B-298443.4, Partnership for Response and Recovery, December 18, 2006

B-298443.4 Dec 18, 2006 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Partnership for Response and Recovery (PaRR) protests the corrective action taken by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in response to the protest of Alltech, Inc. of FEMA's award of contracts under request for proposals (RFP) No. HSFEHQ-06-R-0013 to PaRR and Michael Baker, Jr. Corporation for housing inspection services (HIS). The RFP contemplated award of multiple indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts for HIS, which involves providing individual housing inspectors and managing a program to deploy and oversee the inspectors when a disaster occurs. PaRR argues that the agency's revised corrective action, which consists of reopening discussions and requesting completely revised proposals, unfairly favors Alltech and is an abuse of agency discretion. We deny the protest. View Decision B-298443.4, Partnership for Response and Recovery, December 18, 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: Partnership for Response and Recovery File: B-298443.4 Date: December 18, 2006 E. Sanderson Hoe, Esq., and Karri L. Garrett, Esq., McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP, for the protester. Eric J. Marcotte, Esq., Scott A. Schipma, Esq., and Nathan C. Guerrero, Esq., Winston & Strawn LLP, an intervenor. Leigh M. Hoburg, Esq., Federal Emergency Management Agency, for the agency. Katherine I. Riback, Esq., and James A. Spangenberg, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST Agency is not required to limit discussions and revised proposals in taking corrective action in response to protest where it found discussions and evaluation were inadequate and new requirements have been added to the solicitation. DECISION Partnership for Response and Recovery (PaRR) protests the corrective action taken by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in response to the protest of Alltech, Inc. of FEMA's award of contracts under request for proposals (RFP) No. HSFEHQ-06-R-0013 to PaRR and Michael Baker, Jr. Corporation for housing inspection services (HIS). The RFP contemplated award of multiple indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts for HIS, which involves providing individual housing inspectors and managing a program to deploy and oversee the inspectors when a disaster occurs. PaRR argues that the agency's revised corrective action, which consists of reopening discussions and requesting completely revised proposals, unfairly favors Alltech and is an abuse of agency discretion. We deny the protest. Alltech had protested that the agency's evaluation was –irrational, unsupported by the record, and punctuated with recurring examples of blatant disparate treatment,— that the discussions were incomplete, and the source selection decision was not explained or documented. Alltech's Protest Comments (B-298443, Aug. 7, 2006) at 2. After receipt of the agency report and comments thereon, our Office scheduled a hearing to address the various problems in the record. The agency then decided to take corrective action in response to Alltech's protest, and we dismissed Alltech's protest. Specifically, the agency found that the entire source evaluation board (SEB) had not reviewed the evaluation report, and only a –draft— report, which contained a discussion of a number of weaknesses attributed to Alltech's proposal that had been resolved during discussions and the submission of final proposal revisions, had been provided to the source selection official. The final SEB report was only prepared after the source selection decision. It was also found that the agency had not conducted meaningful discussions regarding Alltech's past performance and that there appeared to be a disconnect between the discussion questions asked and the agency's true concerns about Alltech's proposal, for example, in the training area. Agency Report at 4-5. The corrective action first proposed by the agency was to appoint a new SEB and source selection official to conduct a de novo evaluation of the competitive range offerors' proposals. The new evaluators would evaluate proposals based upon the initial submissions and responses to discussion questions. FEMA contemplated that the agency would reopen discussions only for newly identified significant weaknesses that were not the subject of previous discussions and price revisions would only be permitted to the extent they could be tied to the technical changes resulting from new discussion questions. Contracting Officer's Statement at 8-9; FEMA's Corrective Action Letter (Aug. 18, 2006). The agency later determined, for a variety of reasons, that the evaluation, discussions and proposal revisions, including price revisions, should not be restricted.