B-310548, Cornell Companies, Inc., December 3, 2007

B-310548 Dec 03, 2007 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Cornell Companies, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Dismas Charities, Inc. by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) under request for proposals (RFP) No. 200-0953-SC, for Residential Reentry Center (RRC) services in El Paso County, Texas. Cornell asserts that the agency failed to follow the evaluation criteria set forth in the solicitation, failed to hold meaningful discussions, and made a flawed source selection decision (SSD). We deny the protest. View Decision B-310548, Cornell Companies, Inc., December 3, 2007 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: Cornell Companies, Inc. File: B-310548 Date: December 3, 2007 Ruth E. Ganister, Esq., Rosenthal and Ganister, for the protester. Alex D. Tomaszczuk, Esq., Orest J. Jowyk, Esq., and Daniel S. Herzfeld, Esq., Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman, LLP, for Dismas Charities, Inc., an intervenor. Tracey L. Printer, Esq., Department of Justice, for the agency. Eric M. Ransom, and Christine S. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preperation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Assessment of a weakness against the protester's proposal was not improper where the considerations on which the assessment was based were encompassed by the evaluation criteria. 2. Assessed weakness was not required to be raised in discussions where the weakness was not considered significant, and did not prevent the proposal from meeting the solicitation requirements or having a reasonable chance of award. DECISION Cornell Companies, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Dismas Charities, Inc. by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) under request for proposals (RFP) No. 200-0953-SC, for Residential Reentry Center (RRC) services in El Paso County, Texas. Cornell asserts that the agency failed to follow the evaluation criteria set forth in the solicitation, failed to hold meaningful discussions, and made a flawed source selection decision (SSD). We deny the protest. The BOP issued the RFP on December 21, 2006, requesting proposals to provide RRC services for male and female Federal offenders. The RFP contemplated award of a fixed-price requirements-type contract with a base period of 2 years and 3 option years. Award was to be made to the offeror whose proposal was determined to represent the best value to the government under three evaluation factors: past performance, technical/management, and price. RFP sect. M.5. The RFP stated that technical/management and past performance, when combined, were significantly more important than price, and that in the non-price areas past performance was more important. Id.Proposals were to be evaluated using a color/adjectival rating system: blue/very good; green/acceptable; yellow/poor; and red/unacceptable. Id. Timely proposals were received from Cornell and Dismas. In accordance with the solicitation, technical/management proposals were submitted to a three-person source selection evaluation board (SSEB), which was to review the proposals under the technical/management factors stated in the solicitation: site location,[1] accountability, programs, facility, and personnel. RFP sections M.3, M.5, at 2.0. After initial review, the SSEB chairperson requested that the contracting officer conduct discussions with the offerors based on needed clarifications and deficiencies identified in the proposals. Agency Report (AR), Tab 5, Request to Open Discussions. Written discussions were then conducted with both offerors. AR, Tab 6, Discussions with Offerors. After discussions, the SSEB evaluated the revised technical/management proposals and the contracting officer performed the past performance and price evaluations. After these evaluations, Cornell's revised proposal received a rating of blue/very good under the past performance factor, green/acceptable under the technical/management factor, and had an evaluated price of $14,794,571.88. AR, Tab 11, SSD, at 17. Dismas' revised proposal received a rating of blue/very good under the past performance factor, blue/very good under the technical/management factor, and had an evaluated price of $16,140,846.48. Id. In the SSD, the source selection authority (SSA) summarized the past performance evaluation and reviewed the SSEB's technical/management evaluation. The SSA concurred with the SSEB that, although both offers met the requirements of the statement of work (SOW), the technical/management proposal submitted by Dismas was most advantageous to the government. Id. at 19.