can vote to listen to one of them or both of them or none of them if that's that that's
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 56:08
your choice if you feel that's an important issue um no ma'am that the question was about the process that you use to eliminate two non-respondent applicants that were different in their non-response the level of non-response that you made a determination versus the committee no I'm not that's all that's the end of that's all that I
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 123 56:26
was really oh all right okay moving right along
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 58 56:29
representative Lowry thank you Mr. Chair
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 59 56:36
um let me follow up on that questioning uh I know we have had other contracts that have come before ALC where and it may be a totally different process but two bidders the winning bidders ends up being thrown out because the losing bidder says wait a minute there was a violation of the process there was information that came out later these specific areas where there may be a non-response from the second bidder is there latitude for them to correct that um correct those omissions or to supplement their information without us running into one of these challenge type situations that is up to this committee
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 69 57:32
to determine um the rfp does not state that those are automatic
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 57:39
uh rejections of those bids so it's up for you to determine um i can't say whether or not another entity would protest on that basis they always have that ability under the rfp
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 57:50
to do so and that protest would be filed with the executive subcommittee of legislative council okay would
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 125 57:58
not necessarily go go to um office of procurement no
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 58:02
sir none of this is controlled by them
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 59 58:05
okay and my follow-up question on the i heard the tail end of the discussion about dr lori taylor Are we certain that that is the Dr. Taylor that was negatively referenced in the APA references? Because there is a Dr. Taylor that is on staff with West Ed that's a different Taylor. Pardon? I thought you said Lori. The staff member is Darius Taylor, and I'm wanting to find out which Taylor was the one that was negatively referenced.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 19 58:48
Do we know that? Dr. Taylor, that I understood, the Dr. Taylor that was referenced in the Kansas reference, was from Texas A&M University and was a subcontractor. And there were a couple of issues, one of which was, again, related back to more political rather than performance necessarily issues. Apparently a former member had helped with the selection of that individual, and that was not acceptable to all parties involved. But then there was another issue that related to some supplemental materials that were provided with the report that either due to a photocopying error or they're not sure what happened. Some of the supplemental materials were not included in the final report, and it led some individuals to be concerned about the validity of the report because it made it appear as if some districts had been omitted. They went back and verified none of the substance was affected by that at all, but just the fact that some of the supplementary information was incomplete gave some people pause. Okay, and that was
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 63 59:58
information tied to Dr. Tia Taylor. No, sir, that was Dr. Lori Taylor. It's on
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:00:05
Kansas' report on the number one question. Yes, it does say that. It says Dr. Lori Taylor from Texas A&M, yes. Where are we getting the Tia? Oh.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 63 1:00:21
Okay. All right. That's clear as mud. Thank you. Thank you, Mr.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:00:32
Chair. Senator Elliott. Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is Schultz and Associates. Did not submitted one proposal without OPPS. I don't know what OPPS is, so tell me what that
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:00:45
is, please. Sorry, that's their official price proposal sheet, and that's where they submitted one proposal without it and then a proposal with it, and the RFP asks for pricing information to be separately sealed. And did you say
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:01:01
or do you know the reason we cannot, that they don't have a tax ID number? They do
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:01:09
have one. They just didn't submit it. They just didn't submit it. I do have it now. I
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:01:16
got it this past Friday morning. Okay, so you've got everything there. Okay. And that was my only other question. I'd just like you to ask APA if they can do this, if they can tell us any reason that will not violate privacy, why they made that substitution, and I guess I could go back by looking at last ones and this time, but who is the substitute person and why should that make us feel better? because I really don't want to get us I don't know this person have no personal interest I don't want us to get bogged down in Kansas' politics that's the major thing that's their issue if they have it and I think that was it I had another question but I found the answer thank you Mr. Chair Rep. De
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 142 1:02:15
La Rosa Thank you Mr. Chair I had a question it's regarding the Schultz proposal how do we fund or do we fund the office of education policy because I'm kind of it's kind of a weird thing that we would end up paying people that work at the OEP at the University of Arkansas which we fund to then do something for us which we would also I feel like we're double paying but if they're not funded by us then I'd just like to know who they are where they come from and and what do we pay towards them right and and i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:02:49
