JOURNALISTS & STRINGERS FOR ENGLISH AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE NEWS BROADCASTING

The U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), International Broadcasting Bureau's (IBB), Voice of America (VOA) and Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB) are seeking qualified individuals for free-lance Radio and Television, English and foreign language news broadcasting assignments in Washington, DC; Miami, FL (for OCB); and overseas locations that are not serviced by full-time VOA and/or OCB staff correspondents. The VOA broadcasts in English and 44 other languages. These languages are as follows: Afan Oromo, Albanian, Amharic, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Bangla, Bosnian, Burmese, Cantonese, Creole, Croatian, Dari, French, Georgian, Greek, Hausa, Hindi, Indonesian, Khmer, Kirundi, Kinyarwanda, Korean, Kurdish, Lao, Macedonian, Mandarin, Ndebele, Pashto, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Shona, Somali, Spanish, Swahili, Thai, Tibetan, Tigrigna, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek and Vietnamese. News reports submitted by free-lance journalists will be used in broadcasting to international audiences. The following general information pertains to the above-listed free-lance assignments: 1) Assignments are performed on a contract basis at various VOA, and/or OCB domestic and overseas locations. 2) Contractor candidates may be required to undergo a background security investigation and successfully pass the IBB's security clearance process in order to receive work assignments. 3) Contractor candidates must be willing to work on an "as-required" basis, depending on when the VOA, or OCB requires the filing of news stories. 4) Free-lance assignments are contracted for strictly on an "as needed" basis. The VOA and OCB make no guarantees on the amount of work assignments that contractors can expect to receive. 5) The Government is obligated to inspect all contractors performed work to insure that it fully satisfies the Government's requirements. The Government is further obligated to reject all work that fails to meet Government-specified requirements. The following criteria are used by the VOA and OCB to evaluate prospective contractors: (1) Newspaper, wire service, radio or television experience; (2) Experience in writing news for broadcasts; (3) Extensive knowledge of the target broadcast language(s); (4) Ability to produce work that demonstrates a keen knowledge of national and international issues; (5) Ability to explain complex issues in clear, logical terms that can be understood by VOA's and OCB's worldwide audiences; (6) Ability to research, select, and prepare material to provide background and highlight key elements of VOA or OCB web news reports, prepare and encode additional streamed media, and ensure compliance with copyright restrictions; and (7) Documented (i.e., education/training and/or practical experience) knowledge of the principles and practices of journalistic writing, editing, and Internet publishing. Prospective contractors are hereby notified that the basis for award will be based on best value; with technical evaluation factors (i.e., strength of prospective contractor’s CV, approach to performing work) being more important than the prospective contractor's proposed hourly price. Submit price proposal based on hourly or assignment basis. Individuals who are interested in and believe that they have the experience and capabilities to perform one or more of the above-stated free-lance English or foreign language news broadcasting Assignment/Task Orders that are issued under a contract basis with one or more of the above-stated BBG organizations (VOA) at their respective Washington, DC; Miami, FL (for OCB) and/or overseas locations may submit written inquiries for additional information and/or submit their written statement(s) of interest, technical qualifications, desired compensation, and pertinent experience for proposing to contract for one or more of the above-listed free-lance English and foreign language news broadcasting assignments with the appropriate BBG organization(s) as follows: (a) For free-lance assignments with the VOA (Radio) in Washington, DC or overseas, submit written inquiries for additional information and/or contract technical proposals to the Voice of America (VOA), Attention: Ms. Cynthia Krasinski, VOA/C, Room 1450, Cohen Federal Building, 330 Independence Avenue (SW), Washington, DC 20237,email address: cakrasin@voanews.com; (b) For free-lance VOA (Television) assignments in Washington, DC or overseas, submit written inquires for additional information and/or contract technical proposals to VOA - TV, Attention: Ms. Donna Buchan, VOA/O, Room 2276, Cohen Federal Building, 330 Independence Avenue, (SW), Washington, DC 20237, email address: dlbuchan@voanews.com; and (c) For free-lance radio and/or television assignments with the Office of Cuba Broadcasting's (OCB) Radio and/or TV Marti in Miami, FL or overseas, submit written inquiries for additional information and/or contract technical proposals to OCB, Attention: Ms. Mary Ann Amps, OCB/A, 4201 NW 77th Avenue, Miami, FL 33166, email address: mamps@ocb.ibb.gov. Any written inquiries and/or contract proposals responding to this Public Notice may be submitted to the above-listed respective VOA and/or OCB POCs at any time up to the December 31, 2008 expiration date of this Public Notice. This Notice is not a RFQ, RFP, or IFB.