Justification for Exception to Fair Opportunity Redacted_FINAL.pdf

Control Number: 21-13

Justification and Approval for an Exception to Fair Opportunity W911W4-17-D-0001, Task Order 0002, Modification 40

1. Contracting Activity: Army Contracting Command-Detroit Arsenal (ACC-DTA), 6501 East 11 Mile Road, Detroit Arsenal, Ml 48397, is the contracting activity for this action.

2. Description of Action:

a. ACC-DTA intends to award a Cost Plus Fixed Fee (CPFF) Term modification to Task Order 0002 under contract W911W4-17-D-0001 with Valiant Government Services, LLC (referred to herein as Valiant), 101 Walton Way, Hopkinsville, KY 42240, under its Department of Defense (DoD) Language Interpretation and Translation Enterprise (DUTE) II Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract 1 . This modification will extend the task order's period of performance (PoP) by up to 23 months, comprised of an 11-month base period (from 1 May 2021 to 29 March 2022) and one 6-month option period (from 30 March 2022 to 29 September 2022) as well as a 6-month Option to Extend Services in accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 52.217-8 (from 30 September 2022 to 29 March 2023). The Government will fund the base period of this modification using Fiscal Year (FY) 21 Operations and Maintenance Army (OMA) - Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) funds. If necessary, the follow-on option period(s) will be funded with FY 22 OMA OCO funds.

b.

3. Description of Supplies/Services: The subject task order provides contract Linguist Support Services (LSS) to the US Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM) Contract Linguist and Intelligence Program Support Office (CLIPSO) in support of the CJTF-OIR ongoing mission. This modification will provide continued support to the CJTF-O1 R mission to ensure no unacceptable delays arise in fulfilling the Government's immediate requirement.

a.

1 DUTE II consists of a small business pool of contractors, and an other than small business pool, who are capable of providing non-commercial linguist services to transcribe, interpret, and translate information. This action was awarded within the large business pool.

Control Number: 21-13

4. Authority Cited: 10 U.S.C. 2304c(b)(1), as implemented by Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 16.505(b)(2)(i)(A), "[t]he agency need for the supplies or services is so urgent that providing a fair opportunity would result in unacceptable delays."

5. Reason for Authority Cited:

Previously, a follow-on effort, called Army Central Command (ARCENT), was being competed amongst the DUTE II Force Projection Pool of Large businesses. The ARCENT solicitation combined CJTF-OIR and CENTCOM, two of the four task orders supporting USCENTCOM into one task order. The agency attempted to competitively award the ARGENT Task Order multiple times over the last three years; however, we received multiple protests after each attempt. After the last protest, the Agency stated to GAO it would take corrective action and resolicit. The agency has implemented the following lessons learned that have yielded benefits in successfully defending post-award protests: incorporating floor rates to streamline cost realism analysis and ensure offerers are not buying-in as well as reducing the number of evaluation criteria to focus on areas that are critical to the success of the mission and will provide delineation among the different proposals allowing for a true Best Value selection.

a.

At this time, the INSCOM Commanding General issued direction, that a new competitive follow-on contract combining all missions, currently serviced by four task orders, across the USCENTCOM AOR2 be explored to aid in Army's readiness, as combing the missions will help reduce concerns associated with the geographic complexity of the operations. The complexity and fluidity of operations make it difficult to parse requirements geographically or by mission set. For example, Recently, the Government The CENTCOM II program will eliminate these types of geographical issues and concerns. As such, a Request for Information (RFI) was released to DUTE II Force Projection Pool of Large Businesses in December 2020 that summarized this approach to consolidate the four CENTCOM task orders in

2 The forthcoming consolidation contract will be solicited as CENTCOM II under DUTE II.