don't know the answer to that but can certainly get it for you and have it for this committee these committees before your next meeting the reason i ask that question
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 142 1:02:58
because it's on page ii which i don't even know how to tell you where that is in the schultz thing but it just says the oep's mission is to serve as a resource resource for arkansas lawmakers educators and minister well I think that's us, so I'm just trying to figure out if we're already within their scope of practice here or if we're going outside of it, but I'd appreciate an answer
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 110 1:03:21
to that. Absolutely, and I will tell you when I began gathering documentation on them,
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:03:27
as I had for WestEd last time and contacted them this last week to get their tax ID number and check all of, and then was told, well, it's the same as the University of Arkansas,
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 47 1:03:38
so they are part of the University of Arkansas system, but we
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Jim Dotson Unverified 1:03:53
will find out the funding mechanism. Representative Dotson. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Excuse me. So just so I'm clear as far as the RFP, if there is, say we move forward to hear from both of these and there is a a challenge that doesn't go to anybody else other than to the legislature and then we would make that determination as far as the the legislative council executive subcommittee i'm assuming would make that challenge that determination whether to uphold or dismiss that challenge yes sir and then
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 1:04:27
of course legislative council has to adopt any action of that subcommittee okay
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Jim Dotson Unverified 1:04:33
so I mean I'm not sure mr. chair if we're at the place where where we're considering one thing or another but just in the hope that we could hear from both of these whenever the proper time is for motion I'd make a motion we hear from both of
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 149 1:04:56
them we'll hold off to all questions then
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 94 1:05:04
we'll make a motion okay Representative Murdoch. Thank you again. Do you know, I was looking
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:05:11
through the RFP for the, sometimes in contract solicitations there is a, the owner has the right to waive any informalities as they make some decisions, final decisions, which would allow for the flexibility that has been exercised to disqualify one allow someone else to do something subsequent to a response you know after a post-response type of activity so what we have here and you know I've dealt with a lot of state contracts so I know what you subject yourself to when you're not consistent across the board whether you got a third party that's or a third bidder that's totally irrelevant and a second one is better than that third one uh still non-compliance is non-compliance sometimes there is a waiving of formalities that is allowed for that will allow us to do that uh so as a matter of process is still where i am i'm not at choosing i'm just at process now to make sure that we're doing it in a manner to prevent challenges we need to do a good job of making sure we're keeping ourself consistent and we're doing it in a manner that it's not going to cause us any future problems so on the informalities do you know if that's possible are you
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:06:36
familiar with what i'm talking about yes sir and and i really all i can say is the the rfp there are a couple of things that say this is it this is if you don't do this you're rejected on other things it says that this may result in and that this the committees are the final determiner of that um we don't have anything in here that says and it'll be applied the same every time that's you know usually implied um but again it's just going to be your discretion and and what you feel comfortable with and um if there were to be any kind of a protest in front of executive subcommittee you know the chairs would also appear to
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 46 1:07:17
give their side of that so right and i think
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:07:22
that this discussion would be a
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:07:24
if there ever is a a protest to it i think someone i think this would be prudent to know that it was given some diligence in even in this forum to justify whatever decision is made my last question is can you again talk about the OPPS in the price sheet that was not submitted was well let me ask
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:07:47
this question prior to or or with their response was a price sheet submitted by Schultz Schultz yes there was and so it just was they didn't give you a no go
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:08:04
Well, the RFP says that pricing from the official proposal price sheet must be separately sealed and submitted from the proposal response and clearly marked as pricing information. And then it has to be done the same way for the electronic versions that they submit. What every other time I've done this, they submit their pricing sheet on its own, sealed up separately. and then also in a separate e-mail or on a separate flash drive, however they're electronically submitting. For Shul's, they submitted a proposal that was just a proposal with no pricing information, but then they also submitted the same proposal with pricing information on the front of it. So it wasn't separate from the proposal. It was with it, but there were two separate submissions. Was the pricing sheet with
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 156 1:08:57
the flash drive, or was it with the written proposal? It was
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:09:01
with the written, and it was also with the e-mail. it's all one in the email is one big PDF the pricing's on the front and then with the hard copies they submitted bound copies and one of those bound copies had the price bound into the front of it thank you and then I will also say I did find the language in here that says the committee is reserved to award a contract or reject a proposal for any or all line items of a proposal received if it is in the best interest of the committees to do so. So your best interest is what determines the basis for accepting or rejecting.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Brian S. Evans Unverified 1:09:46
Representative Evans. Thank you Mr. Chair. Ms. Laurie, thank you very much for your diligence in gathering all of the reference data. As we have learned through this process there is a very small select number of companies that are out there that do this work and because of that I believe that parallels that there's only so much data that they can collect because there's only so many pools out there that are going to take this large step and use these services so in looking at that and thinking through that In your reference call to Matt Wilmarth from the Wyoming legislature, he made a point to state that Arkansas should make sure that APA does not provide canned recommendation from reports. So there was something triggered that response. I didn't see anything else in any other responses from anyone else that pointed direct to that. Do you think that there was a triggering event that caused him, in their experience, to state that? Or was that just goodwill on his part to let us be aware that that is a possibility with there only being so
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 19 1:11:12
many sources available? I'm not sure that I can address that fully, but I do think he provided a few recommendations to us. as we were just talking with him about things to keep in mind, and that was one of them, just that we encouraged them to be very specific about Arkansas educational needs. And I'm not sure that I can comment beyond that. There was no further elaboration on him on the recommendation? I don't believe that he did expound or say that we found X, that's causing me to make this comment. I don't think he was that specific. I can certainly go back and listen. We do have a tape of it that
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:12:09
I can listen to. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Senator Elliott. I wrote my questions down. Now I've got to find it. There's two, I think. One was, did... Well, one had to do with whether or not the tax ID number, did you say the tax ID number for OEP is the same as University of Arkansas' tax ID number?
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 135 1:12:36
Let me have their documentation here. Okay. Leave. i know that i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 143 1:12:53
believe it was but i know that what they sent back to me was
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 1:13:01
u of a stuff let's see um yes because i asked them for um i wasn't
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:13:09
sure who they were when i started out i asked for a certificate of good standing showing they're certified to do business in the state, their illegal immigrant certification, the Israel boycott certification, their EEO policy, and their executive order disclosure forms that shows whether or not they have any conflicts with any of you. And what I got back from them was all U of A information, the U of A's illegal immigrant certification, et cetera. And I don't... and the illegal immigrant certification is in the vendor name of University of Arkansas okay so and that that one you search
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:13:55
by tax ID number okay so do you know if if an entity such as OEP is being paid by somebody other than University of Arkansas itself or public dollars would they be allowed to still use, if they are being paid by somebody who's not a part of University of Arkansas funding, would they still be able to use U of A tax ID number? I do not know the answer to that. And my last question is, will you please ask, be sure that APA, I guess they will tell us who their local contractors are? Yes. Thank you.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 94 1:14:45
That's it, Mr. Chair. thank you um jill was was did sure
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:14:51
was sure did sure um provide a response the initial time to this one out were they responding no
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:14:59
sir the the first time we only received the apa west ed proposal do you
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 104 1:15:04
know of any legislative member that may have encouraged sure to do
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:15:09
this encourage no or even recommended them to do this um i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:15:17
did receive a list of entities to email to but um i don't know that anybody was encouraged to respond or i don't know the answer to that sure
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 104 1:15:28
was on a list that you received from a legislature a member of legislative body the chairs asked members
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 10 1:15:34
to let me know if there was anybody that they would like the RFP sent to and and Dr. Scholz was one of those yes my question
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:15:44
is because with them not being an entity that does this so there's not a record of him doing this obviously so he put together a team for this so out of transparency I'm asking this question to know how did this where did this come from so my question to the chairs would be where did this come from how did how did you all know whomever recommended show how did you all know that they would do this or wanted to do this usually when an rfp goes out people that respond to these are people first of all with experience at this because usually if i don't have any experience at this i i see no real opportunity that i'm going to be chosen for such a task when i've never done this before i have no experience as a team to do such a task so usually i may be encouraged or recommended by someone so my question for transparency is where did
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:16:39
the show dr shaw's encouragement come from reps and murdoch you'd have to i'd have to ask somebody
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:16:45
to raise their hand that might have suggested them because i i have no clue who they are is anybody never heard their name until we got this back so i mean somebody wants to say that they recommended them they could say that but i it was not from me and i'm
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:17:03
sure do you understand that the question i mean i think
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:17:07
you're saying that somebody possibly recommended them or thinking they recommend them to bid on this project is that what
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 113 1:17:13
i absolutely go put together a team because we need this done they don't do this according
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:17:18
to their submission they've never he hadn't done this in this manner so they put together a team to come do this apa and the others that obviously have years and years of experience uh at least at doing this so and i'm not saying there's anything wrong with that i'm just asking for transparency what are we working with i
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:17:35
think can i can i ask uh he has done this
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 170 1:17:39
for other places though right no no i'm i'm sorry well i mean we
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:17:46
got we've got people that they've work for yes sir as an individual he has performed this work for entities as listed in his proposal and the ones that Laurie
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:17:59
checked his references for so again it's again it's not too I'm not disparaging this applicant in terms of their qualifications their ability to do something individually and what they've have contributed to a team or as an employee for another outfit what I'm saying is this required generally an entity to to respond to inside of his proposal is response so you'll see there are some things absent because it has not been a team there has not been a history of this so again I just want to make sure we're starting out the right way and that we just everything is on the table. And again, not that they can't come together if it meets all the other questions that have been asked about OEP and their relationships. If all that makes out, it's not a problem. But let's just say what it is. If it was Murdoch that did it, I would say yes. I know Dr. Shaw. I recommended that because I thought it would be great for the need
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 113 1:19:00
that we have. And I would say that. Somebody did that. And
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:19:05
it's okay to say that. I don't know who that would be, but I'll speak to, I guess, the way that it would be done. I mean, I know I'm a builder. I can't do everything. Sometimes I have to put together a team every time I build a house. So he may have done a lot of smaller things, but then come together for something larger like this, and this may be small to him. I don't know. Like I said, I don't know the company, don't know them at all. But you've got to put a team together, and I think even the other people are putting a team together to make this work. So I don't see a problem with him putting a team together and trying to do it. I don't think you do either. No, it's not a problem. I don't have a problem. But I don't know. I've never heard a thing about anybody recommending, so I'm kind of
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Jane English Unverified 1:19:51
– that's the first time I've heard that. Well, I think that Jill asked early on if anybody had any idea of somebody to send it to to let her know who that was. so anybody could have sent her yeah anybody could have sent her something nobody but
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 173 1:20:09
it could have come from anywhere
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:20:14
i'm saying i can't talk to you about what other members have asked me to do without them allowing me
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 113 1:20:25
to do that i'm sorry okay let me get back to that then so now you
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:20:32
just did something else. The question was clearly asked and this is not, this is not anything about legislation or anything that's proprietary. If someone came to you and asked you to possibly ask to invite him as a bidder, I just don't think that, but
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 175 1:20:50
yes you can, yes you can. No, there's nothing wrong with it, it's just a
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 95 1:20:54
discussion. There's nothing wrong with you answering this question knows that's not it's not it's nothing wrong with
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 96 1:21:01
your answer this question but I think that you're gonna be told you can't answer this question so let me let let me make it simple for you and let you don't worry about answering that question you the question is really being answered right
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 129 1:21:14
now thank you Yeah, that's confidentially why she can't
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 176 1:21:16
answer. That's not true, but we okay. Yeah, that's fine.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Rick Beck Unverified 1:21:20
Representative Beck. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And this may be, we may have to answer this outside of this meeting, but there's a significant difference in these prices in the earlier one. Is there any way that you guys can, or that you saw, is there anything that you see, what's the big difference? you know, APA, right, bid with another group before, and they were, I'm rounding, it was like $300,000 more for the same job. So it's almost like you're buying a car here, it's like, okay, what's not in this car that was in that car? So I'm curious as to what that's about. I mean, is there anything that jumps out, like there's 500 less hours of supervision or something like
