Peace River Regional District

Staff Initials:  Dept. Head:  CAO:  Page 1 of 3 

REPORT To:  Committee of the Whole  Date:  September 7, 2016 

From:  Trish Morgan, General Manager of Community & Electoral Area Services 

Subject:  Review of 9‐1‐1 Service Provider Proposal 

RECOMMENDATION(S): That the Committee of the Whole support entering into a 5 year agreement with E‐Comm for the provision of 9‐1‐1 Primary Safety Answer Point services based on the annual pricing model provided in their proposal and an agreement be brought back to the Board for final authorization. 

BACKGROUND/RATIONALE: Following through from direction from the Board of Directors, a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI) for the provision of 911 Primary Safety Answer Point (PSAP) services was issued on November 1, 2015 for a period of 30 days. The purpose of the RFEI was to identify agencies that may be interested and qualified to provide this service in the future as the cost to contract with the RCMP, the current service provider, has increased by more than $150,000 over the past five years. 

As a result of the posting the Regional District received two RFEI submissions – one from the City of Fort St John and one from E‐Comm in Vancouver.  (Note that the RCMP did not submit an expression of interest although they were made aware of the opportunity.)  In scoring the submissions it was determined that both organizations met the criteria to varying degrees and in the interest of evaluating options it would be prudent to invite both organizations to provide comprehensive proposals, including costs, for the provision of 911 PSAP services for the Regional District.  

In January 2016 the Board authorized staff to invite both the City of Fort St John and E‐Comm to submit proposals for 911 PSAP Service.  The RFP was issued June 1 and closed on July 15, 2016 – both E‐Comm and Fort St John were invited to submit proposals at that time.  Only one proposal was received, that being from E‐Comm.  Pomax Consulting has evaluated the proposal and provided a report discussing its evaluation and their recommendations (see attached). 

The Regional District has an agreement with the RCMP to provide 911 PSAP service to March 31, 2017.  The RCMP has advised that they are willing to continue to provide the service after that date until another service provider can take over the provision of the service – estimated to be on or before May 17, 2017. 

OPTIONS: 1) Seek to enter into new 5 year agreement with the RCMP to continue to provide 911 PSAP

services.

Note that within the Province of BC there are very few 911 PSAP providers. E‐Comm and the RCMP provide the bulk of the service, however, during our negotiations with the RCMP in 2012/2013 the RCMP made it clear that they  are no longer in the business of providing this service and that service would be provided at 100% cost.  After that time a number of regional 

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districts in BC migrated to E‐Comm due to the rapidly increasing cost of the service from the RCMP.  The RCMP were made aware of the opportunity to submit a RFEI for 911 PSAP but did not submit anything in the end. 

STRATEGIC PLAN RELEVANCE: 1.2   The PRRD will provide cost effective access to protective and emergency services including 911  

call services by 2018 to its residents. 1.2.1  Explore potential of entering into agreements with service providers to provide 911 call answer 

services and to implement appropriate response protocols for the handling of oil and gas emergency calls. 

FINANCIAL CONSIDERATION(S): Should the Board authorize entering into agreement with E‐Comm for the provision of 911 PSAP services, it is estimated that the Regional District will save approximately $1.56 million over 5 years, a 64% cost reduction. 

Estimated Costs with change to E‐CommAgency  2017  2018  2019 2020 2021  TOTAL RCMP  175,259E‐Comm  110,295  138,710  142,870 147,160 151,570 

total cost  285,554  138,710  142,870 147,160 151,570  865,864 * less savings in 2017 due to 4.5 months with the RCMP and 7.5 months with E‐Comm, thereafter it includesonly E‐Comm

RCMP Estimated Costs (no change in Service Provider) (should the Board chose to remain with the RCMP and the RCMP agrees to continue to provide the service) 

Agency  2017  2018  2019  2020 2021 TOTAL RCMP  467,357  476,605  486,044  495,765 505,680 2,431,451 

COMMUNICATIONS CONSIDERATION(S): If approved by the Board staff will work with E‐Comm to develop a communications strategy to inform residents, businesses and emergency responders of the change to the service provider.  E‐Comm has assisted other regional districts with this task as part of their implementation strategy. 

