REDACTED_ROS Extension JA 2021_Redacted.pdf

Justification and Approval (J&A) for Other Than Full and Open Competition

CUI - PROCURE

March 2020 CUI - PROCURE Page 3 of 7

I. Agency and Contracting Activity.

USSF SPOC 45 CONS/PKDB

1201 Edward H. White II Street Patrick SFB FL 32925-3238

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

Approval is requested for an extension to contract FA2521-15-C-0063, Range Operations Support (ROS), by extending the contract for six months (1 April -30 September 2021). This action will be a sole source modification extending the existing contract. This extension will permit the continuation of mission critical supplies and services for the remainder of FY21. This will also prevent an interruption of support, for the specified period of this extension, while the $230M Ascension runway project is being completed.

A follow-on contract for the services performed under ROS (Ascension Island Mission Services (AIMS)) was originally scheduled to be awarded in the summer of 2020 to allow for transition prior to the contract expiration of 30 September 2020. Award was made on 30 June 2020 and started transition, but was subsequently terminated following corrective action in response to a GAO protest. This termination prompted a six-month extension of the ROS contract, utilizing FAR 52.217-8, Option to Extend Services. A second award was made on 25 January 2021 after the Small Business Administration (SBA) responded to a size standard protest ruling that the awardee is a small business. That size determination was appealed to the SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA). In response to the second award, two GAO protests were received. The GAO protests prompted the SBA OHA to stay the size standard appeal pending resolution of the GAO protests. While one of the two GAO protests has been withdrawn, the anticipated GAO decision on the other is 20 May 2021, almost two months after the ROS contract expiration of 31 March 2021.

The current ROS contract is with Wolf Creek Federal Services. The hybrid contract utilizes Firm-Fixed-Price, Cost Plus-Fixed-Fee, and Cost Reimbursement contract line items. All contract options, including the option to extend services, have been exercised. The contract, originally awarded on 30 July 2015 with a $108M total contract value, included five one-year option periods with an additional six-month option IAW FAR 52.217-8, Option to Extend Services. Due to emerging Ascension Auxiliary Air Field (AAAF) and communication requirements during the first few option years, a Justification and Approval was completed on 5 April 2018 to increase the value of the total contract up to $185M. This increase in contract ceiling was to account for requirements that were not included in the original baseline requirements as well as other requirements that were created due to mission changes. The contract is currently utilizing the six-month option to extend services which will end on 31 March 2021.

The ROS contract is being transitioned into two separate acquisitions; the Eastern-Western Operational Communication Services (EWOCS) and the Ascension Island Mission Services (AIMS) contracts. The EWOCS contract was awarded on 30 December 2020 and will be assuming the Patrick SFB, Cape Canaveral SFB and Vandenberg SFB communication requirements on 1 April 2021. The AIMS contract has been awarded twice but will be unable to begin performance by 1 April 2021 due to the continuation of protests that have delayed transition of the follow-on effort. The current, ongoing SBA size challenge protest and GAO protest have impacted the ability to ensure a timely transition of the Ascension Island requirements to the AIMS contract prior to the start of demolition and full replacement of the island's only runway. With this no longer possible, the Government will need to re-evaluate, at a future time, when it is feasible to allow for contract transition to occur due to the logistics and manpower limitations ongoing with the runway project. At this time, this data is unknown and will need to be re-evaluated once the outstanding protests are resolved. In addition, sufficient time is also needed to deal with possible

March 2020 CUI - PROCURE Page 4 of 7 corrective actions and/or re-solicitation of the AIMS requirements.

III. Description of supplies/services required to meet agency needs (including the estimated value).

The preponderance of the ROS contract involves essential elements of base operations support for the Eastern Range (ER) at Ascension Auxiliary Air Field (AAAF). The contract is responsible for executing the base services requirements while also providing support to the 45 SW launch mission at AAAF.

