The Government Accountability Office has rejected the Department of Energy’s attempt to dismiss a protest by Project Enhancement Corporation of an Office of Environment, Health, Safety and Security support contract award, but it threw out a supplemental protest by PEC that tried to argue that a post-award certification by the Small Business Administration should be relevant to its claim. A team led by PEC was initially awarded the contract under the National Nuclear Security Administration’s technical services blanket purchase agreement earlier this year, but a team led by Link Technologies challenged PEC’s small business size standard. The SBA upheld the size standard challenge, disqualifying PEC, and Link was awarded the contract in early October. However, the SBA recertified PEC as a small business under an inflation-adjusted $15 million cap for NAICS code 541330 (professional engineering services) Oct. 21, but the GAO said in a message to the parties involved in the protest last week that the recertification was “not relevant to the protest grounds.”
PEC argued in its initial protest that SBA’s decision raised a number of ambiguities about the procurement and “fundamentally changed” the competition, and it said if its proposal was disqualified due to the size standard challenge, the contract should have been recompeted because there was only one other bid—from Link. DOE argued that the protest should have been dismissed, but the GAO said the protest will move forward, “finding that the protester is an interested party; the protest is timely filed within 10 days of protester’s receipt of the OHA decision; that the legal and factual bases are sufficient for our review; and that, if we sustain some or all of the protest, we are able to grant at least some of the requested relief.” According to the GAO message, the SBA also is planning to weigh in on the protest, and it directed DOE to share a copy of its response to the protest with the SBA. DOE’s response is due to the GAO by Nov. 17.
