CSS_Digital Archive 8-24-2020.docx

Combined Synopsis/Solicitation Number: W912HQ-19-Q-0014 – Request for Offers Administer Digital Research Collection and Provide Oral History Support

This is a combined synopsis/solicitation for commercial items prepared in accordance with the format FAR 12.603 – Streamlined Solicitation for Commercial Items, as supplemented with additional information included in this notice. This announcement constitutes the only solicitation. Offers are being requested and a written solicitation will not be issued. This solicitation document and incorporated provisions and clauses are those in effect through Federal Acquisition Circular 2020-06, dated 6 May, 2020.

The requirement is for a 100% small business set-aside under NAICS code 519120 Libraries and Archives. The size standard for this NAICS codes is $16,500,000.00.

Description: The Office of History (CEHO) maintains a rich collection of documents, photographs, and oral history interviews that chronicle the history of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. In the past, the majority of the material accessioned into the office’s Research Collection consisted of textual records—primarily documents, transcripts, photographs, and maps—that needed to be integrated into the office’s existing collection. Nowadays, the majority of its records are created and transmitted electronically. Moreover, in a bid to make its historical content available to a wider audience, the office is digitizing significant portions of its holdings. Consequently, CEHO requires the services of a support contractor to help the office manage and grow its Digital Research Collection (DRC) and to organize and permanently store a wide variety of digital content.

CEHO also requires the services of a contractor to process, arrange, evaluate, track, and accession interviews into its oral history collection. Those interviews include: more than 25 interviews conducted about USACE’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, 14 interviews about Task Force Barrier’s and South Pacific Border (SPB) District’s efforts to replace and build the border wall, 5 Career and Subject interviews (hereafter Career interviews), 14 interviews conducted for the preparation of the Los Angeles District Update History, 2 interviews about the Wilmington Distract, and approximately 10 interviews with participants in Task Force Essayons, Middle East District, and Transatlantic Afghanistan District.

Contract Line Items: This requirement and associated contract line item numbers (CLINs) is provided below:

Hours

*Estimated number of labor hours.

**Price per hour.

Basis for award: The Government will award a contract resulting from this combined synopsis solicitation on the basis of comparative evaluations based on price, technical capability and past performance of responsible offers whose product/service meets the requirements as listed in the purchase description or performance work statement.

Offerors must submit the following documents for this solicitation:

1. Offer using CLIN structure above;

2. The Offeror must submit proposed total price and extended prices for CLIN 0001.

3. A technical description that explains the Offeror’s capabilities as required in the PWS in sufficient detail to evaluate compliance with the requirements in the solicitation. This may include product literature, or other documents, if necessary; also, please provide resume’(s) of key person/personnel.

4. The Offeror’s past performance will be evaluated on recent and relevant contracts completed or ongoing for the same or similar in nature, complexity and dollar value to the work required in this solicitation. Offerors are asked to provide information for up to three (3) references:

5. Include a statement specifying the extent of agreement with all terms, conditions, and provisions included in the solicitation. Offers that fail to furnish required representations or information, or reject the terms and conditions of the solicitation may be excluded from consideration. Please sign and date the following statement on your proposal –

“I, as signatory for _____________ do hereby agree that we will comply with all terms, conditions, and provisions included in the solicitation. Name_____________ Date_______”

Offerors are required to be actively registered with the System for Award Management (SAM) at www.sam.gov prior to award. Offerors are highly encouraged to download and review all attachments to this solicitation prior to submitting an offer.

Please include CAGE Code and/or DUNS number.

Period and Place of Performance:

All work performed under the anticipated contract for this requirement must be completed within twelve (12) months of award.

Delivery shall be made to: The CEHO facility at 7701 Telegraph Road, Alexandria, Virginia.

