Executed RH Ceiling Increase JA - Redacted (2-26-21)_Redacted.pdf

JUSTIFICATION FOR OTHER THAN FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION

41 U.S.C. 3304(a)(1)

Pursuant to the requirements of the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) as implemented by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Subpart 6.3 and in accordance with the requirements of FAR 6.302-1, the justification for the use of the statutory authority under FAR Subpart 6.3 is justified by the following facts and rationale required under FAR 6.303-2 as follows:

1. Agency and Contracting Activity.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Human Capital (HC) and Contracting and Procurement (CP) propose to modify an existing contract to increase the contract ceiling on a basis other than full and open competition pursuant to FAR 6.302.

The Justification and Approval tracking number for this document is JA-2021-01-0605. The Procurement Request number is PR217663A027.

2. Nature and/or Description of the Action Being Approved.

This Justification and Approval sets forth the Agency’s rationale to issue a contract modification to the IDIQ contract HSTS01-16-D-HRM037 to increase the overall contract ceiling from $290,000,000 by $60,000,000 to $350,000,000. The single-award Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract was awarded in 2016 to Accenture Federal Services LLC 800 North Glebe Road, Suite 300, Arlington, VA 22203-1807. The contract ceiling increase will allow TSA’s Human Capital (HC) to continue to recruit, hire and maintain a diverse, well-qualified workforce in compliance with the Aviation Transportation Security Act (ATSA), Public Law 107-71 (November 19, 2001), as well as other federal human capital management requirements.

The contract includes Firm-Fixed Price contract line items (CLINs) to support recruitment and hiring, and a Cost CLIN to support advertising, marketing, travel, and Other Direct Costs (ODC).

The contract period of performance is as follows:

Base Period: 08/31/2016 - 02/28/2017 (6 Months) Option Period One: 03/01/2017 - 02/28/2018 (12 Months)

Option Period Two: 03/01/2018 - 02/28/2019 (12 Months)

Option Period Three: 03/01/2019 - 02/29/2020 (12 Months)

Option Period Four: 03/01/2020 - 02/28/2021 (12 Months)

Option Period Five: 03/01/2021 – 08/30/2021 (6 Months)

TSA anticipates using Fiscal Year (FY) 21, and 22 Mission Support appropriations to award any potential Task Orders under the remaining contract period of performance.

3. Description of Supplies/Services.

TSA’s recruitment efforts involve providing comprehensive professional support for all of TSA’s recruitment needs for both field and Headquarters positions, including analysis, planning and strategy development, marketing, ad placement in all appropriate media and markets, participation in and coordination of job fairs and other hiring events, and reporting. TSA is active with a variety of focused recruitment initiatives, including: Veterans, Women, Diversity, Individuals with Disabilities, and Student Programs. There are ten (10) primary categories of employees at TSA:

Entry level Transportation Security Officer (TSO)

Lead Transportation Security Officer (LTSO)

Supervisory Transportation Security Officer (STSO)

Coordination Center Officer (CCO)

Entry level Federal Air Marshal (FAM)

Standard Management, Administrative, and Professional Positions (MAP)

Explosive Detection Caine Handlers (EDCH)

Federal Air Marshal (FAM) Supervisor Sections (FAM J-Bands)

Assistant Federal Security Director (AFSD)

Airport Mission Support Staff (e.g., Financial Specialist)

Additionally, under this contract TSA also provides promotion support (i.e., career advancement) for the entire screening and FAM workforce.

Transportation Security Officers: To effectively and efficiently meet the hiring needs of more than 450 federalized airports, TSA utilizes a local hiring model to initiate and execute numerous phases of the TSO hiring process; portions of which are centrally controlled and portions of which are decentralized to the local TSA staff at the airport. To meet attrition rates and the use of new screening technologies, TSA hires 11,000 TSOs a year. To achieve the hiring demand, TSA must recruit more than 60,000 candidates per year from a pool of more than 360,000 applicants.

Federal Air Marshals: The Federal Air Marshal (FAM) position is a critical component of our Nation’s homeland security efforts, and TSA must ensure that all persons hired as a FAM can perform the job safely, efficiently, and effectively. This contract supports a detailed and promotion process for FAM Supervisors.

Standard Management, Administrative, and Professional Positions (MAP): TSA has a number of Standard MAP positions that it recruits for and hires at its nationwide Airports, Headquarters offices and FAMS Field Office locations. For those common, frequently filled positions, TSA relies upon contractor assistance to engage with the various locations and facilitate the federal hiring process to address their specific hiring needs; to include filling internal promotion processes. Last Fiscal Year, there were approximately 1,800 Field MAP Job Opportunity Announcements (JOAs) posted, resulting in 3,350 hiring actions for Standard Field MAP positions.

