An efficient, fair and transparent procurement system is vital to the government of the City of New York. Procurement affects the City’s delivery of essential services, our efforts to encourage economic growth, and our development of infrastructure. We buy supplies that range from the paper and computers used in agency offices, to the gardening equipment to maintain the parks, to the salt for snow removal. We purchase services as varied as foster care for children, janitorial services for public facilities, and architects to design new buildings. We hire construction contractors to rehabilitate roadways and bridges, build new facilities to protect the City’s drinking water, and improve playgrounds throughout the City. In Fiscal Year 2011 City agencies completed almost 55,000 procurements, for a total purchasing volume of nearly $15 billion.
Although largely unseen by the public, a well-functioning procurement system is vital to the City's ability to deliver the essential services that its citizens expect and demand. The Mayor’s Office of Contract Services (MOCS) is the City’s compliance and oversight agency for procurement. The City’s procurement system spans an enormous range of subject areas, but three overarching goals guide our efforts: first, we aim to achieve the best value for the taxpayers’ dollar: high quality goods and services, with timely delivery, at fair and reasonable prices; second, and of equal importance, we seek responsible business partners, i.e., vendors whose records of integrity, financial capacity and successful performance justify the use of tax dollars, and; third, so that we can continue to obtain best value from responsible partners, we must ensure that our contracting process delivers fair treatment to all vendors. MOCS accomplishes its mission by:
- Working with and overseeing the activities of each Agency Chief Contracting Officer (ACCO) in the development and approval of their procurement actions.
- Ensuring that the vendors the City does business with are responsible.
- Maintaining a comprehensive vendor information system known as VENDEX.
- Supporting continued outreach to the vendor community, and maintaining the Public Access Center where the general public can access public contract information.
- Conducting public hearings prior to the awarding of contracts.
- In conjunction with the Financial Information Services Agency (FISA) and most Mayoral agencies, maintaining centralized, Citywide bidder lists, which agencies use to solicit vendors.
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Learn more about Fiscal 2011 Procurement HighlightsIn addition, MOCS oversees the operations of the Procurement Policy Board (PPB) and the Franchise and Concession Review Committee (FCRC), as well as the oversight and implementation of other important initiatives such as Doing Business Accountability Project ("Pay to Play"), Prevailing Wage, M/WBE, and Environmentally Preferable Purchasing.
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