(a) Yes, stipends are eligible for Federal-aid participation. Stipends are recommended on large projects where there is substantial opportunity for innovation and the cost of submitting a proposal is significant. On such projects, stipends are used to:

(1) Encourage competition;

(2) Compensate unsuccessful offerors for a portion of their costs (usually one-third to one-half of the estimated proposal development cost); and

(3) Ensure that smaller companies are not put at a competitive disadvantage.

(b) Unless prohibited by State law, you may retain the right to use ideas from unsuccessful offerors if they accept stipends. If stipends are used, the RFP should describe the process for distributing the stipend to qualifying offerors. The acceptance of any stipend must be optional on the part of the unsuccessful offeror to the design-build proposal.

(c) If you intend to incorporate the ideas from unsuccessful offerors into the same contract on which they unsuccessfully submitted a proposal, you must clearly provide notice of your intent to do so in the RFP.