Valley Water requires experienced, and qualified firms to provide general and specialized biological Services in the areas of botany, wetlands, fisheries, wildlife, restoration ecology, land and natural resources management and other biological support services on an “as needed basis”, to assist Valley Water in accomplishing its tasks in a timely manner. Project Objectives A. The Santa Clara Valley Water District (Valley Water) implements a number of capital and operational projects and programs to meet its mission and goals in water supply, flood protection and watershed stewardship. The on-call services provided pursuant to this Agreement will augment the services of Valley Water staff and provide additional biological services as needed. B. The objectives of each phase of biological services include but are not limited to: 1) Planning phase: To gather the required information to understand what biological resources need to be considered when planning a District operation or project. This knowledge can be used during early stages of planning and design to avoid and minimize impacts to biological resources, identify and plan biological mitigation, and to identify opportunities to conserve or enhance the biological resources. 2) Design phase: To expand the biological investigations and analysis for application to the developing project or operation. This additional, more detailed knowledge can inform decisions on preliminary and final designs of projects and their associated mitigation. 3) Construction phase: To monitor the project or operation during construction activities to ensure biological resources are protected or, if it is a biological restoration project, are correctly constructed. 4) Post Construction phase: To monitor and document that identified biological resources are responding, establishing or recovering to an expected level of success or performance criteria, after construction activities of a project or operation. This information may be used to determine a project has met (or not) its regulatory requirements in regard to biological resources. This information can also be used in adaptive management for improving an ongoing operation so as to further reduce impacts (or increase benefits) to biological resources. C. All Services required pursuant to this Agreement will be provided only on an as-needed/as-requested basis by the issuance of an authorized Task Order by Valley Water to the Consultant. A project scope will be developed for each task order, including deliverables for a total not-to-exceed amount. No work will be performed without a task order. The Consultant will perform services on a Task Order Basis as authorized by the VWPM, as set forth in the Standard On-Call Consultant Agreement, Section Twelve, Miscellaneous Provisions, subsection 13. Task Orders.