Non-standard MAP Positions: TSA has a number of standard and non-standard MAP positions, certain K Band Executive positions, L and M Band Executive positions, and TSES positions that it recruits for and hires at its Headquarters and Field Office locations. In support of filling these positions, TSA was using Government HR staff resources for HQ hiring. The contract was modified on 3/2/2020 to add HQ MAP hiring support.

4. Identification of Statutory Authority Permitting Other Than Full and Open Competition.

The statutory authority permitting other than full and open competition is 41 U.S.C. 3304(a)(1) implemented by the FAR Subpart 6.302-1 entitled “Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements”.

5. Demonstration that the Nature of the Acquisition Requires Use of the Authority Cited.

This R&H contract supports HC’s mission to recruit, hire and maintain a well-qualified workforce to ensure the protection of the nation’s airports, railways and other hubs of transportation. This acquisition supports Strategic Goal 3.1 of the Administrator’s Intent:

Recruit and hire a capable and diverse team of exceptional individuals.

There are several significant events that occurred after contract award which will cause TSA to reach the R&H ceiling ($290M) five (5) months prior to August 30, 2021 end date:

A. The R&H contract was awarded on 8/31/2016 to Accenture Federal Services through full and open competition. The contract included a six-month Transition-In, full Authority To Operate (ATO), system “Go Live”, and Operations and Maintenance (O&M). The contract solicitation and subsequent award required a security categorization of Moderate-Moderate-Moderate; however, more than two months after contract award, TSA Chief Information Officer (CIO) determined that due to the high volume of Personally Identifiable Information (PII) processed and stored throughout the new system, the security categorization needed to be changed from the solicited and awarded requirement of Moderate-Moderate-Moderate, to High-High-Moderate. The impact of this security change resulted in more than a 30-month delay to complete the ATO process and additional cost under the contract. The ATO process led to an unforeseeable engineering change for operational functionality. The change was incorporated in the R&H contract in FY19 and resulting in price increase under the contract.

Pre Pandemic, the US economy was extremely robust with record low unemployment rate TSA had to remain competitive in the job market with other industries that offered same or competitive wages and benefits. Additionally, the following factors influenced TSO hiring:

Planned roll out of new Computed Tomography (CT) screening systems at the airports.

Fourteen (14) new airports were federalized during the last three years, which required staffing/hiring support for TSO hiring.

TSO attrition rates increased from 16.1% in 2017 to an average of 17.6% for both 2018 and 2019 in a workforce of more than 45,000.

Congressional demand for shorter wait times at the nation’s busiest airports.

To account for the increased hiring volume, TSA modified section 3.1 of the contract’s SOW on 11/01/2019 (Mod 35) to reflect the increased hiring volume - “On average TSA hires between 5,000 – 12,000 TSOs per year.” Included in the modification was an increase to the Recruitment Management Team Support (CLIN 3004, 4004, 5004) to cover the increased level of service provided above the original assumptions at an estimated cost of $2.4M.

C. The DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) conducted covert testing at several TSA check points and reported an x-ray performance finding and potential color vision deficiencies of employees. Independent of the OIG report, TSA’s Chief Medical Officer (CMO) identified inadequacies with TSA’s color vision test and testing process.

In addressing the OIG findings, TSA proposed a plan to conduct a one-time color vision test of TSOs hired before December 2017 and introduced an annual medical evaluation requirement beginning the following year, which the OIG approved.

Under the new color vision test, TSA has hired 31,663 to date and begun the re-testing of TSOs hired before the new test was administered. This number does not include the total number of candidates who took the test and failed, or were not hired.

D. An ATO is required before implementing new information technology systems and services. As demonstrated above, the security review process is comprehensive, and demands a significant lead time. Accenture is the only viable source available at this time who can provide continued seamless R&H services, and who has a current ATO to operate the R&H system. A gap in service would lead to a potential failure to execute the TSA security mission across the nation’s airports and cause recruitment and onboarding of new hires to come to a halt.

E. Finally, based on current estimates, the R&H ceiling will be reached in March 2021, five

(5) months prior to the contract expiration date of August 2021. No other vendor has an approved ATO or has the ability to get an approved R&H system ATO by August 2020.

The requested ceiling increase will allow TSA to meet the front-line hiring requirements that will continue to ensure safe travel. TSA has made a substantial investment to modernize its recruiting and hiring system to ensure proper and secure safeguarding of PII data.

