The Bay Mills Indian Community ("BMIC" or the "Tribe") is a federally recognized sovereign nation located in the rural eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan on the shores of Lake Superior. The people of Bay Mills are Ojibwa (or Chippewa) and have resided in this area since time immemorial. BMIC was granted a federal Corporate Charter pursuant to Section 16 of the Indian Reorganization Act on June 18, 1934. BMIC is one of the four original reservations established in Michigan. There are currently 2,206 enrolled Tribal members, with approximately 1,388 members living within the tri-county (Chippewa, Luce, and Mackinac counties) service area.

The Bay Mills Indian Community is currently accepting proposals for the production of a strategy plan that accomplishes three goals: a plan that highlights feasible economic development possibilities for the Tribe, both on and off the Reservation (Phase I); creates a community land use plan for existing land owned by BMIC (Phase II); and, determines a land acquisition plan for BMIC (Phase III).

The purpose of this request for proposals (RFP) is to solicit proposals from multiple firms to ensure the Tribe's limited resources will be used efficiently through a competitive and sealed bidding process that evaluates all proposals equally based upon the criteria listed in this document, and to select a firm that will be able to deliver what is needed within the specified timeframe.

This project contains three different phases. Phase I (Economic Diversification Strategy Plan) will entail an assessment of BMIC's current assets (facilities, land/property, financial capability, workforce, equipment, current investments, etc.) and those resources that are available/present in the region by a firm to determine different viable business ventures for BMIC. The end product of this phase would be an economic diversification strategy plan for BMIC to participate in to restructure its economic fundamentals away from casino-dependent revenue streams.

Stemming from this primary phase would be Phase II — Land Use Plan. This would entail looking to BMIC's current land/property ownership and determine usage for such. The Tribe currently does not have a land use map for its community. No land is strictly "zoned" as residential, cultural/sacred lands, commercial, etc. This phase would require a consultant to assess both what we have for land/property and BMIC's economic diversification strategy plan (created from Phase I) to determine how each parcel should be classified for future usage.

Tying in with this phase would be Phase III — Land Acquisition Plan. This phase would look to the economic diversification strategy plan and BMIC's current lands to determine which properties the Tribe should acquire in order to successfully participate in the broadening of its business ventures.

Funding for this project is provided from a competitive grant award from the Economic Development Administration.

For the full RFP, please visit http://www.baymills.org