RFP: Business Planning

Pathways to Housing PA, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit human services organization celebrating 16 years in 2024, is seeking a consultant to support a business planning process. We recently completed our strategic plan, which covers 2024-2029, and would like to build on our new plan to identify growth and operational plans for our core business, housing development, social enterprise, and real estate.

As a $21.5 million organization that has grown significantly in the last five years, we want to pay particular attention to our clinical work, community inclusion programming, social enterprises, housing development, and financial data and develop strong plans for growth and stability in those areas.

Priority will be given to consultants who are local to Philadelphia and have experience working with housing and human services organizations. We hope to finalize the plan within eight months.

Organization Background

In 2008, the City of Philadelphia engaged Pathways to bring its evidence-based Housing First model to Philadelphia to help end chronic homelessness. We currently house more than 550 people in regular apartments across the community, with an unprecedented 85% housing retention rate for participants. These same participants would be considered not housing ready in other programs.

As an alternative to emergency shelter and transitional housing, Pathways’ Housing First model is simple: provide housing without preconditions, and then address underlying issues around mental health, substance use, medical care, and education to welcome people back into the community. In our 16 years of operation, we’ve expanded our offerings to include an onsite Integrated Care Clinic and Community Inclusion Program, the Philadelphia Furniture Bank, Good Haul, Pathways Housing Wellness Corporation, and Work First.

Project Scope  

Pathways to Housing PA has several values that we expect our strategic planning partner to hold as well:

• Empathy
• Inclusion
• Accountability
• Respect
• Collaboration
• Adaptability

It is also important to us that the organization we collaborate with hold diversity, equity, and inclusion at the core of their work with us as we chart a path forward. We support a vibrant, diverse population of individuals and we want to ensure their best interests are priority as we chart a path forward.

The ideal proposal will support our efforts to build business plans in key areas of our operations. With two years under our belts with our first social enterprise, we want to create a strategy that will build structure and support growth. We also just received the final funding piece for our first affordable housing development, and similarly need to build out the next several years of operation, strategy, budget, and growth. We’ve been in the same space for nearly ten years and will need to look at options for when the lease is up in a few years; we have the option of extending, moving, or buying our own space. We also want to plan for our core business to explore growth, value-based payments, contracts with MCOs, and other options for increasing our core service offerings. The chosen partner will design and deliver a written business plan to guide those key areas.  

Please note that there is a requirement for some meetings/focus groups to be held in person at both of our current locations. This is not 100% virtual work.

We will concurrently be working on a Dashboard Development project to support us in defining key metrics for tracking impact and progress in each of our departments and programs. While issued as a separate RFP, we will consider working with the same organization for both projects if the expertise is present.  If different organizations are chosen, cooperation is expected as we are on related paths.  

Timeline

The timeline for this project is as follows:  

• August 23, 2024: RFP is announced  
• November 30, 2024: all proposals are due to Pathways to Housing PA
• December 31, 2024: all applicants are informed of their status
• January 1, 2025: project begins
• September 30, 2025: project is completed

Application and Selection Process

Submissions are due by November 30, 2024, and should be submitted to development@pthpa.org. Questions may also be submitted to development@pthpa.org, and we will answer them as quickly as we are able prior to the submission deadline.  

We do not require a specific format or template, but we do ask that all proposals include:  

• Your background and expertise including similar work done for other organizations
• Team members and bios
• Your approach to business planning
• List of deliverables
• Project timeline
• Comprehensive budget, not to exceed $100,000

The Dashboard Development RFP can be found here.