Request for Proposals Tourism Strategic Planning Services

Request for Proposals
RFP # 01-024
Tourism Strategic Planning Services
for the
City of Belton
Proposals will be received by the City Clerk located at
Belton City Hall, 333 Water Street, Belton, Texas 76513
PO Box 120, Belton, Texas 76513
Proposals due: Monday, October 19, 2026

The City of Belton is seeking competitive sealed proposals from qualified consulting firms
to prepare a comprehensive Tourism Strategic Plan. The plan will establish a practical
three-to-five-year roadmap for strengthening Belton as a visitor destination, increasing
overnight stays and visitor spending, supporting tourism-related businesses and events,
and guiding the effective use of City resources. The engagement will begin upon formal
approval by the City and will continue through final acceptance of all required
deliverables. The City anticipates completion within approximately six months of notice to
proceed, subject to the schedule proposed by the selected consultant and approved by
the City.
At a minimum, the selected consultant will be expected to address the following
components:
* Project Initiation and Background Review - Review relevant City plans, tourism
data, prior studies, current programs, and available visitor-economy information.
* Community and Stakeholder Engagement - Engage elected officials, City staff,
tourism partners, hoteliers, businesses, attractions, event organizers, and
community stakeholders.
* Tourism Baseline and Destination Assessment - Evaluate Belton's existing visitor
assets, accommodations, events, recreation, downtown, infrastructure,
partnerships, and visitor experience.
* Market and Visitor Analysis - Identify priority visitor markets, travel motivations,
competitive position, gaps, and opportunities for overnight visitation and visitor
spending.
* Vision, Goals, and Strategic Priorities - Establish an achievable tourism vision,
measurable goals, and a focused set of strategic priorities.
* Destination and Product Development - Recommend opportunities involving
lodging, attractions, outdoor recreation, downtown, sports, events, visitor services,
wayfinding, and related infrastructure.
* Organization, Staffing, Partnerships, and Funding - Confirm an effective service-
delivery model built around one full-time tourism position, clarify supporting roles
and partnerships, and address Hotel Occupancy Tax and other eligible funding
sources.
* Implementation and Performance Measurement - Deliver a prioritized action plan
with responsibilities, timelines, anticipated costs, funding options, and measurable
performance indicators
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REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS
I. INTRODUCTION
A. General Information
The City of Belton is requesting proposals for Tourism Strategic Planning
Services.
There is no expressed or implied obligation for the City of Belton to
reimburse responding companies for any expenses incurred in preparing
proposals in response to this request.
A Selection Committee will evaluate submitted proposals.
During the evaluation process, the Selection Committee and the City of
Belton reserve the right, where it may serve the City of Belton's best
interest, to request additional information or clarifications from proposers or
to allow corrections of errors or omissions. At the discretion of the City of
Belton or the Selection Committee, companies submitting proposals may
be requested to make oral presentations as part of the evaluation process.
Also, at the discretion of the City of Belton or the Selection Committee, past
performance reference checks may be made.
The City of Belton reserves the right to retain all proposals submitted.
Proposal materials may be used by the City for evaluation, selection,
contract negotiation, and administration of this procurement. Submission of
a proposal does not transfer ownership of a proposer's proprietary
methodologies, tools, or intellectual property to the City. Proposers should
clearly identify information they consider proprietary or confidential;
however, disclosure will be governed by the Texas Public Information Act
and other applicable law.
It is anticipated that the selection of a company will be completed by:
Friday, October 30, 2026.
Following notification of the selected company(s), it is also anticipated
that a contract will be negotiated between both parties by:
Thursday, November 5 2026.
The contract award is anticipated to occur on:
Tuesday, November 24, 2026.
B. Proposal Submittal
To be considered, one (1) unbound original proposal and three (3) bound
copies must be submitted by the time and date indicated herein. The original
signature must be in ink and must be signed by an officer or agent of the
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proposing company who is empowered to contractually bind such company.
