Work With Us

Our agency often needs help from experts to accomplish this mission. Beyond hiring our staff positions, we seek the help of qualified companies, organizations and/or individuals for support. For small purchases or projects, we research, collect quotes (if over $5,000) and pursue the project directly.

For projects $10,000 and above, we use three tools to procure this work:

• Request for Qualifications (RFQ)
  Interested applicants submit work experience and background and rate/pricing sheets, we may conduct interviews and we may choose one or more vendors for any given project. Sometimes, we will use the qualifications we’ve collected into a list for multiple years, so sometimes you could respond and not get work right away, but be under contract two years later. The contracts that come from this method of seeing who is qualified can range anywhere from a one-time $300 project to multi-year, multi-million dollar project.
• Request for Proposals (RFP)
  Interested applicants submit a proposal response to a specific project we’ve outlined in the document, often including your approach, qualifications, timeline and costs. We may conduct interviews and we would typically move forward with one or more vendors on that specific project right away.
• Bids
  For construction items, which can include new greenways, maintenance projects, etc, we publicly bid out the work. This means we post the bid here on our website (for smaller projects) or on BidExpress for larger projects. See below for detail about BidExpress.

Regardless of how we’ve procured your services, these items are generally true for contracting moving forward:

• Our calendar-year budget is approved by our Board of Directors, typically in December for the following year. Any project that we embark upon that may go into a future year is always subject to budget approval.
• If on a qualified vendor list from an RFQ and the proposed project is over $50,000, three vendors will be selected to submit a proposal for the work and/or interview. If the total contract value will be under $50,000, no further process is necessary if everyone agrees on the scope and fee.
• We have draft contract templates we’ll provide for you to review, suggest edits, and sign. Contracts over $50,000 must be first approved by our Board of Directors at one of their monthly meetings.
• We typically operate on contracts with a not-to-exceed amount and vendors bill us monthly for what’s been completed so far. More technical contracts even come with an invoice memo sheet to fill out.
• As required by the State of Missouri, contracts over $5,000 require a notarized affidavit from e-Verify employment to certify that your team is legally allowed to work in the United States. For contracts over $100,000, a notarized affidavit of compliance with Anti-Discrimination Against Israel Act.
• Many contracts will require some degree of business insurance and coverage.
• We want Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBEs) to have the maximum opportunity to participate in our contracts. Minority and Women Business Enterprise goals of 25/5% have been established, i.e. 25% of the total contract amount to be awarded to Minority Business Enterprises (MBE) and 5% of the total contact amount to be awarded to Women Business Enterprise (WBE). Some projects may have goals above and beyond this, including workforce goals.

In order to make sure that people know about the opportunities to work, we:

• • Host a Great Rivers Greenway 101 hybrid info session annually, with the recording posted right here for anyone to view (passcode: 1#l1K8G!). Questions welcome to info@grgstl.org.
  • Participate in industry forums, fairs, speaking engagements, meetings and professional organizations to spread the word about our opportunities.
  • Post our opportunities with ample time for people to learn about them, form teams if necessary and submit a thoughtful response. We also advertise in local papers, post to our website and encourage people to subscribe for email alerts every time we post things. You can do that here.
  • Host pre-bid meetings or informational sessions during the process to understand the projects, ask questions, form teams if relevant and prepare to submit.

As a steward of taxpayers’ dollars, Great Rivers Greenway embraces the diversity of our region, proactively creating inclusive public spaces and processes with and for all. We’re committed to bringing the vision of a dynamic network of greenways to life in ways that achieve more equitable outcomes for all. As an organization, we expect all employees, vendors, partners and volunteers to support this dedication to diversity, equity and inclusion in our work. Learn more about our strategy.