Justification for an Exception to Fair Opportunity-Service Now Extension-Redacted.pdf

JUSTIFICATION FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

FAR Part 16.505(b)

MyData - Service Development Extension – 19AQMM18F4804

1. Identification of the agency and the contracting activity:

The Office of Acquisition Management proposes to extend current task order, 19AQMM18F4804 issued under contract HHSN316201200134W, MyData - Service Development with an exception to fair opportunity for one year on behalf of Bureau of Administration, Office of Planning, Resources, and Innovation, Office of Technology, and Innovation (A/PRI/TI). The total estimated cost is XXXXX

2. Nature and/or description of the action being approved.

The request is to extend the current time and materials task order, 19AQMM18F4804 issued under contract HHSN316201200134W for one year and increase the contract ceiling by XXXXX to support the continued effort for infrastructure and critical initiatives, to maintain current services, and to consolidate ServiceNow Platform instances and services to IRM. The increase will raise the task order maximum from XXXXX to XXXXX.

3. A description of the supplies or services required to meet the Department’s needs.

The requirement is to provide support for A Bureau’s unique mission set and disparate value streams while the bureau undertakes a wide-reaching IT realignment. The estimated value for the entire period of performance from 4/1/24 – 3/31/25 is XXXXX.

These supplies/services require that continued effort for infrastructure, critical initiatives, and to 1) maintain current services (XXXXX) and 2) act on consolidating ServiceNow Platform instances and services to IRM (XXXXX).

To support A Bureau’s mission and IT Reorganization, the contractor will support current services and will maintain program areas listed below:

• Bureau of Administration, Office of Technology and Innovation (TI) Infrastructure Support & Transition to IRM:

o Alignment to A Bureau’s strategy for IT consolidation and organizational realignment, over the next year the team will work to consolidate A Bureau’s ServiceNow stage/production instances with IRM’s instances. This requires executing the development plans for this multi-year project to transition 40+ applications into a single instance, while continuing to maintain customer satisfaction and ongoing support. The transition activities include application export and reconfiguration, and activities needed to transition to the new environment.

o Maintain Enterprise ServiceNow environments; 40+ applications, 1200 myData forms;

platform support, including 4 hosting instances, development, test, staging and production in compliance with DOS security, privacy, and operational protocols. This support maintains formalized cybersecurity policies, Authority to Operate (ATO) modifications, DOS’s release processes, and required annual upgrades to align with the Department’s Assessment and Authorization and Privacy Impact Assessment processes. In addition, this effort will support ongoing enhancements to continue to meet the cybersecurity policies as they are finalized and updated, for example Okta integration for sign in verification, and continuous efforts for improved 508 compliance and support of end user feedback, as mandated by the Rehabilitation Act.

• Bureau of Administration, Office of Technology and Innovation (TI) Maintain Current Services:

o Operations & Maintenance/Help Desk (Tier 2)/ Distributed Management

Environment (DME)/Tier 1 - Ongoing maintenance and continuity of services that support various automated administrative workflows and service request management that provide bureau and department wide capabilities. Maintaining these current services enables continued support to department users and offices actively using these applications, this includes bug fixes, minor changes, helpdesk support for Tier 1&2 and ongoing compliance and security improvements.

• Bureau of Administration, Executive Office (A/PRI/EX), Executive Services Executive Services supports various automated administrative workflows and service request management which offers bureau and department wide capabilities:

o Human Resources Division (A/PRI/EX/HRD) – Human Capital Management

System (ES-HCMS) – Modernize HR's existing manual processes by developing and supporting new module(s) to support the mission. This effort tied directly into the Departments initiative to modernize costly legacy systems to increase operational efficiency and security, decrease on-premises services, and simplify IT and security architectures for processes such as Career Ladder, Hiring Plan, Employee Departures, expansion of Employee Relations for use by other bureaus and improvements to the overall Case Management offerings.

o Enterprise Time and Attendance, Work Orders, and other applications – Ongoing maintenance and enhancements to support a variety of business processes to ensure optimal customer satisfaction, improved 508 compliance, including helpdesk support, bug fixes, and minor updates and changes as business processes evolve.

o Applications/Administration - examples include A/OPR Reserve!t, DS Security Clearance, Regional Bureau’s COMPAS, A-IRM Travel Support, etc., development and maintenance to include Help Desk (Tier 1 & 2)/ (DME) that supports administrative functions internal and external to A Bureau and provide Department wide services.

• Bureau of Administration, Office of Directives Management (A/GIS/DIR) o To continue the transition of forms under GIS/DIR and form business owners, the contractor will support applicable training, form creation and form updates until a full transition plan with GIS/DIR to take over the appropriate functions is in place.

• Bureau of Administration, Office of Language (A/OPR/LS):

o To meet the demand of ‘external to State’ customers, the interpreter and translator billing and invoicing process needs alignment to new business requirements driven by security policies and integrations for more streamlined data collection. These enhancements ensure that the system is relevant to current processes and continues to support automation requiring minimal manual inputs.

• Bureau of Administration, Office of the Procurement Executive (OPE):

o OPE Modernization – Modernizing OPE’s existing suite of applications by developing and supporting new module(s) to support the OPE mission. This effort ties directly into the Departments initiative to modernize costly legacy systems to increase operational efficiency and security, decrease on-premises services applications, and simplify IT and security architectures. Projects are sponsored by the Procurement Executive. These continued efforts focus on implementing minor enhancements in support of policy changes, user feedback and addressing any maintenance activities to support continuity of service.