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OTHER CONSIDERATION(S): Previous Board resolutions: 

June 11, 2015 COW  Chris Kellett of POMAX Consulting provided a review of 911 and fire dispatch.  Topics included: 

• Analysis of current fire dispatch• Industry standards and best practices• Fire dispatch options with current providers• 911 emergency service function and bylaw• 911 civic addressing process and systems• Alternative service delivery considerations• Home owner insurance

June 11, 2015 Regional Board Meeting: 1) a)  That staff be authorized to issue a “Request for Expressions of Interest” to identify

agencies and organizations who may be interested in providing 9‐1‐1 Public Safety Answer   Point Service (PSAP); and

b) That, upon receipt and review of the expressions of interest, staff develop a report forthe Regional Board with options on how to proceed based on the findings.

2) a)  That staff be authorized to issue a “Request for Expressions of Interest” to identify    agencies and organizations who may be interested in providing fire dispatch      services; and 

b) That the “Request for Expressions of Interest” document provide for the flexibility ofan agency to express their interest in providing fire dispatch services for either theNorth Peace, the South Peace or the entire Peace Region; and

c) That upon receipt and review of the expressions of interest, that staff develop a report for theRegional Board with options on how to proceed.

3) That staff be authorized to organize a meeting with service providers, and further, provide areport on the implications of changing 911 and Fire Dispatch service providers.

October 15, 2015 Regional Board Meeting: That staff be authorized to delay the release of the request for expression of interest (RFEI) in regard to the Secondary Safety Answer Point (SSAP) (fire dispatch) until February 1, 2016. 

January 14, 2016 Regional Board Meeting: 1) That the City of Fort St John and E‐Comm be invited to submit proposals for 911 Primary Safety

Answer Point services.2) That Pomax Consulting be contracted to assist in the process of writing and evaluating the request

for proposals for 911 Primary Safety Answer Point services and that an evaluation of options basedon information received be presented to the Board.

3) That, upon receipt and evaluation of the 911 Primary Safety Answer Point proposals, a Committee ofthe Whole meeting be held to review options for service.

Attachments: Pomax Report: 9‐1‐1 PSAP RFP Response Analysis 

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Peace River Regional District

9-1-1 PSAP RFP ResponseAnalysis

Pomax Consulting Inc. August 31, 2016

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 2

2. Background ................................................................................................... 3

2.1. Service Requirements ………………………………………………………… 3 2.2. Additional Services ……………………………………………………………… 4

3. Evaluation ..................................................................................................... 5

4. Implementation .......................................................................................... 11

5. Conclusion & Recommendation ................................................................... 12

Glossary ...................................................................................................... 13

Tables

Table 1: E-Comm Initial RFP Price submission ............................................................................................. 5

Table 2: Initial E-Comm proposal evaluation ............................................................................................... 7

Table 3: E-Comm Alternate Pricing Model ................................................................................................... 8

Table 4: Revised E-Comm proposal evaluation .......................................................................................... 10

Appendices

Appendix A – PSAP Service Overview Diagram

Appendix B – Northwestel Coverage Map

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1. Introduction

The purpose of this report is to summarize the results of the Request for Proposal (RFP) that was released on June 3rd, 2016, with a closing date of July 15, 2016, to receive proposals to be the new contract provider of PSAP (Public Safety Answering Point) Services as shown in the Appendix ‘A’ current overview diagram.

Based on the previous Request for Expression of Interest (RFEI) process that was conducted earlier this year, two proponents were invited to respond to the RFP, these being the Fort St. John Fire Department and E-Comm 9-1-1.

E-Comm 9-1-1 was the sole respondent, so this report provides an analysis of their proposalalong with recommendations for moving forward.

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2. Background

The RFP that was issued required the proponents to address the following service requirements:

2.1. Service Requirements

1) Answer emergency telephone calls (E911 calls) and re-route (downstream) to anappropriate SSAP established for Police (Prince George RCMP OCC), Fire(currently North Peace River Fire Dispatch or South Peace River Fire Dispatch),and Ambulance Dispatch (BCAS);

2) Ensure the caller is connected with the appropriate SSAP Centre beforedisconnecting;

3) Once the call becomes the property and responsibility of the downstreamagency the PSAP operator disconnects from the call;

4) Maintain an acceptable call answer standard from a recognized agency i.e.NENA, NFPA, including having the tools necessary to measure against thesestandards;

5) The Call Answer Centre must be able to provide “Initial Call Answer” forapproximately 17,000 emergency calls originating within the serving area;