6. Description of Efforts Made to Ensure that Offers Are Solicited from as Many Potential Sources as is Practicable.

As required by FAR Subparts 5.201 and 6.302-1(d), a Notice of Intent to increase the R&H IDIQ ceiling has been posted to Beta.SAM.gov. The notice allows any vendor the opportunity to challenge TSA’s decision to increase the contract ceiling. Details about the incumbent contractor and the services the incumbent provides to TSA are outlined in the notice.

7. Determination by the Contracting Officer that the Anticipated Cost to the Government will be Fair and Reasonable .

Prior to increase the contract ceiling, the Contracting Officer will ensure that the anticipated cost to the Government is fair and reasonable through comparisons to historical pricing, pre-established FFP CLINs, and previous price analysis/negotiations with Accenture under HSTS01- 16-D-HRM037 in accordance with FAR 15.404-1.

8. Description of Market Research.

On December 12, 2019, TSA issued a Request for Information (RFI)/Sources Sought on Beta.Sam to gather information in preparing for the R&H re-compete and increase industry's understanding of TSA's requirement for providing Recruitment, Assessments, pre-Hiring and Promotions (RAH&P) services in support of TSA Human Capital (HC). Through the RFI, TSA sought to improve its understanding of market capabilities, identify qualified vendors that are capable of providing RAH&P support services to HC, and to accept ideas on how to efficiently and effectively procure the services that meet TSA requirements.

The market research demonstrated that there are a number of qualified contractors that are capable of providing recruitment and hiring services. However, none of the sources identified, with the exception of the incumbent, possessed the required ATO in order to operate its systems inside the TSA IT security boundaries. Few vendors have shown the capability to handle such large hiring volumes while securely maintaining cloud services and equipment at the High-High- Moderate level.

In addition to the RFI issued in December, TSA issued a follow-up RFI on June 15, 2020 to help further inform TSA’s future procurement strategy.

9. Any Other Facts Supporting the Use of Other Than Full and Open Competition.

Increasing the contract ceiling is an immediate tool to satisfy security mission requirements while TSA undertakes activities associated with re-competing existing contracts. These capabilities assist in continuing the seamless process for all necessary activities involved in the staffing and hiring support for TSO, MAP, FAM and EDCH candidates. TSA is currently developing a procurement strategy to compete TSA Human Capital (HC) support requirements, This proposed ceiling increase will allow Accenture to continue providing uninterrupted recruitment and hiring support for TSA, complete the HR modernization initiative, while maintaining an experienced workforce and without interruption to hiring critical security screening workforce at the nation’s airports.

The incumbent is the only provider available with ATO to operate information technology system(s) on TSA and DHS networks. The process leading up to ATO is highly technical, complex, and expensive.

10. A Listing of the Sources, if Any That Expressed, in Writing, an Interest in the Acquisition.

The Notice of Intent to Sole Source was issued on Beta.SAM.gov, January 28, 2021 requesting that parties express their interest in writing, to the Contracting Officer no later than February 9, 2021. As of February 10, 2021, no interested parties have expressed interest in this acquisition.

11. A Statement of the Actions, if Any, the Agency May Take to Remove or Overcome Any Barriers to Competition Before Any Subsequent Acquisition for Supplies or Services Required.

TSA is committed to competitive procurements, and will continue to seek innovative ways to compete and procure the required human capital services and support. Furthermore, this ceiling increase will allow adequate time and remove barriers to properly complete the ongoing re-competition activities, which, will be based on full and open competition. The barriers for competition for this ceiling increase at hand are a result of the need to ensure that there are no gaps in satisfying TSA’s aviation security requirements.

12. Contracting Officer’s Certification. I certify that the data supporting the recommended use of other than full and open competition is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Sophia Woodward Contracting Officer Date

13. Technical/Requirements Personnel Certification. I certify this requirement meets the Government’s minimum need and that the supporting data, which forms a basis for this justification, is complete and accurate.

Technical Representative Date

14. Legal Counsel Review. I reviewed this Justification and Approval for Other Than Full and Open Competition in accordance with HSAM 3006.304-70 and find it legally sufficient.

Legal Counsel Date

15. APPROVALS:

Division Director Date

TSA Competition Advocate Date

SOPHIA L

WOODWARD

Digitally signed by SOPHIA L

WOODWARD

Date: 2021.02.19 12:06:07 -05'00'

J. William Weinberg Date Head of Contracting Activity Assistant Administrator for Contracting and Procurement Transportation Security Administration

JOSEPH W

WEINBERG

Digitally signed by JOSEPH W

WEINBERG

Date: 2021.02.23 09:52:55 -05'00'