Georgia Tech Procurement Assistance Center

What federal contractors should know about small business subcontracting plans

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Every year, the U.S. federal government establishes goals for the awards of prime contracts and subcontracts to small business concerns.  While agencies are responsible for achieving these goals by awarding prime contracts to small businesses, contractors that are “other than small” are obliged to ensure that the small business subcontracting goals are met.  Contractors that compete for a contract worth $750,000 or more ($1.5 million for construction contracts) must submit a small business subcontracting plan that specifies how a contractor will attract small businesses and will ensure that such businesses have a maximum practicable opportunity to subcontract.  FAR 19.702.  In the plan, contractors must indicate separate dollar and percentage goals for small businesses, provide a list of services and supplies to be subcontracted, and describe methods for securing small business subcontracts.  FAR 19.704.

Continue reading at:  Morrison Foerster

Do small businesses lack a voice in the federal marketplace?

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Small businesses contractors testified before Congress July 16, asking lawmakers to improve the Small Business Act, remove barriers to federal procurement marketplace entry and increase the use of subcontractors.

Witnesses told the House Small Business Subcommittee on Contracting and Infrastructure of challenges they faced, as well as opportunities for improvement.  One major point was that subcontractors should be explicitly named in prime contractor’s subcontracting plans, to ensure that commitments and payments to small businesses are met.  Without proper identification in contracts, subcontractors often lose the opportunity to work on projects, even after helping the prime contractor win a bid.

“We’ve all been to large contractor’s meetings, we’ve been invited on projects, and then all the sudden [another subcontractor] comes in and says, ‘I can do this,’” said Thomas J. Depace — CTS, C.O.O. and senior engineering manager of Advance Sound Company, testifying on behalf of the National Electrical Contractors Association.

“It really limits our ability to support local labor … to continue to grow in the marketplace — somebody just taking the scope and the specification documents that we’ve pined over for a long period of time and just putting a number to it,” Depace said.  “Being named as a subcontractor from the start would be an advantage that would give us an opportunity to … make sure commitments are met.”

Continue reading at:  Federal Times

Small business advocate wins $475,000 in legal fees after 4-year fight with federal government

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After four years and expenses of more than $700,000, a California-based small business advocate on Thursday won an agreement from the Justice and Defense departments to pay his legal fees for litigation forcing the government to release confidential contracting data.

Lloyd Chapman, the outspoken founder of the Petaluma-based American Small Business League, declared victory in what he called an “historic” move by Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to require the government to pay Chapman $475,000.

Neither Justice nor the Pentagon would comment on the case to Government Executive, but Chapman’s award was confirmed by his Washington attorney, Jon Cuneo of Cuneo, Gilbert & Laduca.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.govexec.com/contracting/2018/08/small-business-advocate-wins-475k-legal-fees-after-4-year-fight-government/150280/

Army told to improve monitoring of small business subcontracts

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Staff at two Army Contracting Command locations sometimes neglected to assure that contractors gave appropriate subcontracts to small businesses, the Pentagon watchdog found.

Though most of the officials located at Redstone Arsenal in Alabama and Army Contracting Command in Warren, Michigan, were given a clean bill of health, officials working on 23 contracts valued at $918 million “did not ensure that prime contractors provided small businesses with adequate subcontracting opportunities,” the Defense Department inspector general said in a report dated March 19.

The review of 80 Army contracts completed in fiscal 2015-2016 found that prime contractors provided adequate subcontracting opportunities for 27 contracts valued at $694 million.

But a subset worth $331 million were signed without a subcontracting plan or a contracting officer’s determination that no subcontracting possibilities existed.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.govexec.com/contracting/2018/03/army-told-improve-monitoring-small-business-subcontracts/146931/

GSA holding small business networking session Feb. 8th in Savannah

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The General Services Administration’s Office of Small Business Utilization and Hoar Construction LLC are holding a networking session for small businesses on Feb. 8, 2018 in Savannah, Georgia.

Background

On Sept. 28, 2017, GSA awarded a contract in the amount of $22,819,862 to Hoar Construction of Birmingham, Alabama to design and build the new Tomochichi Courthouse Annex in Savannah.  Since Hoar is not a small businesses, the firm is required to develop an acceptable small business subcontracting plan in accordance with FAR 19.7.  The event being planned on Feb. 8th is designed to facilitate small business participation in the project.

The scope of design/build contract includes: design/construction documents and construction work, consisting of all labor, equipment, and materials for a complete build-out.  The project includes space for one bankruptcy courtroom and chambers, the bankruptcy clerk, and space for the U.S. Probation Office.  The total space requirement is approximately 35,000 square feet of office space and 11,000 square feet of parking for 25 cars,  for a total of 46,000 gross square feet, available for personnel, furnishings and equipment, with occupancy planned for the year 2020.  The newly constructed Courthouse Annex will be located on GSA-owned property, on a site between Barnard Street, West Your Street, Whitaker Street, and West State Street in Savannah.