Date, Time, and Place Offers are Due: The closing date for the delivery of a response to this combined synopsis/solicitation is on or before 4:30 pm Eastern Daylight Time (EDT), on Thursday, 17 September 2020. Questions should be submitted no later than Wednesday, 2 September 2019. Offers should be e-mailed to the Point of Contact (POC) shown below by the closing date and time. If offers are mailed, an electronic version of the offer (i.e. CD, DVD, etc.) should accompany the paper copy. If an offer is e-mailed to the POC shown below, it is the Offeror’s responsibility to ensure that the transmission is received by the Government prior to the closing date and time. Fax quotes will not be accepted. Late quotes will be processed in accordance with FAR 52.212-1(f) “Late submission, modifications, revisions, and withdrawals of offers.” Upon receipt of the electronic offer, the Government will acknowledge receipt of that offer via email to the Offeror. Upon receipt of an electronic offer, the Government will acknowledge receipt of that offer via email to the Offeror.

POC: David A. Kaplan Address: 7701 Telegraph Road Alexandria VA

BASIS OF AWARD

All offers will be comparatively evaluated based on the factors described below: Technical Capability, Past Performance and Price. Offers must be submitted using the CLIN structure above in Contract Line Items.

Factor 1 – TECHNICAL:

The Offeror must submit a technical work plan to detail how the Offeror will meet the performance requirements in the Performance Work Statement. The Offeror must limit their technical work plan to no more than twelve (12) typed pages that explains the Offeror’s capabilities as required in the PWS, paragraph 11 – Qualifications and Experience, and ability to produce a manuscript meeting the requirements in the PWS. Key personnel resumes are highly encouraged and do not count against the page limitation.

Subfactor 1.1 – Technical Understanding and Approach The Government will assess the quality of the proposal; determine the Offeror’s understanding of and knowledge of the performance requirements; ability to meet the required period of performance/delivery dates; whether the proposal identifies potential challenges which may occur as a result of performing the work; and whether the Offeror mitigates the inherent risk in achieving the contract’s performance requirements. The evaluation will also consider the degree to which the proposed work plan provides assurance that the services will meet the program’s requirements and the minimum requirements set forth in the PWS.

Subfactor 1.2- Task Staffing-Level of Effort-Qualifications The Government will assess the proposed personnel for each task (base and option tasks), the level of qualification of personnel assigned to each task, the level of effort for each personnel assigned to each task, and the overall level of effort for the task order. The evaluation will consider whether the proposed personnel used are appropriate for the required services, whether the amount of labor hours for each task is appropriate, and whether the overall level of effort is appropriate for the requirement. The evaluation will also consider the qualifications and experience level of key personnel identified in the technical work plan; and how those personnel will be used to maintain the required level of quality for the required deliverables and mitigate risks associated with successful completion of the contract.

Factor 2 – Past Performance

The Offeror’s past performance will be evaluated on recent and relevant contracts completed or ongoing for the same or similar in nature, complexity and dollar value to the work required in this solicitation. The Offeror must provide three examples of completed transcripts in word or PDF format that were completed within the last two (2) years (i.e. since 1 SEPT 2016). The examples must reflect work completed in accordance with paragraph 7 of the attached PWS below. Please limit your transcript examples to no more than 5 typed pages each. Additionally, offerors must provide the following information for up to three (3)* references:

Name of firm and Point of Contact (POC)________________ Email address_______________ Phone number________________ Summary of project and date completed.

Your role on this project_______________ Approximate dollar value________ Attached letter of commendation or evaluation (if available)

*The Offeror shall include information on the three (3) most recent (within two (2) years from the date of issuance of the solicitation) contracts that are the same or similar to the type and magnitude of work described in the Scope of Work.

Relevant information involves work that is the same or similar to the type and magnitude or size of work described in the Scope of Work.

Factor 3 – PRICE:

This factor will use price analysis to determine the total evaluated price. The price factor will be evaluated for price reasonableness in accordance to FAR 13.106-2. The price to be analyzed is the total price inclusive of the base and all options.