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:22:10
that there there are a couple of things um shuls does not list any support staff whereas apa does so i imagine those you know are administrative assistants and and people that are helping with the project that aren't the um managing personnel the travel expenses are very different apa has $30,000 more listed than Shulls and Associates who has $15,000 for the year of work. Now again I would point out both of them will be required to be present at your meetings every month so I don't know if they've taken those travel expenses into account or not but it could be that APA is based in Denver and Shulls and Associates is in Missouri and is using OEP who are based here so that might cut that down
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Rick Beck Unverified 1:23:04
some and I'm sorry I didn't make myself clear I apologize I wasn't work I wasn't concerned about the two that we have in front of us I was worried about the earlier bid that they were involved with is essentially less than the bid now so is there anything that jumps
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:23:21
out yes between those two bids I think part of it is that the time has been cut back severely the original contract would have gone into place in June of this year this one won't until October so it cuts several months of work off they've also eliminated three of their subcontractors that they had listed on the previous bid that are not listed on this one those are the two main ones that i know of it could be that the change to the scope of work previously they were going to look at three possible routes of adequacy studies and now that has been removed um but that's something you definitely need to ask them as far as the the plan but the the personnel is something that's very different.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Rick Beck Unverified 1:24:02
So apparently they took the leather off the seats and we got just regular
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 85 1:24:07
seats. I'm not sure. Thank you.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified 1:24:15
I get it. I'm fine. This is a process question, Ms. Thayer. If I were to recommend Rick Beck to you as a person I want you to contact to bid on this contract on this contract what would that look like would you just do you call that person say you should bid do you just put it out there and hope he bids what what
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 75 1:24:38
actually happens my process is that on the day
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 6 1:24:41
that this committee adopted in the timeline for the rfp to be released i actually start the day before contacting the office of state procurement to get all the paperwork done to have it put out on their website and with any additional people after it's been posted on the osp website i email them and i have a form email just to let them know um you know it seems like this might be the type of work that you do here's the rfp please let me know if you're interested. Okay. All right. Thank
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:25:18
you. All right. Seeing no more questions. I have a motion you have to make because it has come here. If you want to make it, I'll let you do it, but you're going to have to read it because it has one request in there that has to be added to their bill and you'll have to name both of the consultants but just make sure that they have their very bottom part on that we just have to add something that was left off of a qualified thing not really a qualified thing Repson Dotson you are
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Speaker 184 1:25:57
recognized thank you Mr. Chair I move that for the committees to extend an invitation to
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Jim Dotson Unverified 1:26:13
APA and Shoals, both consultants, to appear here at the October 8th meeting of the education committees and give oral presentations and to request that they provide hourly rates for all subcontractors prior to that date. That's
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified 1:26:33
a proper motion. Do I have a second? I have a second. No discussion. All in favor say aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Looks like we will be seeing them on the 8th, and we'll let you get a hold of them. Is there any other things to come before this committee? We will hear adequacy on the Monday of the 7th. Is that correct? Yeah. and we will hear this proposal on the 8th from the consultants. We'll hear from both of them. Thank you all for coming. Without objection, we are adjourned.
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error
Unknown speaker 1:27:33
Thank you. Thank you. You
▶ Play Suggest a correction Report an error

Agenda

No agenda available.

Documents

No documents posted.

Speakers

Representative Bruce Cozart Unverified
24 segments
Speaker 4
1 segment
Speaker 5
2 segments
Speaker 6
81 segments
Speaker 7
1 segment
Speaker 19
31 segments
Speaker 10
8 segments
Senator Joyce Elliott Unverified
31 segments
Speaker 42
1 segment
Speaker 53
2 segments
Speaker 58
2 segments
Speaker 59
11 segments
Speaker 46
6 segments
Speaker 67
1 segment
Speaker 63
4 segments
Senator Linda Chesterfield Unverified
3 segments
Representative LeAnne Burch Unverified
4 segments
Speaker 47
2 segments
Speaker 75
3 segments
Speaker 94
3 segments
Speaker 95
11 segments
Speaker 96
24 segments
Speaker 97
1 segment
Speaker 99
2 segments
Senator Jane English Unverified
4 segments
Speaker 104
4 segments
Speaker 123
1 segment
Speaker 69
1 segment
Speaker 125
1 segment
Speaker 142
4 segments
Speaker 110
1 segment
Representative Jim Dotson Unverified
6 segments
Speaker 149
1 segment
Speaker 156
1 segment
Representative Brian S. Evans Unverified
4 segments
Speaker 135
1 segment
Speaker 143
1 segment
Speaker 113
3 segments
Speaker 170
1 segment
Speaker 173
1 segment
Speaker 175
1 segment
Speaker 129
1 segment
Speaker 176
1 segment
Representative Rick Beck Unverified
6 segments
Speaker 85
1 segment
Speaker 184
1 segment