AAAF is a contractor-operated tracking and instrumentation station on a volcanic-rock island in the South Atlantic nearly 5,000 miles downrange from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). The contract supports non-mission communications at AAAF. The contract has the following seven major areas of base operating support responsibility at AAAF:

1. Responsible for a broad range of civil engineering services, including real property management, facility engineering, and infrastructure work.

2. Provide air field management, air traffic control, air crew services, and airfield ground support services.

3. Provide a variety of public health and medical services, including the implementation of a public health program, occupational health program, and the provision of acute, routine, and emergency medical services by credentialed healthcare providers.

4. Manage and provide emergency response, emergency medical response, and fire protection services for facilities, aircraft, and personnel.

5. Provide law enforcement services for surveillance and intrusion detection.

6. Provide an emergency management program that includes disaster avoidance, mitigation, and response, along with personnel accounting procedures.

7. Responsible for managing and providing lodging, housekeeping, custodial, dining, laundry, recreation, and other related support services for government tenants, contractor personnel, and visitors.

IV. Statutory authority permitting other than full and open competition.

10 USC 2304(d)(1)(B)(ii), as implemented by FAR 6.302-1(a)(2)(iii)(B), provides that services may be deemed to be available only from the original source in the case of follow-on contracts for the provision of highly specialized services when it is likely that award to any other source would result in unacceptable delays in fulfilling the agency's requirements.

V. Demonstration that the contractor's unique qualifications or the nature of the acquisition requires use of the authority cited above (applicability of authority).

1. Only One Responsible Source (FAR 6.302-1): An extension is required to guarantee there is not a break in service for the subject contract before the following-on contract, AIMS, that has already been competed and awarded can begin. Given the complexity of the systems used and the required expertise in specific methodologies and disciplines that are outlined in the Performance Work Statement (PWS), only the current contractor for ROS is capable of

March 2020 CUI - PROCURE Page 5 of 7 performing to avoid unacceptable delays in fulfilling the full scope of the PWS requirements. Wolf Creek, the current ROS contractor, continues to maximize operational availability of critical AAAF mission essential infrastructure, facilities, and communication systems and equipment, while extending their useful operational life.

Much of the base infrastructure in place at AAAF has evolved over the decades to fit the island's unique location and maintenance requirements due to the corrosive nature of the environment.

2. The highly specialized services by Wolf Creek include support to the 45 SW, NASA, Space and Missile System, commercial launch customers, Air Force Research Laboratories, Navy Research Lavatories, Naval Ordnance Test Unit and other tenant agencies. These services operate and maintain fire, security, air traffic management, logistics, facility maintenance, runway repair, lodging, food services, vehicle repair, and other related services for AAAF. This specialized knowledge is required to operate and maintain services for an Air Force installation 8,000 miles from CCSFS in one of the most corrosive environments on earth. Services performed on AAAF are required to support critical space surveillance, space launch tracking and AFRICOM flight operations.

3. Wolf Creek is currently the only contractor on AAAF that is capable of completing the work by 1 April 2021.

The AIMS contact is the follow-on contract to the ROS contract. It has already been competed and awarded, but is delayed because of GAO protests and potentially a SBA OHA appeal. Given that the solicitation for AIMS closed in October 2019 and award was made in June 2020 and the magnitude of the scope of services warrants competition, the current ROS contractor is the only capable source of performing the scope services in question on 1 April 2021.