6) Initiate an SMS messaging session with a registered DHHSI Text with 9-1-1 caller(when applicable)

7) Conference/transfer the 9-1-1 call (and when applicable – text session) to theappropriate ERA;

8) Release from the call once the ERA agent has answered (or act as a messagerelay for SMS text sessions when applicable); AND

9) Have operational guidelines and standards in place that are followed andenforced;

10) Work with SSAP’s to provide for efficient and effective customer service;11) Develop a positive and effective working relationship with PRRD Staff

responsible for the administration of this service;12) Ensure that all matters related to the administration of this contract are referred

to the PRRD’s designate;13) Create a CAD dispatch and/or event call to capture and record the ANI/ALI

information and the disposition of the call to the appropriate ERA;14) Have a well-developed Quality Assurance Program; including a clearly defined

complaint procedure process;15) Ability to meet quarterly with stakeholders (in person or via teleconference);16) Provide timely notification of any maintenance, upgrades, breakdowns, or

changes to dispatch equipment or protocols that will impact the proper dispatchand/or safety of fire department responders;

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17) Capacity to handle future boundary extensions, and new service areas;18) Ability to interconnect into the existing TELUS 9-1-1 infrastructure;19) Have the capacity to address Next Generation 9-1-1 requirements including IP

interconnection and text messaging.

2.2. Additional Services

The following additional services were identified:

a. Accommodating test calls for local exchange carriers, wireless service providersand voice over internet protocol phone service providers on an as-requiredbasis.

b. Liaising with all ERAs on all 9-1-1 related announcements (e.g. service outages,changes to network configuration, consolidation of ERA’s, backup services, orcarrier issues).

c. Maintaining an Enhanced 9-1-1 Operations Manuald. Working with stakeholders to develop an appropriate process for receiving and

transferring calls related to oil and gas emergencies.

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3. Evaluation

E-Comm in their response stated that they meet or exceed all of the Service Requirements(see Section 2.1), as well as the requested Additional Services (see Section 2.2), whichincludes a new process for oil and gas emergencies. Pomax has reviewed their responsesand concurs with their stated comments. However, we felt that the information providedon their Quality Assurance program required further clarification, and this was provided insubsequent clarification correspondence with E-Comm.

E-Comm provided the following pricing (with notes and assumptions) in the initialresponse:

Table 1: E-Comm Initial RFP Price submission

Five (5) Year Fixed Price Contract

with Maximum Contingency Allowance for Unforeseen Capital

Notes and Assumptions:

1. Purchase, install and test primary and backup 9-1-1 trunks from Telus.Capital costs shared with other agencies; amortization is included in the annualoperating costs.

A B C D E F

Contract

Year

Project

Management

Costs

Capital /

Equipment

Upgrade Costs

Operating

CostsTotal Annual

Fixed Cost

Maximum

Contingency

Allowance(NOTE 1) (Sum of Columns C

& D) B & C in Year

1 only

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Total Contract Price over 5 Year Term(Sum of rows E1, E2, E3, E4, E5)

6921,520$

15,300$

16,500$

17,800$

19,200$

20,700$

89,500$

5207,490$ 207,490$

4192,120$

179,310$

2164,710$ 164,710$

192,120$

3177,890$ 177,890$

115,000$ 11,800$ 152,510$

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2. Based on the 2016 Budget Approved by the E-Comm Board of Directors adjusted to

reflect fixed-pricing over the 5 year term.

3. % targeted average service 95%/5 seconds for 9-1-1 Call Answer.

4. Staffing and related assumptions include:

(a) The staffing component takes into account the efficiency of joining a

consolidated 9-1-1 PSAP call answer centre.

(b) The total staffing component is based on a total call volume of 17,181 calls

(c) Based on the requested fixed-price proposal, the operating component includes

an annual escalation factor for growth, inflation and contingency over the term

of the contract.

Should the Regional District wish to consider an annual fee for services basedon E-Comm's annual budget increases, we would be pleased to provide thisseparately.

(d) The staffing component is based on down-streaming all abandoned calls.

5. As part of the governance of E-Comm, our proposal is subject to approval by our

Board of Directors. This will take place once the Service Agreement has been

finalized.

6. Maximum Contingency Allowance is provided for estimate purposes only and is

calculated as a 10% of Annual Operating Costs.

7. It is anticipated that provisioning for future services such as Next Generation 911

are not expected to be implemented within the 5 year term of the contract as

industry standards not yet defined.

