Resource Consultants, Inc., B-290163; B-290163.2, June 7, 2002

Resource Consultants, Inc., B-290163; B-290163.2, June 7, 2002 TITLE: Resource Consultants, Inc., B-290163; B-290163.2, June 7, 2002 BNUMBER: B-290163; B-290163.2 DATE: June 7, 2002 ********************************************************************** Resource Consultants, Inc., B-290163; B-290163.2, June 7, 2002 DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This redacted version has been approved for public release. Decision Matter of: Resource Consultants, Inc. File: B-290163; B-290163.2 Date: June 7, 2002 Jacob B. Pompan, Esq., and Gerald H. Werfel, Esq., Pompan, Murray & Werfel, for the protester. David S. Cohen, Esq., John J. O'Brien, Esq., Rowena E. Laxa, Esq., and Catherine K. Kroll, Esq., Cohen Mohr, for NCS Pearson, Inc., an intervenor. Duane L. Zezula, Esq., Department of Transportation, Transportation Security Administration, for the agency. Tania Calhoun, Esq., and Christine S. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. General Accounting Office has jurisdiction over protest challenging the Transportation Security Administration's (TSA) award of a contract for services where the applicable statutory language effectively exempts TSA's acquisitions of equipment, supplies, and materials--but not acquisitions of services--from GAO's bid protest jurisdiction. 2. Protests that contracting agency's evaluation of proposals and source selection decisions were unreasonable are denied where the record shows that the evaluation and source selection decisions were reasonable and consistent with the solicitation's stated evaluation criteria. DECISION Resource Consultants, Inc. (RCI) protests the award of a contract to NCS Pearson, Inc. under request for proposals (RFP) No. DTTS59-02-R-00440, issued by the Department of Transportation's (DOT) Transportation Administrative Service Center (TASC), on behalf of the newly created Transportation Security Administration (TSA), to obtain a wide range of human resources services to establish and support the TSA. RCI challenges as unreasonable the agency's evaluation of proposals and source selection decisions. We deny the protests. In the aftermath of the terrorist hijackings and crashes of passenger aircraft on September 11, 2001, the Congress passed, and the President signed, the Aviation and Transportation Security Act (ATSA), Pub. L. No. 107-71, 115 Stat. 597 et seq. (2001), on November 19, 2001. The ATSA established the TSA as a new agency within the DOT and tasked it with security responsibilities for all modes of transportation overseen by the DOT and other related activities. As part of its mission to ensure aviation security, the TSA was made responsible for passenger security, including the qualification, recruitment and examination of a federal workforce responsible for all phases of security screening at various security checkpoints throughout commercial airports. To fulfill this mission, the TSA is required to hire and deploy more than 30,000 federal security screeners and thousands of federal security managers, federal law enforcement officers, and intelligence and support personnel to screen all passengers and property at 429 domestic airports by November 19, 2002. Id. sect. 110(c). The TASC, which was delegated authority to conduct procurements on behalf of the TSA, issued this solicitation on January 18, 2002 to acquire contractor support to develop, implement and execute an overarching qualification, assessment, staffing, and placement system and to provide on-going human resources services for airport security screeners, law enforcement officers and other TSA personnel in compliance with federal law, regulation and policy to allow the TSA to meet or exceed the dated mandates and other legislative requirements of the ATSA. RFP sect. C.1.0.B. The RFP's scope of work was broadly written to encompass a wide range of human resources services divided into four separate modules, three of which are at issue here: Module 1, ?Posting and Applicant Intake for Security Screener and Law Enforcement Job Applications and Additional Postings as Required?; Module 3, ?Candidate Selection?; and Module 4, ?Day-to-Day Servicing.? RFP sect. C.2.0.G. The agency planned to award a single contract for each module, and to evaluate each module independently of the other modules, but contractors were not limited to one award. Award was to be made, without conducting discussions, to the offeror whose proposal provided the best value. The agency planned to award time-and-material and labor hour contracts with a cost line item for other direct costs. Performance was to commence upon award and continue through December 31, 2002. Proposals would first be evaluated against minimum requirements for each module on a go/no-go basis.