Website Design, Content Management System, & Hosting Services Request for Proposals

REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS CITY PROJECT NO. 2026-07-41100-01 REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL WEBSITE DESIGN, CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM & HOSTING SERVICES ISSUE DATE: Monday, August 3, 2026 ISSUED BY: City of East Ridge, Tennessee 1517 Tombras Avenue East Ridge, Tennessee 37412 Website: www.EastRidgeTN.gov PROJECT CONTACT: Cameron Hobbs-McAllister Administrator of Economic & Community Development Phone: (423) 867-7711 Email: CMcAllister@eastridgetn.gov PROPOSALS DUE: Monday, September 14, 2026 3:00 PM Eastern Time CITY OF EAST RIDGE, TENNESSEE WEBSITE DESIGN, CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM & HOSTING SERVICES Project Overview The City of East Ridge, Tennessee is seeking proposals for web design, content management system and hosting services to assist and guide the City in the redesign of the City's public facing website: www.EastRidgeTN.gov. Interested vendors should propose a solution that addresses the following goals and minimum requirements. Project Goals To create a website that:  Is presented in a clean layout that positively represents the City and that is easy to use with intuitive navigation;  Provides citizens, visitors and businesses with easy access to relevant information relating to City services, public meetings, public documents, community resources and economic development opportunities;  Embraces the principle of quality over quantity. Our goal is not to have pages and pages of information that appear robust but in fact add little value to our end users but rather a concise, modern, clean site that exceeds the expectations of site visitors.  Interfaces seamless with current and future emerging technologies (i.e. social media, AI functionality);  Considers future consolidation of existing City-controlled websites (i.e. Animal Services, Parks and Recreation, etc);  Provides for or integrates with a third-party vendor for the submission of City forms / applications to improve customer service and staff workflow;  Is dynamic and is implemented through a management system that is easy and intuitive for City staff to use and update;  Is reliable and available 24/7 (see Attachment A, Hosting, Site Availability, Hardware / Software Requirements);  Meets ADA standards for accessible design (see Attachment B for ADA design standards). Minimum Requirements  A content management system (CMS) that will allow the staff to easily update the site including the ability to schedule future content posting and removal;  A mobile site and/or App version of the site.  An end-user managed registration tool for subscribing to mailing lists and notifications for specific sections – i.e. new job postings, news events, etc.;  Document storage including automatic conversion to PDF;  Translation functionality built into the site to serve non-English speaking website visitors;  Multiple customizable calendars with “Add to My Calendar”/ ICS option;  Customizable friendly links – i.e. www.EastRidgeTN.gov/jobs;  Site statistics and reports;  Searchable content;  Social Media integration;  Customizable templates for subsections. Ongoing Support Through a maintenance agreement, the successful vendor will provide the City with troubleshooting and support which should be available during normal business hours (8 am to 5 pm Eastern time). Requests for support should be available with a minimum response time target of two (2) hours or less. East Ridge City Background Known as the "Gateway to Tennessee," the City of East Ridge is a vibrant, family-friendly suburban community bordering Chattanooga. Home to approximately 22,000 residents, East Ridge is strategically located off Interstate 75 at the Georgia border, making it a bustling hub for thousands of travelers and a premiere destination for regional sports tourism. Incorporated in 1921, the City is dedicated to providing effective and efficient governance that promotes business opportunities, enhances diverse and safe neighborhoods, and creates a high quality of life for all citizens. Learn more at www.eastridgetn.gov. City of East Ridge - www.EastRidgeTN.gov City of East Ridge Facebook - www.Facebook.com/EastRidgeTN East Ridge Parks & Recreation - www.eastridgeparksandrec.com East Ridge Animal Services - www.eastridgeanimalservices.org Chattanooga Chamber of Commerce - www.chattanoogachamber.com Hamilton County School District - www.hcde.org Hamilton County, Tennessee - www.HamiltonTN.gov Proposal Requirements Interested vendors should prepare a response that includes the following information presented in the following order:  A cover letter that introduces the company and clearly identifies the contact person for the proposal.  A project approach narrative that discusses how the vendor would address the project goals.  An explanation of the CMS and its capabilities specifically relating to the project's minimum requirements.  A sample project timeline with milestones assuming an October 15, 2026 project award.  Qualifications and experience on similar website design projects, including at least three references from clients within the past five years, with contact name, phone number, and email address.  A fee proposal, which includes o Design and Deployment Phase – including anticipated hours per task and hourly rates o Annual hosting / maintenance costs o Any other costs necessary to complete the project. Proposal Requirements – Alternate No. 1 The City will consider awarding a secondary project to provide for an Agenda Management System to manage the development and distribution of Council and Board agenda packets and minutes.  A fee proposal, which includes o Design and Deployment Phase – including anticipated hours per task and hourly rates o Annual hosting / maintenance costs o Any other costs necessary to complete the project. Proposal Requirements – Alternate No. 2 The City will consider awarding a secondary project to codify and host online the East Ridge Municipal Code. The last formal codification effort occurred in 2000.  A fee proposal, which includes o Design and Deployment Phase – including anticipated hours per task and hourly rates o Annual hosting / maintenance costs o Any other costs necessary to complete the project. Proposal Requirements – Alternate No. 3 The City will consider awarding a secondary project to provide for a Citizen Request Submission / Tracking / Resolution solution. The solution should offer a web and app-based submission process, ability to include photos and highly granular control of access to and routing of request types.  