Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company

B-290158 Jun 17, 2002 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights A firm protested an Army contract award for navigation improvement project, contending that the Army should have rejected the two proposals priced lower than theirs because they failed to include all permits for the proposal disposal site. GAO held that the Army properly determined not to reject the competitive bids as nonresponsive because the solicitation did not require the bidder to have all permits to win the bid. Accordingly, the protest was denied. View Decision Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company, B-290158, June 17, 2002 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Company protests the award of a contract to any bidder other than itself under invitation for bids (IFB) No. DACW51-01-B-0024, issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New York District for a navigation improvement project for New York Harbor, Kill Van Kull and Newark Bay Channels. Great Lakes contends that the agency should have rejected as nonresponsive the two bids that were lower in price than its own. We deny the protest. The IFB, which was issued on September 4, 2001 and amended ten times prior to bid opening, required the dredging and disposal of rock and non-rock material from the channels. The solicitation provided for placement of the non-rock material removed at the Historic Area Remediation Site (HARS), IFB Sec. 02900, Para. 7.2.1, but also identified some of the material to be dredged as "[n]on-rock material unsuitable for placement at the HARS [disposal facility]." IFB, Sec. 02900, Para. 6. The IFB gave bidders the option of using the OENJ Cherokee Bayonne Landfill Remediation Site or of proposing their own facility for disposal of this material. IFB Amend. No. 0010, Sec. 00010, Item No. 0001AC. Bidders proposing their own facilities were to enter the name, address, and permit number of their site(s) on the bid schedule, and Note 8 to the schedule instructed bidders as follows: Should bidders choose to supply their own site in 0001AC, bidders shall submit the documents specified [in] Section 00800: Special Contract Requirements within 70 calendar days from the date the bids were opened and determined as an apparent low bidder or the Contractor's bid will be considered non-responsible and rejected. In addition the bidders should submit with the bid, permits demonstrating that the chosen disposal site(s) is legal to operate on or before the date of the bid opening must accompany the bid package, or the bid will be considered non-responsible and rejected. IFB amend. No. 0010, Sec. 00010, Note 8. /1/ Four bids were opened on the March 15, 2002 opening date. The three lowest bids were as follows: Bidder Total Bid Weeks Marine, Inc. $44,199,621 Bean Stuyvesant LLC $47,403,111 Great Lakes $47,928,201 On May 10, the contracting officer determined that Weeks was non-responsible and rejected its bid, leaving Bean in line for award as the apparent low bidder. The contracting officer determined that Bean's bid was responsive and is currently in the process of examining Bean's responsibility. Great Lakes proposed to use the Cherokee site for disposal of the non-rock material not suitable for placement at the HARS, while Bean proposed an alternate site, the City of Linden, New Jersey landfill. Specifically, in materials accompanying its bid, Bean explained that it intended to process the raw dredged material at the CTI Claremont Dredged Material Processing Facility, Jersey City, New Jersey, which already possessed all necessary permits and approvals (copies of which Bean furnished with its bid package), and then dispose of it in the City of Linden landfill. Bean listed the permits that the City of Linden landfill already possessed and noted that disposal of the dredged material in the landfill would require approval of a Revised Landfill Closure/Post-Closure Plan and issuance of a Final Landfill Closure and Disruption Permit and an Acceptable Use Determination permit. /2/ Bean enclosed with its bid a copy of the Revised Landfill Closure/Post-Closure Plan submitted to the NJDEP on January 17, 2002 and a copy of its Final Closure Permit application, but did not furnish copies of any permits for the landfill. The protester argues that it was a material requirement of the IFB that bidders commit to disposing of the non-rock materials not suitable for placement at HARS in a facility that was legal to operate and had all permits necessary to receive the material from this project as of the bid opening date. Great Lakes contends that Bean failed to comply with this requirement in that, by its own admission, it did not have all of the requisite permits at the time of bid opening, and in that its bid documentation affirmatively establishes that the City of Linden landfill was not "legally able to operate" at the time of bid opening.