The proposal must be received by 2:00P.M. on Monday, October 19, 2026,
in a sealed container/envelope clearly marked "RFP for Tourism Strategic
Planning Services for the City of Belton" in the following manner:
MAIL TO: IN PERSON OR DELIVERY SERVICE:
City of Belton City of Belton
City Clerk City Clerk
Attn: Amy Casey Attn: Amy Casey
PO Box 120 333 Water Street
Belton, Texas 76513 Belton, TX 76513
Proposals that fail to comply with the terms of this RFP may be considered
non-responsive. It is the proposer's sole responsibility to assure that its
proposal is delivered at the proper time and place of the proposal opening.
Proposals that for any reason are not so delivered will not be considered.
Late proposals will be filed unopened. Proposals by telegram, telephone, e-
mail, facsimile reproduction and transmission will not be considered.
C. Subcontracting
Following the award of the project contract, no additional subcontracting will
be allowed without the express prior written consent of the City of Belton.
II. Scope of Work to be performed
The City of Belton desires the selected consultant to develop a comprehensive,
implementable Tourism Strategic Plan for the City of Belton.
The consultant's work shall include, at a minimum, the following tasks and
deliverables:
** COMPANION MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS INITIATIVE. The City
has a separate tourism branding, marketing, and communications initiative
currently underway. Work completed or in progress through that initiative may
include brand development, visual identity, messaging, website development,
content creation, social media, advertising, and related implementation. The
selected strategic-planning consultant will be expected to review and coordinate
with those materials so the Tourism Strategic Plan and marketing effort reinforce
one another. This RFP does not seek to duplicate or replace the City's ongoing
branding and marketing work. The consultant may identify strategic marketing
priorities, target audiences, performance measures, or gaps that should inform
future implementation, but creation of a new brand, logo, tourism website, ongoing
social media management, advertising campaigns, or routine marketing content is
not included unless later authorized by the City in writing.
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* 1. Project Initiation and Management - Conduct a kickoff meeting; confirm the
work plan, schedule, communications protocol, decision points, and required
data; and provide regular progress updates throughout the engagement.
* 2. Background and Data Review - Review relevant City plans, the Tourism
SWOT exercise, available Hotel Occupancy Tax information, lodging and event
data, tourism grant practices, prior research, current tourism assets, and other
materials supplied by the City.
* 3. Stakeholder and Community Engagement - Develop and implement an
engagement process that may include interviews, focus groups, workshops,
surveys, public meetings, and presentations. The process should include City
Council, City staff, hoteliers, downtown and business representatives,
attractions, UMHB, the Bell County Expo Center, event organizers, recreation
and sports partners, and other community stakeholders identified with the City.
* 4. Tourism Baseline and Destination Assessment - Inventory and evaluate
accommodations, attractions, downtown experiences, dining and retail, parks
and outdoor recreation, sports facilities, signature events, visitor services,
transportation and wayfinding, public spaces, event infrastructure, and other
tourism-supporting assets. Identify strengths, gaps, barriers, and opportunities
affecting the visitor experience.
* 5. Market, Visitor, and Competitive Analysis - Identify existing and potential
visitor segments, origin markets, travel motivations, length-of-stay
opportunities, and visitor-spending potential. Compare Belton with appropriate
peer or competing destinations and identify practical areas of differentiation.
* 6. Vision, Positioning, Goals, and Strategic Priorities - Facilitate development
of a clear tourism vision and a limited number of measurable goals and
strategic priorities. Recommendations must align with and inform the separate
branding, marketing, and communications initiative without recreating that
work.
* 7. Destination and Product Development Strategy - Recommend feasible
opportunities to strengthen lodging, downtown, events, sports tourism, outdoor
recreation, cultural and heritage experiences, group travel, visitor amenities,
signage and wayfinding, transportation connections, public spaces, and
tourism-related business development.
* 8. Events and Experience Strategy - Evaluate the tourism role of existing
events and identify opportunities to improve visitor draw, overnight stays,
coordination, scheduling, measurement, and return on investment. Distinguish
community-serving events from events with meaningful tourism potential.
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* 9. Organization, Partnerships, and Governance - Recommend appropriate
roles for the City, tourism staff, advisory groups, hotels, business organizations,
UMHB, the Expo Center, event organizers, and regional partners. Identify
opportunities to improve coordination, accountability, and resource sharing.