Based on our analysis and the pricing provided, the response is scored below in Table 2 against the evaluation matrix used in the RFP.

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Table 2: Initial E-Comm proposal evaluation

Factor Weight (100)

Poor (0.30)

Marginal (.50)

Fair (.70)

Good (.90)

Exc (1.0)

Total

Completion/quality of RFP 5 0.9 4.5

Organization Experience 10 1 10

Technology capability 15 1 15

Call Taking Staff Resources 20 1 20

Support Staff Resources 10 1 10

Backup capability 5 0.7 3.5

Ability to quickly respond to major events/fluctuations in call volume

5 0.9 4.5

Standard compliance and quality assurance program

10 0.7 7

Price 20 0.7 14

Totals 100 88.5

E-Comm has multiple levels of backup, including arrangements with BC Ambulance Servicein Vancouver and a fail-safe arrangement in Kamloops. The BCAS dispatch in Vancouver issetup to allow BCAS dispatch staff to handle 9-1-1 calls if the service at E-Comm iscompromised, while E-Comm staff migrate to the BCAS dispatch (approximately 5

kilometers away) to resume full operations at that location. In the event that the Telusnetwork is compromised and is unable to deliver calls to the lower mainland, the 9-1-1 callscan be rerouted to Kamloops BCAS dispatch and they will handle 9-1-1 calls from thatlocation. However, we scored this as Fair, since E-Comm does not have a ‘hot backup’ i.e.that is calls cannot be processed from two locations allowing for seamless handling of 9-1-1calls should a problem arise at the primary centre. Given that they handle calls for 84% ofthe population of BC any interruption in service, even the 5 minutes stated as required forBCAS dispatch staff to start answering 9-1-1 calls, could mean significant 9-1-1 disruption inthe province.

The quality assurance field was initially scored as Fair as E-Comm did not provide enough

information. We sought clarification from E-Comm and this provided the level of detail necessary to raise the score to Good, resulting in the adjusted score in Table 4 on page 10.

For pricing, we scored this as fair, even though it is well under 50% of the current cost, because the fixed price model had annual increases that were too high. E-Comm had offered to provide pricing that is not fixed price and we asked them to provide this information.

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E-Comm offered in the RFP to provide a non-fixed pricing model based on their annuallevies, which is shown below in Table 3:

Table 3: E-Comm Alternate Pricing Model

Five (5) Year Price Estimates

Based on E-Comm's Annual Pricing Model

Notes and Assumptions: 1. Purchase, install and test primary and backup 9-1-1 trunks from Telus.

Capital costs shared with other agencies; amortization is included in the annual operating costs.

2. Based on the 2016 Budget rates as approved by the E-Comm Board of Directors. 2017-2020

Estimates expected to increase by 3.0% annually.

3. % targeted average service 95%/5 seconds for 9-1-1 Call Answer.

4. Staffing and related assumptions include:

(a) The staffing component takes into account the efficiency of joining a consolidated 9-1-1 PSAP call

answer centre.

(b) The total staffing component is based on a total call volume of 17,181 calls

A B C D E F

Contract

Year

Project

Management

Costs

Capital /

Equipment

Upgrade Costs

Operating

CostsTotal Annual

Fixed Cost

Maximum

Contingency

Allowance(NOTE 1) (Sum of Columns C

& D) B & C in Year

1 only

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Total Contract Price over 5 Year Term(Sum of rows E1, E2, E3, E4, E5)

Fixed Price Submission per RFP 921,520$ 89,500$

Estimated Savings of Annual Costing Model vs Fixed Price Model 179,740$ 89,500$

115,000$ 11,800$ 134,670$ n/a

2138,710$ 138,710$ n/a

3142,870$ 142,870$ n/a

161,470$

4147,160$ 147,160$ n/a

5151,570$ 151,570$ n/a

6741,780$ n/a

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(c) Based on the requested fixed-price proposal, the operating component includes an annual

escalation factor for growth, inflation and contingency over the term of the contract.

Should the Regional District wish to consider an annual fee for services based on E-Comm's annual

budget increases, we would be pleased to provide this separately.

(d) The staffing component is based on down-streaming all abandoned calls.

5. As part of the governance of E-Comm, our proposal is subject to final approval by our Board of

Directors. This will take place once the Service Agreement has been finalized

6. Maximum Contingency Allowance for Unforeseen Capital is not provided under the annual pricing

option.

