Baltimore County, MD Hello Baltimore County, 1 Aug 2017

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From YouTube: County Streamlines Procurement Process to Aid MBE/WBE Firms

Description

Learn about big changes to the County’s procurement process that make it easier for smaller firms to compete.

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Welcome to hello! baltimore county., I'm your host, ellen kobler,, and there is big news in baltimore county.

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For minority and women-owned businesses.

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here to tell us all about it are carla tucker,, who is the county's minority and small business marketing manager and chuck ingram, chief of construction contracts, administration.

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For the department of public works., thank you both so much for joining us. thank you.. Thank you.. Carla, tell us a little bit about the county's minority and women-owned enterprise program.

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Well,, the minority business enterprise program in baltimore, county.

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Is a program that is put together for minority and women businesses,.

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Which tend to be small. they're, small businesses., and the purpose of that program is to encourage the inclusion.

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Of the smaller companies in the procurement process.

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okay. and the county's had a procurement process for a long time,.

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And there's systems in place to try to encourage.

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These businesses to participate. right?.

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Yes,, but at times, the smaller companies tend not to be able to bid against the larger companies.

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so,. We incorporated a program that would assist them.

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In participating in that process. okay., and what do we do to encourage them?.

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How does it work? so,, what we do is we do educational outreach efforts.

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That we host, meet the primes, meet the buyers,.

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That we introduce the vendor community to the opportunities that we have.

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So, kind of helping to facilitate networking,.

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So smaller businesses can interact with the larger ones..

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That's correct., that's correct..

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And then we also set goals on contracts to encourage the use.

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Of subcontracting of minority and women businesses, as well.

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Okay.- and this is for county contracts. chuck,, can you give us a sense of what types of projects baltimore county has,? What types of business opportunities?.

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Sure. in terms of construction, opportunities,, abundant, to say the least.

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In terms of scope, think about just about any type of road,.

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Bridge, building, utility project, pumping stations, environmental work.

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Schools. parks.

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Pretty much any time you see, construction, activity.,.

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That's correct. and these projects' sizes range from maybe just a few $100,000 dollars up to many millions.

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Okay. and any other types of contracts beyond construction?.

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Absolutely. baltimore county actually also buys health and human services training,.

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Computer/It-Related contracts.

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so,. We have opportunity across the gamut.

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Okay. and recently, county executive kamenetz issued an executive order.

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To improve the procurement process to assist with.

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Kind of efficiency for businesses,, but it also is targeted towards.

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These smaller, minority- and women-owned businesses.

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Tell us what's: different., that's correct.

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So,, one of the components that's different with the executive order, is that we are now allowing minority firms and women firms.

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To count up to 50% of the subcontracting goal.

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That are set in the contracts. and that's to encourage more prime contracting opportunities for minority and women. Businesses.

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Okay. so, prime contracting means that you're, like the general contractor type of thing?,.

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Yes., you would be the general contractor, and you would be paid directly by the county,.

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Provided that the invoice that you submitted is approved by the county.

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You would be paid within 30 days of that submittal.

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okay. and there's also a streamlining of the process. Itself. right, chuck?.

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Definitely. and I'll stay off my soapbox here,, but I just want to say that,.

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You know,, we consider all our processes that need to be evaluated. Periodically,.

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Just to make sure they're holding up, and they're still functioning the way they need to.

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and through a recent collaborative effort between the department of public works and department of budget and finance,.

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We work with our colleagues there, and we identified some refinements to the pre-qualification process. That--.

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It's really paying off, in terms of speeding up the process.

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Okay. so,, what does that mean for a person,, a contractor that might want to do business with baltimore county?.

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What's different from their perspective?

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there's a few things that they'll realize are different.

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And the first is we eliminated a third party reference form.

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That was in our system, prior,, and it was just very cumbersome.

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And slowing things down, and we decided it just wasn't necessary any longer.

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so, that's been eliminated.

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Okay. so,, that was a reference for them to submit?.

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To demonstrate a firm's experience in the type of work they can accomplish, successfully.

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Like another government that they worked, with? correct. exactly.

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Okay. and now,, they don't have to have a government reference?.

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It can just be from a private.

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What they'll essentially do is they'll no longer need that third party reference,.

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Which again, took so long to achieve.

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and now they're providing us with think of it as a project résumé.

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Or project list,, a summary of projects, recent that they successfully completed,.

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And we utilize that document instead of the third party reference.

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Okay. so,: it's like a piece of paperwork.

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That was hard to get through the system,, and so you realized it wasn't as critically important.

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It was really gumming up the works.

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Okay. and there's a new tier-based system.

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Can you explain a little bit about what that means for the businessperson out there?.

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Yes. so, with the tier-based system,, what we're going to be doing in the future.

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Is to award smaller contracts at different levels.

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So, we have tier-- designating tiers one through possibly four or five.

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Where there will be a dollar threshold assigned to those tiers,.

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And based off of the contractors' experience, they'll be able to bid in whichever tier is most appropriate for them.

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Okay. and a tier means that it's a different dollar figure,.

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Like a smaller project,, medium,, large?

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yes., something like that?, yes., okay.,.

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So,, when they respond, they'll, be able to respond at whatever level that they need, to, or whatever level they deem is most appropriate for them..

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Okay. so,: does that mean that it's like smaller chunks of big projects,.

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Something like that?, yes. and so,. The businesses-- smaller businesses have an opportunity to come. In?.

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You said something about prime?.

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Being a prime. yes., this is opening up the prime contracting opportunity. yes.

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okay., and if people want to find out more, if they own their own business,.

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Or they know somebody who does, can they contact you, or how do they learn more about this?.

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Absolutely. they can contact me at 410-887-3407,.

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Which is the minority business enterprise unit,, as well as we have opportunities under current solicitations on the county's website.

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Okay. and are there other services that the county provides.

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Or any help with financing, anything like that for companies?.

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The county department of economic and workforce development.

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Also offers the boost fund,, which may assist with gearing up for contracts.

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Maybe they need to buy supplies or equipment, or they also assist with workforce hiring.

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Company may need to hire individuals to help fulfill a contract, requirement.

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They can contact the department of economic and workforce development to get assistance with their hiring needs, as well.

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okay., and all of this is on the county. Website?.

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Yes, it is. right., okay. and chuck,. You mentioned something about prequalifying.

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Does the department of public works and purchasing,.

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Are you able to assist potential contractors in navigating through this system?.

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We are., we have staff available to assist contractors.

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If they have questions completing the application., if there's maybe some components that are missing from their application,, we reach out to them.. We get things straightened out and help them through process,, which again, with these new refinements we've made,.

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The timeline has really been improved for everyone from maybe 90 days down to something closer to like 30 days. Turnaround.

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On a new application. so, we're happy about that.

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Okay. so, do you kind of feel like this? Is a game changer.

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For these small companies?, I think it is.. I think it's going to open up a lot of opportunities.

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To help these companies grow into larger contracts.

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All right. well,, thank you both very much.. We really appreciate your taking some time. thank you. thank you. and thank you for watching hello! baltimore county..

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We encourage you to connect with baltimore county government on facebook,, twitter,, instagram, and linkedin..

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We'll see you next time. ( ♪♪♪ ).