The agency may issue a request for proposals, which shall set forth the scope of work, design parameters, construction requirements, time constraints, and all other requirements that have a substantial impact on the cost or quality of the project and the project development process, as determined by the agency. The request for proposals shall include the criteria for acceptable proposals. For projects to be awarded on a best-value basis, the scoring process and quality criteria must also be contained in the request for proposals. In the agency's discretion, the request for proposals may provide for a process, including the establishment of a team to review proposals, for the agency to review conceptual technical elements of each proposal before full proposal submittal for the purposes of identifying defects that would cause rejection of the proposal as nonresponsive. All such conceptual submittals and responses shall be confidential until award of the contract. The request for proposals may also provide for a stipend upon specified terms to unsuccessful proposers that submit proposals conforming to all request-for-proposals requirements. (Added 2009, No. 50, § 84.)