B-298086; B-298086.3, Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture, May 30, 2006

B-298086; B-298086.3, Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture, May 30, 2006 TITLE: B-298086; B-298086.3, Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture, May 30, 2006 BNUMBER: B-298086; B-298086.3 DATE: May 30, 2006 ****************************************************************************** B-298086; B-298086.3, Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture, May 30, 2006 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: Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture File: B-298086; B-298086.3 Date: May 30, 2006 Robert C. MacKichan, Jr., Esq., Kristen E. Ittig, Esq., and Stuart Turner, Esq., Holland & Knight LLP, for the protester. Sharon Roach, Esq., Edith L. Toms, Esq., and Elizabeth A. Hall, Esq., General Services Administration, for the agency. Paul E. Jordan, Esq., and John M. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Elimination of protester's offer from competitive range was unobjectionable where agency reasonably concluded that protester's offered building did not meet solicitation requirement for provision of employee service-related amenities within stated walkable distance. 2. Protest that agency improperly rejected protester's offer based on undisclosed criteria and tenant's dislike of neighborhood is denied where record shows evaluation was conducted in accordance with solicitation requirements. DECISION Bristol Group, Inc.--Union Station Venture protests the rejection of its offer for failure to meet the location amenities requirement in solicitation for offers (SFO) No. 05-019, issued by the General Services Administration (GSA) for office space for the Surface Transportation Board (STB). Bristol challenges GSA's evaluation of its proposed amenities. We deny the protest. The SFO sought up to 74,870 rentable square feet for STB, to be located in the Central Employment Area of Washington, D.C. The SFO provided as follows regarding the location amenities: A variety of inexpensive and moderately priced fast food and/or eat in restaurants must be located within 2,500 walkable linear feet [WLF] and other employee services such as retail shops, cleaners, banks, etc., must be located within 2,500 [WLF]. SFO para. 1.3(c). Bristol submitted an offer in response to the SFO for its building at One NoMa Station, on M Street, N.E., in Washington, D.C. After reviewing Bristol's offer, GSA requested additional information as to how the firm planned to meet the SFO's requirements, and requested a listing of the amenities and their distance from the offered building. Bristol responded with a list of amenities that included establishments located at Union Station, and stated that all were within 2,500 WLF of its building, but did not list the actual distances. GSA performed its own measurements, determined that Bristol's building did not meet--and was not capable of meeting--the location amenities requirement, and rejected Bristol's offer. Bristol challenged the rejection in an agency-level protest, asserting that the agency erroneously determined that its building was farther than 2,500 WLF from the amenities of Union Station. GSA denied the protest, noting that its measurements showed that the amenities inside Union Station were not within the required 2,500 WLF. Bristol then filed this protest with our Office. Bristol asserts that GSA improperly rejected its offer based on an unreasonable determination that its building did not meet the amenities requirement. Specifically, Bristol asserts that its building is within 2,500 WLF of the amenities located at Union Station.[1] The determination of whether a proposal is in the competitive range is principally a matter within the reasonable exercise of discretion of the procuring agency. In reviewing an agency's evaluation of proposals and subsequent competitive range determination, we will not evaluate the proposals anew in order to make our own determination of their acceptability or relative merits; rather, we will examine the record to determine whether the documented evaluation was fair, reasonable, and consistent with the evaluation criteria. Ervin & Assocs., Inc., B-280993, Dec. 17, 1998, 98-2 CPD para. 151 at 3. Bristol's assertions are without merit; the record shows that Union Station and its amenities are more than 2,500 WLF from Bristol's building. GSA's broker in this procurement--Capitol CREAG, LLC--used a walking-wheel to measure the distance from Bristol's building to Union Station and the other amenities identified by Bristol.