B--COMIDA: Impact Monitoring for Offshore Subsistence Hunting

The Department of the Interior, Minerals Management Service (MMS), intends to competitively award a contract entitled "COMIDA: Impact Monitoring for Offshore Subsistence Hunting" for the Alaska Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Region. Please read this notice carefully as it constitutes the only notice that will be issued. The Minerals Management Service Procurement Operations Branch is the contracting office for this procurement and the resultant contract administration. All vendors must be registered in the Central Contractor Registration (www.ccr.gov) in order to receive Government contracts. The NAICS Code for this procurement is 541720-Research & Development in the Social Sciences and Humanities. The contractor must be capable of performing all of the tasks described below. The period of performance of the resultant contract is anticipated to be four years with an estimated cost range between $550,000 to $600,000. Background: This study will constitute a key component of Chukchi Sea environmental studies pertinent to the management decisions resulting from the Chukchi Sea Lease Sale 193 held in February 2008, and subsequent sales scheduled for 2010 and 2012. Specifically, this study will initiate monitoring efforts of offshore subsistence hunting for key marine mammals among the communities most proximate to the Sale Area and to currently anticipated development scenarios. The MMS seeks to establish an updated baseline in the area and to monitor on an annual basis any significant changes in offshore subsistence harvest activities over time. The oil and gas industry has expressed strong interest in leasing in this Planning Area under Sale 193, which may be followed by further exploration and possibly development. In order to assure methodological continuity over time for a potentially large exploration area, appropriate planning and implementation of post-lease monitoring baselines are needed. The COMIDA Workshop in November 2006 recommended the monitoring of offshore subsistence hunting. In particular, the workshop concluded that monitoring efforts should be directed toward the hunt for marine mammals, including bowhead and beluga whales, walrus, seals, and possibly polar bears. There is little up-to-date information about offshore subsistence activities along the Chukchi coast, and there is acute need for more information in the vicinity of Wainwright and Point Lay, where development might make landfall. The voluntary participation of host communities will ultimately depend upon their consent and continued endorsement of the study design. It is anticipated that residents of these communities will support such a research effort and will be actively engaged with ethnographic fieldworkers in the conceptual design of fieldwork strategies, in the collection of relevant data, and in the review of research findings. MMS would encourage the contractor to borrow from the successful conceptual design of the long-term monitoring efforts of bowhead whale hunting activities near Cross Island in the Beaufort Sea under previous MMS funded projects. MMS analysts and decision makers will use the information from this study in NEPA analysis and documentation for Lease Sales, Exploration Plans, Development and Production Plans, and in post-sale and post-exploration decision making in the Chukchi Sea. This study will consist of seven tasks and will gather long-term monitoring data to allow the MMS to assess whether OCS oil development activities in the Chukchi Sea will result in changes to offshore subsistence hunting practices. The first research question is whether subsistence hunting in the Chukchi Sea displays significant variation over time. The second question is whether such variation can be attributed to offshore oil and gas industrial activities. These questions can be stated as hypotheses: Monitoring Hypotheses 1: Offshore subsistence hunting patterns in the vicinity of Wainwright and Point Lay do not vary significantly from year to year; Monitoring Hypotheses 2: Variation in offshore subsistence hunting patterns is not related to offshore oil and gas activities. This overarching goal will be accomplished through the following intermediary steps: 1. Project Management: administer and communicate progress and deliverables of study efforts to designated MMS representatives; 2. Community Engagement: secure participation and cooperation of the native hunter associations and individual hunters and whaling crews in this study and in the tasks of coordination and self reporting; 3. Data Collection: initiate and continue the annual assessment of marine subsistence hunting and whaling by Wainwright and Point Lay communities; expand the research coverage in subsequent years of research (beginning in Year 2) to include Barrow, and possibly Point Hope; 4. Analyze Data: analyze and summarize annual field data sufficient to identify and interpret notable changes in offshore hunting activities over time; 5. Prepare and Submit Annual Field Reports: prepare and present the recorded field data in an annual report for each year 2008-2010; 6. Prepare and Submit Final Summary Narrative: following the last field season, compare and summarize in analytic narrative the significant results from this study; 7. Present Major Findings: present in oral and written format, using language easy to understand, the major findings of research to interested stakeholder groups. Seven tasks include Task 1, Project Management; Task 2, Community Engagement; Task 3, Data Collection; Task 4, Analyze Data; Task 5, Prepare and Submit Annual Field Reports; Task 6, Submit Final Narrative Summary; Task 7, Present Major Findings. How to Respond: If you are interested in participating in this acquisition, please e-mail your organizations name, point of contact, address, telephone and fax numbers, e-mail address and DUNS Number not later than 2:00 p.m. E.T., Monday, June 9, 2008, to contact@example.gov., or send this same information to Debra Bridge, Minerals Management Service, 381 Elden Street, MS-2101, Herndon, VA 20170. Please reference M08PS00068, COMIDA: Impact Monitoring for Offshore Subsistence Hunting, in your document. Those organizations responding to this announcement will receive a copy of the full Request for Proposal (RFP).