* 10. Funding and Resource Strategy - Evaluate available resources and
recommend priorities for Hotel Occupancy Tax expenditures, grants,
sponsorships, public-private partnerships, and other legally eligible tourism
investments. Legal determinations regarding use of public funds will remain
with the City and its legal counsel.
* 11. Implementation Plan - Provide a prioritized implementation matrix
organized by immediate, short-term, mid-term, and long-term actions. Each
action should identify a lead party, supporting partners, estimated cost or level
of effort, potential funding source, sequence or dependencies, timeline, and
measurable outcome.
* 12. Performance Measurement - Recommend a practical tourism performance
framework that may include lodging demand, Hotel Occupancy Tax revenue,
documented room nights, visitor spending, event performance, website
referrals, visitor engagement, business development, and visitor satisfaction.
Measures should use data the City can reasonably obtain and maintain.
* 13. Tourism Staffing and Service-Delivery Assessment - The City currently
anticipates that one full-time tourism position should be appropriate and
sufficient for its present tourism program. Evaluate and validate that operating
assumption; recommend the position's core responsibilities, priorities,
qualifications, and reasonable workload; and identify how other City
departments, consultants, interns, advisory groups, and community partners
can support successful implementation without unnecessarily expanding
permanent staffing. Compare Belton with appropriate peer communities while
accounting for differences in Hotel Occupancy Tax revenue, lodging inventory,
event responsibilities, services performed in-house, and partner capacity. If
future staffing changes may eventually be warranted, provide a phased and
fiscally responsible framework tied to specific workload, service-level, program,
lodging, or revenue triggers. The assessment should not presume that
additional full-time positions are needed.
* 14. Draft and Final Deliverables - Prepare an executive summary, draft plan,
implementation matrix, presentation materials, and final Tourism Strategic
Plan. Facilitate review with City staff and stakeholders, incorporate City
comments, and present the final plan to the Belton City Council. Provide
editable source files and accessible PDF and Word versions of final
deliverables.
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III. PROPOSAL FORMAT
The proposal must be received by 2:00P.M. on Monday, October 19, 2026, and
include the following at a minimum for a proposing company to be considered:
A. Title Page
Title page showing the Request for Proposals subject, the company's name,
contact name, address and telephone number, e-mail address of the contact
person, and the date of the proposal.
B. Table of Contents
A Table of Contents shall be provided that clearly defines the sections of the
proposal.
C. Detailed Proposal
The detailed proposal should follow the order set out as follows:
1. Company Qualifications and Project Team
Describe the firm's organization, office responsible for the work, experience
with tourism and destination strategic planning, and the qualifications and
availability of each person assigned to the project. Identify the project
manager and any subconsultants, including their specific responsibilities.
2. Relevant Projects and References
Provide up to five projects completed within the last five years that are
similar in scope, preferably for municipalities, destination organizations, or
Texas communities. For each project, identify the client, scope, completion
date, project team, contract value, and reference contact information.
Include at least three client references.
3. Project Understanding - Demonstrate an understanding of Belton, the
purpose of this engagement, anticipated opportunities and challenges, and
the relationship between the strategic plan and the City's ongoing tourism
marketing and initiative.
4. Technical Approach and Work Plan - Describe the methodology, tasks,
decision points, quality-control process, and approach to producing an
actionable plan rather than a general vision document.
5. Stakeholder Engagement Plan - Describe proposed engagement methods,
audiences, number and type of meetings, and how input will be documented
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and translated into recommendations.
6. Data and Market Analysis - Identify the information and analytical methods
the firm proposes to use, including any data to be purchased, assumptions,
limitations, and information required from the City.
7. Deliverables - Provide a detailed list and description of all interim and final
deliverables, including editable files, implementation tools, presentations,
and final document formats.
8. Project Schedule - Provide a task-based schedule showing kickoff,
engagement activities, draft deliverables, City review periods,
presentations, and final completion.
9. Coordination With Companion Marketing Work - Explain how the firm will
use existing and forthcoming branding, messaging, website, content, and
marketing materials without duplicating services already underway.