A fee proposal, which includes o Design and Deployment Phase – including anticipated hours per task and hourly rates o Annual hosting / maintenance costs o Any other costs necessary to complete the project. Submittal Instructions This is a sealed proposal project. Interested vendors should submit one electronic copy of their proposal in PDF format on a USB storage drive along with three (3) printed copies of the proposal in a sealed package to the City Clerk. The proposal must be clearly marked “RFP – Website Redesign and Hosting” and delivered to: City Clerk City of East Ridge 1517 Tombras Avenue East Ridge, Tennessee 37412 All proposals must be received no later than 3:00 pm on Monday, September 14, 2026, at which point they will be publicly opened. Selection Process A Selection Committee will choose the vendor by the following process:  The Committee will evaluate the RFP responses based on content, reputation of the vendor and fees.  The Committee will select up to three (3) vendors as finalists for further consideration.  The Committee will interview each finalist and request presentations focusing on site design ideas and the capabilities of the proposed CMS.  The Committee will evaluate the finalists based on the quality of the presentations, the ideas presented by the vendor and the ease of use and flexibility of the proposed CMS.  Based on the results of the RFP evaluations, interviews and presentations, the Committee will select the vendor. * Preference will be given to vendors who can provide government client references and have graphic design resources on staff Questions and Clarifications All interested parties are encouraged to email Cameron Hobbs-McAllister (CMcAllister@eastridgetn.gov) to register their intent to respond to this RFP. All firms expressing interest will be notified of any additional information or addendums issued for this RFP. Questions about this RFP are to be directed to the above-listed contact. Questions must be submitted by Monday, August 31, 2026, and all questions or clarifications will be issued to interested parties by Thursday, September 3, 2026. Special Considerations for Bids The City reserves the right to accept or reject any and all bids and to waive any technicalities or irregularities therein. The City reserves the right to formally amend any portion of the Request for Proposal and to award the contract in any manner deemed in the best interest of the City. Primary criteria for vendor evaluation and consideration include: completeness and thoroughness of response, demonstrated ability to meet the requirements of the program, prior experience with similar programs and favorable past experiences with the City. The proposal selected will be the proposal deemed to be in the best interests of the City while providing the most cost-effective approach to meet the stated requirements. The lowest priced proposal will not necessarily be selected. Vendors may not claim any indemnity, nor may they contest for whatever reasons, the choice of the City. All costs proposed in a submission will remain open for acceptance by the City for a period not less than ninety (90) days from the date of opening. During the evaluation process, the City reserves the right to request additional information or clarifications from those submitting bids, and to allow corrections of errors or omissions. The City reserves the right to retain all proposals submitted and to use any ideas in any proposals submitted, regardless of whether or not that bid is accepted. Submission of a bid indicates acceptance by the person submitting the bid of the terms, conditions and specifications contained in this RFP. The responding firm is responsible for all expenses incurred in responding to this RFP. All bids become the property of the City and will not be returned to the vendor. The selected vendor will be required to enter into an agreement with the City for the project. The City is not under any obligation to award a contract, and reserves the right to terminate the Request for Proposal process at any time and to withdraw from discussions with any or all of the vendors who have responded. Attachment A Hosting, Site Availability and Requirements Vendor-supplied hosting of the site is preferred. If the vendor does not provide hosting, then the vendor should sub-contract the hosting and act as the liaison between the City and the hosting company, accepting all responsibility for any problems or outages that result from the hosting company. It is the responsibility of the vendor to decide on the server hardware/software platform. The requirements from the City are the following:  The site must be available 24/7. Downtime for scheduled maintenance must be held to a minimum, requires a two (2) business day advance notification and must be initiated between the hours of 2 am and 4 am.  The vendor must provide a disaster plan describing system monitoring and redundancy to ensure no loss of service due to hardware failure as well as network outages outside of the control of the vendor. This means that if a server fails, the sites are immediately available via redundant hardware. Also, the hosting company should have multiple ‘paths’ to the internet for the site so that if their main service provider has an outage, the site is still available from a backup service provider.  The vendor must provide documentation describing the data backup and recovery systems to ensure that in the event of accidental data loss or other catastrophic event, appropriate off-site backups of the sites are available. Attachment B Standards for Accessible Design The City provides consistent and equal access to all individuals, regardless of ability, for City programs, services and activities. In delivering website services, the City's website must include accessible features for individuals with disabilities. The selected vendor will be able to demonstrate a working knowledge and understanding of accessible web features built into web pages for assistance technologies used by individuals with disabilities. These features may include, but are not limited to, screen readers and voice recognition technology and the selected vendor must demonstrate that accessibility features are incorporated into its website design standards. Examples of accessible features required by City include:  All images and graphics need to have an alt tag or long description.  When navigation links are used, people who use a screen reader must be able to listen to all the links before proceeding. A skip navigation link that provides a way to bypass the row of navigation links by jumping to the start of the web page content needs to be provided.  A contact information link such as "contact us" needs to be provided as a way for users to request accessible services or to make suggestions.  Alt tags for image maps and for graphics associated with the image map so that a person using a screen reader will have access to the links and information.  Long description alt tags for information on photos and images that contain information too long for the limited text capabilities of simple alt tags. This provides a way to have as much text as necessary to explain the image so it is accessible to a person using a screen reader but not visible on the web page.  Clearly defined text links that indicate what the link is supposed to do. Links such as “click here” may confuse a user.  Tables with header and row identifiers used to display information or data should be associated with each data cell by using HTML so a person using a screen reader can understand the information.