Public Administration Policy Consulting Services

The County of Ocean is a County of the Fifth Class, as defined in N.J.S.A. 40A:6-1 et seq. Pursuant to N.J.S.A. 19:44A-20.4 et seq., the County of Ocean requests qualifications from firms capable of providing Public Administration Policy Consulting Services for a one-year contract term.

The successful vendor or vendors must have a minimum of five years of demonstrated experience providing public administration, policy development, organizational, or related consulting services to governmental or public-sector organizations.

Ocean County seeks an independent consultant or consulting firm to support County administration with Countywide policy management. Work may include reviewing and developing policies; analyzing the County's existing policy inventory, organization, storage, and maintenance practices; recommending a centralized policy-management system; establishing methods for issuing policies to employees; and supporting implementation and evaluation

Research and Analysis

• Review existing policies, administrative practices, legal requirements, relevant data, and comparable public-sector policies. Identify gaps, conflicts, outdated provisions, operational concerns, and opportunities for improvement.
• Assess the legal, Civil Service, labor-relations, workforce, fiscal, privacy, records, and implementation impact(s) of proposed policy changes. Refer legal and negotiability questions to County Counsel and authorized County personnel.
• Prepare clear policy briefs, comparisons, impact assessments, and recommendations supported by documented research.

Stakeholder Engagement

Conduct interviews, meetings, and facilitated discussions with County leadership, employees, departments, subject-matter experts, labor representatives, community representatives, partner agencies, and other stakeholders designated by the County to identify practical impacts, gather relevant perspectives, and support informed decision-making.

Policy Review and Development

• Review Countywide policies for clarity, consistency, effectiveness, legal compliance, and alignment with County operations.
• Develop new policies and revise existing policies using clear language and a County-approved format. Provide clean drafts and redlines or revision summaries.
• Present practical policy options, impacts, risks, and recommendations for County consideration.

Implementation and Evaluation

• Support the implementation of approved policies through coordinated implementation plans, communications, training materials, compliance guidance, and performance measures, as requested by the County.
• Evaluate policy effectiveness using available data, stakeholder feedback, and established measures.

Project Management

• Maintain a current work plan and status tracker identifying assignments, priorities, responsible parties, deliverables, required decisions and approvals, outstanding legal or labor matters, and target completion dates.
• Provide regular progress reports identifying completed work, upcoming activities, unresolved issues, and County action required.
• Submit all final work products and supporting materials in accessible, editable electronic formats specified by the County.

Policy Governance and Administration

• Review the County's existing policy inventory, including how policies are organized, stored, updated, distributed, accessed, acknowledged, and retained.
• Recommend a Countywide policy-administration process addressing policy ownership, required reviews and approvals, naming and numbering conventions, version control, effective dates, review cycles, archival of superseded policies, records retention, employee access, and accessibility.
• Recommend procedures for issuing policies to employees, including communications, training, electronic or written acknowledgment, documentation of receipt, access to current policies, and notification of revisions.

This engagement does not include the preparation of departmental standard operating procedures, desk procedures, task-level instructions, or department-specific process manuals.

**Submission method:** The County of Ocean is accepting only electronic proposals for this RFQ. Submitting your proposal manually is cause for rejection. You may only submit one (1) proposal. DO NOT submit a hard copy of your electronic submission.

All responses must be received prior to **4:00pm, prevailing time** on the date on which they are to be unsealed. The County's preferred method of document submission is DocuSign.

Evaluation Criteria

• Qualifications of the individuals who will perform the tasks and the amounts of their respective participation; 30% of total
• Experience in providing the services requested by the County and references related thereto; 30% of total
• A statement of the proposer's understanding of the Scope of Work and the ability to perform the tasks in a timely fashion, including staffing and familiarity with the subject matter and the County; 20% of total
• Location (distance) of primary office in relation to the County administrative offices; 10% of total
• Thoroughness and completeness of the applicant's submittal. 10% of total

When awarding a contract to a qualified vendor, it will be done on a Project Specific basis and a Purchase Order will be generated that will be the contract for that project.

Ocean County Board of Commissioners will make award within sixty (60) days after receipt of proposals.