David Choate

David Choate, a California-based sole proprietorship, provides vehicle-and-driver services for wildland fire suppression and all-hazard incident response operations to the U.S. Forest Service as a prime contractor under Total Small Business set-asides. All 25 recent awards are prime delivery orders or indefinite delivery contracts, with 100% of work flowing through Forest Service customers across Regions 5 and 6 in the western United States.

David Choate's customer base is entirely concentrated within the Department of Agriculture Forest Service. The National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) anchors the prime footprint with five awards carrying a combined potential value of $1 million, while the Forest Service's Region 5 (Pacific Southwest Region) accounts for ten awards valued at $232 thousand combined. The Forest Service's Fire and Aviation Management office holds eight awards worth $206 thousand combined. All work is performed under small business set-aside vehicles, with no full-and-open competition in the recent award record.

Choate holds three active indefinite delivery contracts with NIFC for vehicle-and-driver services across Regions 5 and 6. The most recent IDC, awarded August 17, 2026, carries a $250 thousand ceiling and extends through August 18, 2031 under a Total Small Business multiple-award BPA designated for firm fixed-price vehicle-with-driver support. A second IDC, awarded February 6, 2026, also carries a $250 thousand ceiling through June 7, 2028. A third IDC, awarded June 7, 2023, carries a $250 thousand ceiling through June 7, 2028. Representative delivery orders issued against these vehicles include a $25,039.28 order on August 28, 2025, for vehicle-and-driver services in Clovis, California (completed September 28, 2025); a $6,562.81 order on January 11, 2025, for Los Angeles-area support (completed January 17, 2025); and an $11,822.35 order on August 30, 2026, for Solvang, California operations (completed September 13, 2026). Choate deploys pickup trucks, stake-side trucks, passenger vans, and sport utility vehicles paired with certified drivers to support incident management logistics and personnel transport.

Activity has been episodic — one award in 2019, three in 2020, one in 2023, two in 2025, and three in 2026 — reflecting the seasonal and incident-driven nature of wildfire and emergency response contracting. Combined potential value across all awards stands at $1.5 million, with $153 thousand obligated to date (10% of the ceiling). All 25 awards fall under NAICS 488410 (All Other Transit and Ground Passenger Transportation) and PSC code Q-Natural Resources/Conservation—Forest-Range Fire Suppression/Presuppression. The vendor operates exclusively as a prime contractor with no subcontract footprint.