Contract Line Items: This requirement and associated contract line item numbers (CLIN) are provided above

APPENDIX A - EVALUATION CRITERIA

FAR 52.212-2 EVALUATION--COMMERCIAL ITEMS

(a) The Government will award a contract resulting from this solicitation to the responsible Offeror whose offer conforming to the solicitation will be most advantageous to the Government, price and other factors considered. The following factors shall be used to evaluate offers:

(i) Technical

(ii) Past Performance

(iii) Price

Technical and Past Performance, when combined, are more important than Price. The award will be made on the basis of the lowest evaluated price of proposals meeting or exceeding the acceptability standards for non-price factors.

(b) Options. The Government will evaluate offers for award purposes by adding the total price for all options to the total price for the basic requirement. The Government may determine that an offer is unacceptable if the option prices are significantly unbalanced. Evaluation of options shall not obligate the Government to exercise the option(s).

(c) A written notice of award or acceptance of an offer, mailed or otherwise furnished to the successful Offeror within the time for acceptance specified in the offer, shall result in a binding contract without further action by either party. Before the offer's specified expiration time, the Government may accept an offer (or part of an offer), whether or not there are negotiations after its receipt, unless a written notice of withdrawal is received before award.

(End of provision)

Appendix B – FAR 52.212-1 ADDENDA Addenda to 52.212-1, Instructions to Offerors – Commercial Along with the required information outlined in 52.212-1(b), Submission of offers, the Offeror shall provide the following information:

Technical - a) All personnel working on the subject contract must demonstrate that they have at least a master’s degree in history or a related subject. They must also have at least one year of graduate course work in library information science and two years of experience in digital archival technology including developing document and metadata standards. All personnel working on the project must also have two years of professional experience in scanning operations including: designing and implementing scanning criteria; designing and implementing quality control plans; and scanning a wide variety of material using professional, high-speed scanners. They must also have two years of experience in each of the flowing: editing oral history interviews, managing archival collections, preparing finding aids, and processing digital and paper oral history materials.

Past Performance – (i) Offerors shall submit past performance information for a maximum of 3 contracts or subcontracts completed or on-going within the last 2 years from the release date of this solicitation. On-going contracts must be at least 50% complete as of the release date of this solicitation. Offers shall provide a project narrative and reference information in narrative form to address each of the bullets below. All points of contact, addresses, telephone numbers, data, fax numbers, etc. should be verified by the Offeror prior to submission to the Government as part of the Offeror’s proposal. Points of contact should be knowledgeable of past performance from a contractual, managerial, and technical perspective.

· Project Title

· Project Description

· Project Start & Ending Dates

· Offeror’s role in the Project

· Contract Value/Actual Awarded Amount

· POCs, Phone, Fax, Address, Email

· Statement of the relevancy of the project to this PWS

· Performance recognition documents received within the last five years on projects relevant to this PWS such as awards, award fee determinations, customer letters of commendation, and any other forms of performance recognition

(ii) In addition to the above, the Government may review any other sources of information for evaluating past performance. Other sources may include, but are not limited to past performance information retrieved through the Past Performance Information Retrieval System (PPIRS), including Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System (CPARS), using all CAGE codes/DUNS numbers of team members (partnership, joint venture, teaming arrangement, or parent company/subsidiary/affiliate) identified in the Offeror’s proposal, inquiries of owner representative(s), Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System (FAPIIS), Electronic Subcontract Reporting System (eSRS), and any other known sources not provided by the Offeror.

FAR 52.212-3 ALT I Offeror Representations and Certifications -- Commercial Items is incorporated by reference in this combine synopsis and solicitation. Offerors must include a statement that certifies the Offeror’s Representations and Certifications are up to date in System for Award management. Put this statement in your proposal.

FAR 52.252-2

The following provisions and clauses apply to this acquisition and can be viewed electronically at http://www.farsite.hill.af.mil in accordance with 52.252-1.

FAR 52.212-5 Contract Terms and Conditions Required to Implement Statutes or Executive Orders

The following FAR Clauses cited within FAR 52.212-5 are applicable to this acquisition:

The Following Provisions and Clauses Are Incorporated By Reference: