Author Archives: Steven Koprince

GAO: Protester’s “Scant” Past Performance Descriptions Justified Low Score

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If your high school teacher or college professor had asked you to compose an essay up to five pages in length, would you expect an “A” for writing a single paragraph?

Probably not, and the same principle applies when it comes to proposals.  In a recent GAO bid protest decision, the agency gave contractors up to five pages to describe each past performance reference.  Not surprisingly, the GAO held that it was reasonable for the procuring agency to downgrade an offeror’s past performance score when that offeror only provided a one-paragraph write-up of each project.

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GAO Bid Protests Rise 5% In FY 2012

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Contractors filed 2,475 GAO bid protests in Fiscal Year 2012, a five percent increase from the prior year, according to the GAO’s annual bid protest report to Congress.  The GAO’s annual report indicated that “sustain” decisions were up slightly from the prior year, while the overall “effectiveness rate” of protests–a combination of sustain decisions and agency corrective actions–held steady at 42%.

Meanwhile, the VA was the only procuring agency to ignore GAO recommendations–something the VA did repeatedly in the Aldevra line of cases.

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Happy Veterans Day From SmallGovCon

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If you click the “service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses” tab on the right, you will find a list of SmallGovCon blog posts on CVE verification, affiliation, joint ventures, and the like.  And don’t let me stop you from reading; this is a legal blog, after all.

But before you scroll through the latest SBA OHA or GAO decision, take a moment to think about that phrase, which can be tossed around rather casually in the industry these days: “service-disabled veteran.”  Let’s not lose sight of the fact that, whether or not you are a veteran, the service-disabled veteran-owned small business program is worthy of our support because it is one small but important way for our country to say “thank you” to those who risked so much, and gave so much, on behalf of us all.

So, to my service-disabled veteran readers and my veteran readers: thank you.  And Happy Veterans Day.

Don’t Subcontract to Mom? SBA OHA Finds Mother-Son Companies Affiliated

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Affiliation based on family relationships is perhaps one of the least understood SBA affiliation rules, and continues to trip up many small government contractors.  Case in point: a recent SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals decision finding a small business affiliated with a company controlled by the mother of the small business’s owner, based on the family relationship and subcontracts between the companies.

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SBA Size Appeals: New Evidence Often Not Allowed

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The SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals will reject a contractor’s attempt to submit new evidence in a SBA size appeal unless the contractor shows “good cause” to admit the new evidence.

And, as demonstrated by a recent SBA OHA size appeal decision, when the evidence was publicly available at the time the size protest was filed, but was not submitted with the size protest, it will be very difficult to convince SBA OHA to review the new evidence.

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SDVOSB Fraud: Justice Department Indicts Construction Company Owner

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The U.S. Department of Justice has indicated David E. Gorski, an owner of Legion Construction, Inc., for alleged service-disabled veteran-owned small business fraud.  The indictment alleges that Gorski, a non-veteran, fraudulently represented that Legion was a SDVOSB to win federal SDVOSB set-aside contracts, and used genuine service-disabled veterans as figureheads in an attempt to avoid detection.

VetBizCentral, an organization providing various services to veteran entrepreneurs, has posted a full copy of the Gorski indictment on its website.  The allegations are well worth a closer look.

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SBA OHA Confirms Broad Affiliation Exception for Tribal Companies

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The SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals has held that the SBA Area Office did not err by refusing to find affiliation between a tribally-owned company and its sister companies.

SBA OHA’s recent decision in Size Appeal of Bosco Contractors, Inc., SBA No. SIZ-5412 (2012), follows on the heels of Size Appeal of Roundhouse PBN, LLC, SBA No. SIZ-5383 (2012), in which SBA OHA found that the SBA had erred by adopting a too-narrow view of the tribal exception from affiliation.

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