Special Education Hearing Officers

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) is issuing a Request for Proposal (RFP) for special education hearing officer services authorized under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). TEA seeks to award multiple contracts with qualified hearing officers who will preside over special education due process hearings filed by parents and school districts. The primary deliverables include conducting formal hearings, preparing written decisions, maintaining case files, and ensuring compliance with extensive legal and procedural timelines established under IDEA and applicable federal and state regulations. Required qualifications include licensure to practice law in Texas (or obtaining licensure within nine months of contract execution), a minimum of five years of active legal practice with at least three years of experience in special education, school law, disability law, administrative law, constitutional law, civil rights, or litigation, and demonstrated knowledge of IDEA and related regulations. Evaluation of proposals will be based on experience and qualifications (40 points), quality of writing samples (37 points), price reasonableness (20 points), and professional references (3 points). Proposals must be submitted electronically through the Euna Procurement (Bonfire) portal by April 16, 2026, at 2:00 P.M. Central Time, with a final publication of questions and answers scheduled for April 2, 2026. The contract term extends for four state fiscal years commencing from contract execution or an agreed-upon start date, with contract negotiations anticipated for May 2026 and a projected contract start date in June 2026.

Compensation for hearing officers will be based on a negotiated hourly rate not to exceed $280.00 per hour, with proposers submitting rates below the cap receiving additional evaluation points for price reasonableness. TEA will reimburse reasonable and necessary costs for travel, training, copying, telephone, fax, translation, and sign language interpreter services, and will provide up to $1,800.00 annually for continuing legal education tuition; however, hearing officers must complete at least ten hours of continuing legal education annually as a contractual requirement. The RFP does not indicate specific set-asides for disadvantaged enterprises or restrictions limiting organizational types, though all submissions must comply with standard Texas state contracting requirements including E-Verify verification, drug-free workplace certification, human trafficking prohibitions, and HUB subcontracting plans. No incumbent vendors or current contractors are identified in the solicitation materials. All case files resulting from the contract work are designated as TEA property, and subcontracting opportunities are not probable under this procurement. TEA reserves the right not to award any contract and makes no guarantee regarding the number of cases assigned to any individual hearing officer, meaning award values cannot be specified with certainty, though the hourly rate cap of $280.00 per hour provides the primary financial constraint for this procurement.