The Department of Energy has decided to conduct a third evaluation of all of the bids submitted for the new Office of Legacy Management support services contract in response to a recent Government Accountability Office decision to sustain a protest filed over DOE’s award of the new contract to Portage. DOE informed bidders on the new contract this week of its plans for responding to the GAO’s decision, saying that no proposals have been eliminated. While eight bids were submitted for the new contract, in its decision last month, the GAO recommended that DOE only re-evaluate two bids and make a new award decision—Portage’s proposal and one submitted by Navarro Research and Engineering, which conducted the successful protest.
The new LM support services contract has been set-aside for small businesses and has been valued at approximately $250 million. DOE has told the bidders on the new contract that its latest re-evaluation will address areas outlined in the GAO’s decision to sustain Navarro’s protest, which found that the Department’s decision to award to Portage was based on “unreasonable conclusions, unequal evaluations, or inaccurate judgments regarding the differences between the two proposals.” DOE also has told bidders that it will decide how to proceed after completing its re-evaluation. DOE did not respond this week when asked why it has chosen to re-evaluate all of the bids submitted, instead of directly following the GAO’s recommendation, nor did it respond when asked of the estimated time frame for making a new award decision. DOE also did not respond when asked if it intended to change the Source Selection Official involved in the procurement, reportedly David Geiser, Director of the Office of Legacy Management.
DOE initially awarded the contract to Portage last April, leading to challenges from Navarro and the team of Wastren Advantage-S.M. Stoller. In response, DOE chose last May to take corrective action by re-evaluating all eight bids, and then chose again early this year to award the new contract to Portage. Both Navarro and the WAI-Stoller team again protested DOE’s decision, and last month the GAO sustained Navarro’s protest but denied WAI-Stoller’s. Currently, LM support services are provided by S.M. Stoller (now a wholly owned subsidiary of Huntington Ingalls Industries) under a contract last set to expire on June 30 after multiple extensions. DOE did not respond when asked this week about its plans for providing a new extension to Stoller while the procurement for the follow-on LM support services contract moves forward.