Networking Event

Prospective attendees at the small business networking event are to register their company with the GSA Contacting Officer listed below via email.  Due to space availability, the GSA asks that no more than two (2) persons per firm be represented.  Call-in reservations will not be accepted.  The networking session is intended to review the scope of the project, review the project site, and conduct a GSA Small Business Networking forum among attendees.

Contact information: Swindale Rhodes, Contracting Officer, Email: swindale.rhodes@gsa.gov

Date and Time: February 8, 2018, 1:30 pm

Location of Event: 124 Barnard Street, J.G. Lowe “B” Building, 3rd Floor, Savannah, GA 31401

Small business activist wins interim victory against Pentagon, Sikorsky

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For four years, the small but vocal American Small Business League has argued that large federal contractors mislead agencies and the public by overstating their use of small businesses as subcontractors to meet statutory goals.

In U.S. District Court in San Francisco last Friday, attorneys for the advocacy group led by Lloyd Chapman and based in Petaluma, Calif., successfully pried out the previously non-public names of suppliers and other subcontractors used by Sikorsky Aircraft Corp.

The helicopter maker had joined with the Defense and Justice departments in seeking to withhold such information as proprietary when submitted to the Pentagon under its 27-year-old Comprehensive Subcontracting Plan Test Program, designed to measure corporate potential for increasing small business opportunities in subcontracting.

Small business booster Chapman has long challenged the Pentagon’s program as nonproductive and oriented mostly toward obfuscating the degree to which large contractors win defense business intended for smaller ones.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.govexec.com/contracting/2017/11/small-business-activist-wins-interim-victory-against-pentagon-sikorsky/142611 

3 ways to make the most of your subcontract

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Are two businesses better than one?

For many small businesses, teaming with a larger and more-established government contractor as a subcontractor may be a great way to gain experience and build a reputation with government agencies.

Despite the many advantages of teaming, subcontractors can sometimes find themselves out in the cold if they don’t take the proper steps to assure inclusion once the contract is awarded.  In fact, according to the American Express Trends in Federal Contracting for Small Businesses report, 31 percent of small business government contractors reported that they participated on a winning bid as a subcontractor, but the prime contractor never used them during the fulfillment of that contract.

No need to be pessimistic!  Many small businesses (including my own) have fruitful experiences teaming up as a subcontractor.  Here are three ways to help subcontractors receive their share of a winning bid and put themselves on the path to more work.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.federaltimes.com/opinions/2017/10/23/3-ways-to-make-the-most-of-your-subcontract-commentary/

GSA aims to refresh Schedules in April

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The Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) is moving to launch a “refresh” of its Multiple Awards Schedule next month, applying recent rules changes to its largest buying program.

On a March 22 conference call, General Services Administration’s FAS officials said the refresh could roll out in the middle of April and would include:

  • Purchasing by Non-Federal Entities from Federal Supply Schedules
  • Small Business Subcontracting changes
  • Model Subcontracting Plan changes
  • Order level changes

Keep reading this article at: http://www.federaltimes.com/articles/fas-aims-to-refresh-multiple-award-schedules-in-april

Pentagon wins court round on disclosing Sikorsky subcontracting plans

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pentagon-sealDefense Department attorneys won an appeals court decision on Jan. 6 that denies a demand from a small business advocacy group that Sikorsky Aviation Corp. be required to disclose its subcontracting plan submitted under a long-standing Pentagon program.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled against the Petaluma, Calif.-based American Small Business League, saying that forcing the helicopter maker to disclose its subcontracting plan would put it at a competitive disadvantage.

Small business booster Lloyd Chapman has long challenged the Pentagon’s 27-year-old Comprehensive Subcontracting Plan Test Program as nonproductive and oriented mostly toward obfuscating the degree to which large contractors win defense business intended for smaller ones.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.govexec.com/contracting/2017/01/pentagon-wins-court-round-disclosing-sikorsky-subcontracting-plans/134472

2017 NDAA strengthens subcontracting plan enforcement

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osdbuThe 2017 National Defense Authorization Act, if signed into law, includes a few changes designed to help small business subcontractors. Among those changes, the bill, which has recently been approved by both the House and Senate, includes language designed to help ensure that large prime contractors comply with the Small Business Act’s “good faith” requirement to meet their small business subcontracting goals.

Section 1821 of the 2017 NDAA is called “Good Faith in Subcontracting,” and is another Congressional effort to put teeth into the subcontracting goals required of large prime contractors.  (Congress took a crack at this same subject in the 2013 NDAA.)  The 2017 NDAA makes a handful of additional changes to the law, all of which should help ensure small business subcontracting goals are met.

The 2017 NDAA strengthens the current statutory language by specifying that a large prime contractor is in breach of its prime contract is it fails to provide adequate assurances of its intent to comply with a subcontracting plan (including, as requested, by providing periodic reports and other documents). The statute also provides that agency Offices of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization (OSDBUs) will review each subcontracting plan “to ensure that the plan provides maximum practicable opportunity for small business concerns to participate in the performance of the contract to which the plan applies.”

Keep reading this article at: http://smallgovcon.com/statutes-and-regulations/2017-ndaa-strengthens-subcontracting-plan-enforcement/

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