Assuming that all NG9-1-1 capital would be shared infrastructure, it would not be agency

specific capital. As shared infrastructure the annual amortization would be charged to agencies

as part of the operating levy, based on a pro-rata percentage of estimated total 9-1-1 call

volume managed within the consolidated communications centre.

Based on the above, on a speculative basis, for preliminary order of magnitude purposes, PRRD

9-1-1 would represent 1.5% of the total call volume which would result in an annual estimate of

an incremental $4,500 in operating levies (calculated as 1.5% share of an anticipated $300K of

annual amortization).

It is important to note that the above is a speculative estimate only as actual impacts of

NG911 are not yet known or expected to be implemented within the initial five year term of

the proposed contract.

7. It is anticipated that provisioning for future services such as Next Generation 911 are not expected to

be implemented within the 5 year term of the contract as industry standards not yet defined.

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Based on the additional answer for the Quality Assurance program, and the revised pricing model, we re-evaluated the proposal as below.

Table 4: Revised E-Comm proposal evaluation

Factor Weight (100)

Poor (0.30)

Marginal (.50)

Fair (.70)

Good (.90)

Exc (1.0)

Total

Completion/quality of RFP 5 0.9 4.5

Organization Experience 10 1 10

Technology capability 15 1 15

Call Taking Staff Resources 20 1 20

Support Staff Resources 10 1 10

Backup capability 5 0.7 3.5

Ability to quickly respond to major events/fluctuations in call volume

5 0.9 4.5

Standard compliance and quality assurance program

10 0.9 9

Price 20 0.9 18

Totals 100 94.5

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4. Implementation

E-Comm has an internal project management team which would be responsible formanaging the transition, and the costs are included in the year 1 pricing estimate.

Only minimal work is required for equipment and software upgrades by Telus and E-Comm and they can be accomplished in the planned timeframes. E-Comm estimates that the transition can happen in 90 to 180 days depending on external stakeholders (such as Telus scheduling) and contract negotiations and requirements of the PRRD. They state that they

can transition earlier than the proposed date in the RFP of May 17, 2017. However, during implementation they will also need to address the call handling process for calls coming from the North Peace that are in Northwestel’s serving area (per the Appendix B – Coverage Map); with this factored in, the May 17, 2017 transition date seems most likely.

E-Comm has identified the addition of one Full-time equivalent call taker position to handlethe additional call volume. This will not be a dedicated position but an additional resourcethat is part of a large number of call taking resources. As E-Comm regularly hires new call-takers no additional timeline is required for the additional FTE.

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5. Conclusion & Recommendation

E-Comm currently provides 9-1-1 PSAP service for over 3.5 million residents of BC andhandles over 1.2 million 9-1-1 calls annually, with a service level that exceeds 95% of allcalls being answered in 5 seconds or less.

The annual non-fixed price offered would mean an average of $149,000 annually, which is roughly 30% of the current contract price with the Prince George RCMP OCC. It is also important to note that other Regional Districts that contracted with E-Comm over the past

2 years on the variable price option have actually realized a small savings versus possible concerns with price increases.

Although there are some concerns about not having a hot backup solution, they do have several layers of redundancy in their current operation and proposed solution.

We recommend entering into a 5-year contract with E-Comm on the variable pricing model. In addition, we would recommend that $10,000 be budgeted annually for additional expenses related to the shared portion of future capital expenses for E-Comm.

NOTE: E-Comm 9-1-1 has indicated that approximately 90-180 days are required for the transition process, therefore they could move the implementation date to sooner than May

17, 2017 if the Board approves the recommended contract award in the fall timeframe.

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Glossary

Acronyms used in this report are presented below for reference purposes.

ALI Automatic Location Identification

ANI Automatic Number Identification

CAD Computer Aided Dispatch

DHHSI Deaf, Hard of Hearing, and Speech Impaired community

E9-1-1 Enhanced 9-1-1 (network configuration)

NENA National Emergency Number Association

NFPA National Fire Protection Association

NG9-1-1 Next Generation 9-1-1 (network configuration)

PSAP Public Safety Answering Point

RFEI Request for Expression of Interest

RFP Request for Proposal

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APPENDIX A – PSAP Service Overview Diagram (as of June 2016)

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APPENDIX B – Northwestel Coverage Map

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