A pre-proposal conference will be conducted at Pierce Transit headquarters, 3701 96th Street SW, Lakewood, WA 98499 on January 22, 2003 at 1:00 p.m. Prospective proposers are encouraged to attend.

PIERCE TRANSIT provides public transportation services in Pierce County with express service reaching into King and Thurston Counties. To support the service the Agency utilizes a 900 MHz Simulcast Radio Communications System for Pierce and King Counties consisting primarily of Motorola equipment for infrastructure and subscriber units. Pierce Transit operates 24 hours per day, seven days per week.

The uninterrupted functioning of the radio communications system is critical to PIERCE TRANSIT. Therefore, we are requesting proposals from qualified firms to provide maintenance services for all components of the radio system.

SYSTEM OVERVIEW

PIERCE TRANSIT uses five (5) 900 MHz channels with Motorola infrastructure components residing at Three Sisters, Gold Mountain, the County/City Building in Tacoma and Pierce Transit headquarters at 3701 96th Street SW, Lakewood, WA 98499. This equipment includes but is not limited to repeaters, satellite receivers, microwave multiplex equipment, voting comparators, control stations and CentraCom/Gold console equipment.

The subscriber units consist of Motorola Spectra mobile radios installed in PIERCE TRANSIT’S bus, SHUTTLE and support vehicles and handheld Motorola MTS1000, MTS2000 and GTX portable radios utilized by supervisory personnel.

Equipment not from Motorola is the County Microwave system and other equipment at the various sites.

SERVICE NEEDS

1. Infrastructure: For infrastructure equipment PIERCE TRANSIT at a minimum requires repair in the case of malfunction and preventative maintenance at regular intervals including optimization of the equipment to minimize degradation of coverage and audio quality. Any service shall include Motorola and non-Motorola equipment. Proposals shall address on-site and in-shop repair availability, pick up and delivery of equipment, availability of spares, hours of coverage, response time to be expected at the various sites and any service contract exclusions. In addition proposers shall detail any equipment that cannot be serviced by the proposer but should be covered by maintenance agreements. In that event proposers should furnish information on how such service may be obtained or indicate willingness or ability to establish subcontractor agreements for such equipment.

PIERCE TRANSIT realizes that equipment failure due to acts of God, such as lightning strikes, floods, earthquakes, high winds, are not normally covered under maintenance agreements, therefore proposers shall provide hourly rates for emergencies, mark-up for parts and response time for the various sites. Emergency rates will become part of the contract.

In addition PIERCE TRANSIT is interested in receiving proposals for a disaster recovery plan that may include critical spare parts availability, methods of response both weekdays and weekends, the advisability for PIERCE TRANSIT to stock some hard to obtain parts or items no longer being offered by the manufacturer.

Current infrastructure locations containing varying amounts of equipment:

• Three Sisters
• Gold Mountain
• County-City Building in Tacoma
• Pierce Transit Headquarters

2. Subscriber Units: PIERCE TRANSIT operates both mobile and portable radios. The mobile units are Spectra 35 watt radios installed in our bus, SHUTTLE, and support fleets, some are dash mount, most are remote mounted. The portable units are MTS1000, MTS 2000 and GTX radios used by our supervisors and maintenance personnel.

Proposals should include cost of repair for malfunctioning units, frequency of preventive maintenance, if applicable; items covered by maintenance agreements, i.e. labor and what parts are included (repair of handsets should be included regardless of the cause of damage); what type of onsite or in-shop service is available; expectations as to PIERCE TRANSIT involvement in the repair/maintenance function, spare parts availability, amount of time equipment is generally in the shop for repairs, recommended spare ratio and hours of coverage.

A spare parts list including price list should be included in the proposal to cover the items Pierce Transit repairs in house. It is understood that it may not be possible to provide pricing for five years for these items, therefore the spare parts price list provided shall be firm for the first contract year. Thereafter increases shall be limited to the national Consumer Price Index (CPI) with a cap of 5% per contract year.

In addition, PIERCE TRANSIT may purchase additional equipment, such as consoles, mobile and portable radios throughout the course of this contract. Proposers shall indicate installation charges for new radios and removal and installation charges for existing mobile radios. New equipment shall be added the contract at the price then in effect as warranty periods expire.

ALTERNATE OR PARTIAL PROPOSALS

Proposers are encouraged to submit alternate proposals for PIERCE TRANSIT’S evaluation. PIERCE TRANSIT reserves the right to award a single contract for all services needed or split contracts by type of service, i.e. infrastructure, subscriber units.

Proposers may choose to propose on a part of Pierce Transit’s service needs only, i.e. Price Proposal Sheets, Part I. Infrastructure including Part III. Other Items; or Part II. Subscriber Units. If so, all items included in that part must be included in the proposal.

TERM OF CONTRACT

Proposers shall provide pricing for five (5) years. The initial contract term shall be for two (2) years with options to renew for three (3) one-year contract periods.