10. Staffing and Service-Delivery Approach - Describe the firm's method for
validating the City's expectation that one full-time tourism position is
sufficient, comparing appropriate peer communities, defining internal and
partner support, and establishing objective triggers for any phased future
changes without presuming additional permanent staff.
11. Budget/Cost Proposal - Provide a not-to-exceed fee by task and deliverable,
including labor, travel, engagement expenses, data purchases,
reimbursable expenses, and all other anticipated costs. Clearly identify
optional services, if any.
12. Exceptions and Conflicts - Identify any requested exceptions to the RFP or
proposed contract terms and disclose any actual or potential conflicts of
interest.
IV. EVALUATION PROCEDURES
A. Review of Proposals
The Selection Committee will use a review process to score proposals. Each
member of the Selection Committee will first score each technical proposal by
each of the criteria described in Section IV B below. The full Selection
Committee will then convene to review and discuss these evaluations, and to
combine the individual scores to arrive at a composite technical score for each
company. At this point, companies with an unacceptably low technical score
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will be eliminated from further consideration.
The City of Belton reserves the right to retain all proposals submitted. Proposal
materials may be used by the City for evaluation, selection, contract
negotiation, and administration of this procurement. Submission of a proposal
does not transfer ownership of a proposer's proprietary methodologies, tools,
or intellectual property to the City. Proposers should clearly identify information
they consider proprietary or confidential; however, disclosure will be governed
by the Texas Public Information Act and other applicable law.
B. Evaluation Criteria
Proposals will be evaluated based on the following factors:
* Technical approach, work plan, and ability to produce an actionable
strategic plan - 25 points
* Qualifications and experience of the firm and assigned personnel - 20 points
* Relevant tourism, municipal, and destination strategic-planning experience
- 15 points
* Quality and inclusiveness of the proposed stakeholder-engagement
process - 15 points
* Strength of the proposed implementation, service-delivery and staffing
framework, and performance measures - 10 points
* Understanding of Belton and coordination with the companion marketing
and communications initiative - 10 points
* Cost, schedule, and overall value to the City - 5 points
C. Final Selection
The Selection Committee's selection will be based on the evaluation
procedures set out in the RFP.
D. Right to Reject Proposals
Submission of a proposal indicates acceptance by the company of the
conditions contained in this Request for Proposals unless clearly and
specifically noted in the proposal submitted and in the contract between the
City of Belton and the selected company.
The City of Belton reserves the right without prejudice to reject any or all
proposals.
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E. Addenda
Questions regarding this RFP must be submitted in writing to
acasey@beltontexas.gov no later than Friday, October 2, 2026. The City
anticipates issuing written responses and any necessary addenda by
Wednesday, October 7, 2026.
Addenda will be posted on the City's website under the Bid Postings tab. Firms
wishing to receive addenda and related updates directly by email must register
with the City Clerk at acasey@beltontexas.gov. It is each proposer's
responsibility to register with the City Clerk, monitor the official solicitation
posting, and acknowledge all addenda in its proposal.
F. Term
The contract term will begin upon formal approval by the City and continue
through final acceptance of all required deliverables. The City anticipates
completion within approximately six months of notice to proceed. Any
extension, additional service, or change in scope must be authorized in writing
by the City in accordance with the final contract.
G. Affirmative Action
The City of Belton is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer and
reserves the right to cancel this RFP process or reject any and all submittals,
extend the RFP deadline and waive minor irregularities which may be in the
best interest of the City at the City's sole discretion.
H. Insurance
Standard insurance policies required are as follows. For each policy, the
company's insurance coverage shall be primary with respect to the City, its
officials, employees and volunteers. Insurance shall be obtained and
maintained at the company's own expense during the duration of the awarded
contract, unless stated otherwise.
1. Commercial General Liability
a. Minimum limit of $500,000 per occurrence for bodily injury and property
damage with a $500,000 annual aggregate.
b. Coverage shall include, but not be limited to, premises/operations,
independent contracts, products/completed operations, contractual
liability (insuring the indemnity provided herein), underground coverage,
and where exposures exist.
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