Ongoing development efforts will account for secure architecture, forms generation, process, workflows, reporting, document management, and security resulting in an increase in operational efficiency.

o Certifications & Warrants: Modernization of this application continues to streamline multiple legacy applications including Grant Officer's Representative (GOR), and Warrants, leveraging one ServiceNow application, OPE Certification & Warrants. This application enables employees to easily request a certification or warrant via the OPE Portal. The application includes capabilities such as automated approvals, validations, and notifications to provide transparency and centralization of information along with system generated certifications.

▪ COR Nomination/Delegation Application and Certification & Warrants (Global

CO/Global GO Coming Soon/GOR) – These enhancements enable the globalization of warrants alleviating the need for CO/GO to reapply every time their post changes resulting in an increase in operational efficiency.

▪ Head of Contracting Authority (HCA) Delegation System allows active Global Contracting Officers to request to be the HCA at one or multiple posts, which allows A/OPE easily see the HCSs across the globe and transitions between HCAs.

▪ Contracting Officer Global Warrants this module allows Contracting Officers to request either a Simplified Acquisition Threshold Warrant or a Professional to Expert Warrant. The additional capability enables users to confirm profile and add Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) to remain active as a Warrant holder.

• Acquisition Planning – The Acquisition Planning application is an automated workflow application for the submission, review and approval of Acquisition Plans received by AQM. The Acquisition Planning application has been designed for the purposes of increasing the effectiveness of the technology supporting AQM mission and to increase the efficiency of their workforce.

4. Authority permitting a Fair Opportunity Exception and the supporting rationale. This acquisition is conducted pursuant to 41 U.S.C. 4103 and 4106 as implemented by FAR 16.505(b)(2) and substantiated by the following:

☒ FAR 16.505(b)(2)(i)(A) – The agency need for the supplies or services is so urgent that providing a fair opportunity would result in unacceptable delays.

A Bureau is undertaking a Bureau wide reorganization where IT consolidation is a priority. In the summer of 2023, the Assistant Secretary issued a bureau wide pause on new IT hiring and spending. The IT pause was meant to give A Bureau a window of time to ensure the bureau aligns spending with its future IT reorganization vision and to conduct an analysis of current requirements and contracts during the reorganization.

The reorganization was scheduled for November of 2023 however did not go into effect until February 2024 thus pushing back the timeline for the newly formed Office of Technology and Innovation (TI) to have the authority and access to assess all IT requirements in preparation for realignment of contracts, financial resources, and Government positions.

Additionally, a new ServiceNow enterprise license agreement lead by the Bureau of Information Resources (IRM) issued in late June of 2023 dramatically changed expected costs for the Department’s ServiceNow footprint. A Bureaus share of this increased cost is estimated to be XXX annually which was not included in Department’s FY25 OMB budget submission or the FY25 Congressional Budget Justification. This escalation initiated a conversation among bureau and Department leadership on the future of the requirements this contract supports. A key option is to move the myData environment supported by this requirement into IRM’s environment to avoid XXX in duplicative license requirements and enable IRM to reprogram costs or renegotiate the ServiceNow license contract. The discussion is ongoing; no decision has been made to date and the uncertainty has impacted planning to recompete requirements covered by this contract.

Disruption to service will impact the following programs but not limited to:

a) The multi-year portable global warrants project sponsored by Acquisitions Management (AQM), scheduled to go-live in May 2024.

b) Provision of translators and interpreters for the White House and interagency managed by the Office of Language Services.

c) Union negotiated time and attendance documentation for the Bureau of Consular Affairs addressing OIG recommendations.

d) Management of 15,600 (CY23) annual General Service Officer (GSO) service requests supporting 12 executive offices..

e) Overseas positions classifications, ambassador away from post notifications

f) Domestic timecard approvals and documentation used by 15,393 Department employees across 15 bureaus and independent offices.

g) Management of the Department’s congressional correspondence, tracking congressional delegation (CODEL) travel.

h) DS-7100 approval workflow for 831,000 yearly requests for leave (in 2023).

5. A determination by the Contracting Officer that the anticipated cost to the Government will be fair and reasonable.

The proposed prices and rates are the same as those contained with option year 4 of the existing task order and align with the discounted rates proposed by the contractor.

NIH Information Technology Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC) CIO-SP3 rates are already determined to be fair and reasonable. Therefore, the Contracting Officer has determined the prices are fair and reasonable.

6. Any other facts supporting the justification.

None

7. Actions the agency May Take to Remove or Overcome Any Barriers to Increase Fair Opportunity before any subsequent acquisitions for the supplies or services is made..

A Bureau is undertaking a Bureau wide reorganization where IT consolidation is priority, and A/PRI/TI is actively assessing all IT requirements in preparation for realignment of contracts, financial resources, and Government positions. The end of this contract is untimely and A/PRI/TI and AQM have been working together to ensure continuity of services and the smooth functioning of IT operations. AQM reviewed options and recommended a one-year extension of the current task order to allow A Bureau leadership the necessary time to define the parameters for a follow-on ServiceNow contract and actively reduce A Bureau’s duplicative ServiceNow requirements.