The AIMS contract awardee cannot begin perform until the GAO protest is resolved, which is not expected to occur until 20 May 2021. Canceling the AIMS contract and resoliciting would likely take even longer given it is now 17 months since the AIMS solicitation closed and 9 months since the initial AIMS award. In addition, the AIMS contract specifies a 60-day transition in order to complete hiring, inventory property, and set up accounting systems and needed logistics. Due to the vast isolation of Ascension Island, on-boarding new contractor personnel and in-processing them at Ascension Island is a relatively slow process. In particular, Ascension Island currently has a COVID-19 quarantine period of 14 days for individuals traveling to the island and flights to the island occur approximately every 10 days with approximately 14 seats at most available to contractor personnel. Given such travel limitations coupled with the complexity of the PWS, no other company is capable of completing the necessary transition requirements within less than 60 days. As such, the earliest any other capable source could start full performance, namely the current AIMS awardee, would be on 20 July 2021. However, the AIMS Contracting Officer may choose to delays AIMS contract performance even following the GAO protest to obviate needing to terminate the AIMS contract should the SBA OHA deem the current AIMS awardee to be other than small and, thus, ineligible for award. If the SBA OHA issues such a decision, then the Government would not have any contractor standing capable of performing unless it elected to let the current AIMS awardee continue performance despite being an other than small business. Given these circumstances, the AIMS Contracting Officer may very well decide to delay the start of the AIMS contract by at least another 70 days to await a decision by the SBA OHA. This would mean the earliest the AIMS contract would begin would be 30 September 2021.

4. Data shows that award to any other source would cause unacceptable delays in fulfilling the USAF/USSF requirements. Completion of a competitive short-term interim contract cannot be completed by the time the current contract expires on 1 April 2021. Inability to increase the contract term would result in critical mission impacts. In particular, it would cause the following impacts:

i. Inability to provide logistics, base support, lodging and meals to 200+ runway support contractors currently supporting the $230M runway contract. Due to the remoteness of the island, no other existing facilities of mess accommodations can be acquired to support this workforce. Loss of contract support would greatly impact overall schedule and cost of the runway project. This is due to the runway contract assuming all base support requirements would be provided by the ROS, and follow-on, AIMs contract.

ii. Inability to hire specialized / skill labor to support evolving runway support requirements. Due to the remoteness of the location, hiring process for new employees can require significant time and logistics which is not feasible

March 2020 CUI - PROCURE Page 6 of 7 during a short term bridge contract. 45 SW does not have the in-house capability to support launches and relies on contractor support for critical space launch efforts. Inability to support AAAF base services and facilities as the USAF only has three AF members on the island and fully relies on the ROS contractor workforce.

iii. Base operations would result in facility outages that go unresolved and inability to continue space tracking, launch tracking and AFRICOM support on AAAF as critical logistics, lodging, power, communications and food services would not be supported.

Accordingly, the incumbent contractor, Wolf Creek, is the only company capable of providing the supplies and services described in Section III above without creating unreasonable delays to the ongoing runway contract and would result in unacceptable delays in fulfilling range requirements.

VI. Description of efforts made to ensure that offers are solicited from as many potential sources as practicable, including whether a notice was or will be publicized as required by subpart 5.2 and, if not, which exception under

FAR 5.202 applies.

Market research was accomplished through a synopsis published on February 2021. No responses were received.

VII. Determination by the Contracting Officer that the anticipated cost to the Government will be fair and reasonable.

Since this is a request for continuation of the existing contract, the Contracting Officer will determine fair and reasonable cost/price in accordance with FAR 15.4. The Cost/price analysis will be based on historical costs incurred, certified cost and pricing data, the independent government cost estimate, technical evaluations, and audit support from the Defense Contract Audit Agency, as appropriate.

VIII. Description of the market research conducted and the results, or a statement of the reasons market research was not conducted.

As described in Section VI above, market research, in accordance with FAR Part 10, was conducted during the solicitation and award of FA2521-19-R-0017.

IX. Any other facts supporting the use of Other Than Full and Open Competition.

N/A

X. List of any sources that expressed, in writing, an interest in the acquisition.

See Section VI above. No sources responded to the synopsis on GSA or Beta.SAM.

XI. A statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers to competition before making subsequent acquisitions for the supplies or services required.

N/A

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XII. Certification by the Contracting Officer.

As evidenced by my signature above, I have determined this document to be both accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

XIII. Certification by the technical/requirements personnel.

As evidenced by my signature above, I certify that any supporting data contained herein, which is my responsibility, is both accurate and complete.