City Council
Report
City Council Meeting: October 22, 2024
Agenda Item: 5.C
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To: Mayor and City Council
From: Feroz Merchhiya, Chief Information Officer, Information Services Department Subject: Award Purchase Order to Allied Network Solutions, Inc. for Adobe Software Subscription Licenses
Recommended Action
Staff recommends that the City Council:
1. Adopt a finding of no possibility of significant effect pursuant to Section 15061(b)(3) (Common Sense Exemption) of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Guidelines;
2. Authorize the Procurement Manager to issue a purchase order with Allied Network Solutions, Inc. (ANS) for Adobe Software subscription licenses for the Information Services Department. This recommended award is made as an exception to the competitive bidding process pursuant to Section 2.24.250 (c) and is for a total amount not to exceed $446,895 over a three-year period (including a $58,293 contingency) with future year funding contingent on Council budget approval.
Summary
The City utilizes subscription licenses with Adobe Software to provide services and applications that give staff access to a collection of software used for document editing, graphic design, photography, video editing, and web development on a cloud-based platform. Staff seeks City Council approval to authorize the Procurement Manager to issue a purchase order with ANS for Adobe Software subscription licenses in the amount not to exceed $446,895, which includes a 15% contingency.
Discussion
The City currently holds an Adobe Software subscription pool of 604 licenses. Adobe products and applications are used by staff to perform daily administrative and 2 of 4
marketing job functions. The City’s subscription pool includes 532 Adobe Acrobat Professional licenses which allow staff to create, edit, and redact portable documents (pdf). The remaining subscriptions include: 48 Adobe Creative Suite, 14 Single-app, and ten (10) Restricted All-Apps licenses used for creating and editing multi-media files.
Adobe products such as Acrobat Pro, Photoshop, InDesign, and its remaining catalog of applications are considered the de facto market standard for PDF software solutions and multi-media creation. As the City provides these business solutions, and having such tools at their disposal, staff can optimize productivity and streamline operational processes.
The City’s Adobe Software subscription licenses are due for renewal in October 2024.
Prior to undertaking a procurement process to renew the City’s licenses, staff engaged Adobe to discuss and request an overview of the City’s current participation within Adobe’s Buying Program and its business solution capabilities. Since there is an evolving and increasing employee user demand from City operations, staff desired to address and implement a more comprehensive and expedited subscription license management solution. Along with easy license deployment and management through the City’s Adobe account Admin Console, staff sought a value incentive for committing to a multi-year term Adobe Buying Program.
Adobe’s proposal to staff’s inquiry for budget predictability included continued Admin Console management solution to deploy and fulfill license assignments per staff requests, continued Single Sign-On (SSO) support, with additional support from Adobe’s Enterprise Term License Agreement (ETLA) Buying Program. Through this Buying Program via a three-year term commitment, the City can manage, purchase and deploy Adobe software in an efficient, targeted and cost-effective manner. This Adobe Buying Program is included and can be acquired by the City via Carahsoft’s National Association of State Procurement Officials (NASPO) ValuePoint contract # 7-17-70-40-
05. Under the State of California’s Participating Addendum, the City can utilize NASPO Contract as a vehicle to procure subscription and cloud solutions.
Vendor Selection
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Exception to Competitive Bidding
Staff recommends ANS to provide Adobe Software subscription licenses as an exception to competitive bidding per Municipal Code 2.24.250 (c). The National Association of State Procurement Officials (NASPO) conducted a competitive bidding process awarding ANS as an authorized reseller. Under the State of California’s Participating Addendum, the City of Santa Monica is eligible to piggyback on the NASPO Master Contract Number: AR2472, Contract Number: 7-17-70-40-05. The City of Santa Monica intends to utilize this agreement, which ensures competitive pricing for the City’s business subscription and cloud solutions. c. Competitive procedures were followed by a governmental agency, including a federal, state, county, city, joint powers agency, special district, or cooperative purchasing agency consisting of one or more such agencies, that are equivalent to the procedures set forth in this Chapter, and the goods or services are supplied to the City at the same or better price as the price obtained by that agency;
Environmental Review
The purchase order for Adobe Software subscription licenses is exempt from CEQA pursuant to Section 15061(b)(3) of the CEQA Guidelines. The agreement is covered by the common sense exemption which states that CEQA does not apply, “where it can be seen with certainty that there is no possibility that the activity in question may have a significant effect on the environment. The purchase order will provide for Adobe software subscription licenses which would not result in adverse physical impacts on the environment, and so therefore, is exempt from CEQA.
Financial Impacts and Budget Actions
Staff seeks authority to approve available funding from the Information Technology Replacement & Services Fund to award a purchase order with ANS for Adobe Software subscription licenses. The cost is allocated to each department based on the number of subscription licenses used by staff.
Purchase Order Request
FY 2024-25 Request
Amount
Future Years
Amount CIP Account # Total Contract Amount
$148,965 $297,930 C7100020.689000 $446,895
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Future year funding is contingent on Council budget approval.
Prepared By: Carolyn Connolly, Administrative Services Officer Approved Forwarded to Council
Attachments:
A. OAKS INITIATIVE FORM
B. Levine Act Disclosure Form
C. Utah Master Agreement AR2472_Participating_Addendum_1 D. California Participating Addendum 7-17-70-40-05
E. Master Agreement AR2472 Coversheet
F. State of Utah Bid CH16012 Coversheet