Logistics Health, Inc. v. United States
| Decision Date | 11 June 2021 |
| Docket Number | No. 21-759,21-759 |
| Parties | LOGISTICS HEALTH, INC., Plaintiff, v. THE UNITED STATES, Defendant, and QTC MEDICAL SERVICES, INC., Defendant-Intervenor. |
| Court | U.S. Claims Court |
Post-award bid protest; technical evaluation; discussions with offerors; FAR 15.306(d); balanced pricing; FAR 15.404-1(g); best-value determination; RCFC 52.1; judgment on the administrative record; Blue & Gold waiver.
Jason A. Carey of Covington & Burling LLP, with whom were Kayleigh M. Scalzo, J. Hunter Bennett, Alan A. Pemberton, Andrew R. Guy, and Peter B. Terenzio III, all of Washington, DC, for plaintiff.
William P. Rayel of the Department of Justice, with whom were Brian M. Boynton, Robert E. Kirschman, and Douglas K. Mickle, all of Washington, DC, and Aaron K. McCartney of the U.S. Army Legal Services Agency, of Fort Belvoir, VA, for defendant.
Marcia Madsen of Mayer Brown LLP, with whom were David F. Dowd, and Luke Levasseur, all of Washington, DC, and James J. McCullough of Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP, with whom were Michael J. Anstett, Anayansi Rodriguez Carbo, and Christopher H. Bell, all of Washington, DC, for defendant-intervenor.
Plaintiff Logistics Health, Inc. ("LHI") brings this bid protest challenging the United States Army's award of a contract for the third Reserve Health Readiness Program ("RHRP-3") to defendant-intervenor QTC Medical Services, Inc. ("QTC") under Solicitation No. W15QKN-18-R-1000. Both plaintiff and defendant-intervenor have significant experience on federal medical services contracts, with plaintiff serving as incumbent on the Reserve Health Readiness Program ("RHRP") contract and QTC performing millions of health assessments for service members and veterans through other contracts. While this contract and solicitation has been through several Army and GAO pre-award and post-award protests, as well as corrective action from the Army, defendant-intervenor QTC has consistently remained the awardee. Pending before the Court are plaintiff's motion for judgment on the administrative record, the government's cross-motion for judgment on the administrative record, and defendant-intervenor's cross-motion for judgment on the administrative record. For the following reasons, the Court DENIES plaintiff's motion and GRANTS the government and defendant-intervenor's motions.
The Army's RHRP contract is for "health readiness services" to the Service Components ("SCs") of the "Reserve Components (i.e., Army Reserve and Guard, Air Force Reserve and Guard, Navy Reserve, Marine Forces Reserve, Coast Guard Reserve), Active Components and Department of Defense Service Civilians throughout the U.S., its Territories, the District of Columbia, [and] Germany." AR at 482. This request for proposals ("RFP") is for the third RHRP contract, and plaintiff has been the incumbent performer of two predecessor contracts for nearly the last two decades. Id. at 11309. The RFP is for a single-award indefinite delivery indefinite quantity task order contract with a maximum dollar value of $999,000,000. Id. at 482. The performance work statement ("PWS") describes the commercial services to be provided and requires the contractor to provide (among other services) immunizations, physical examinations, periodic health assessments, mental health assessments, limited dental treatment, and laboratory services. Id. at 1140.
The contractor will provide health services: (1) at "group event gatherings of Service Members . . . at SC-designated sites (e.g., armories, drill halls)"; (2) "through the Contractor's Call Center"; and (3) "within the contractor's network private sector providers." Id. at 1140. The contractor "must be able to meet surges for various services," providing care to tens of thousands across the nation. Id. at 1141 ( ). The contractor must provide all personnel, equipment, and materials, including vaccines, needed to successfully perform each group event. Id. at 1140-41. The contractor must also have a network of trained and credentialed providers able to travel to a government site at short notice on weekends andmust properly manage a complex cold-chain transportation and storage system for vaccines. Id. at 1142, 1174.
The Army planned to award the contract to the proposal that provides the "best value" under the RFP's four evaluation factors, in descending order of importance: technical, past performance, price/cost, and small business participation. Id. at 1238. "When combined, all non-price/cost factors are significantly more important than Price/Cost." Id. The technical factor is divided into three subfactors, which are also listed in descending order of importance: technical scenarios, management/staffing, and transition/quality assurance. Id. at 1239. For each technical subfactor, contractors received a rating of "Outstanding," "Good," "Acceptable," "Marginal," or "Unacceptable"—the compilation of these ratings "form[ed] the basis of the Technical Factor rating." Id. at 1240-41.
The Army issued RFP No. W15QKN-18-R-1000 on 22 November 2017, and proposals were due 8 January 2018. AR at 227. Three contractors, QTC, LHI, and another offeror, submitted proposals in response. Id. at 229. Plaintiff stressed its incumbency of nearly 17 years in describing its services: "Since 2001, LHI has been honored to help RHRP customers and SMs by providing them with more than 22.5 million services to meet their readiness objectives." Id. at 11180 (LHI Proposal). LHI noted it has "the staff, infrastructure, processes, and network of trained healthcare professionals (HCPs) and dentists in place to continue to deliver high-quality services in support of health readiness requirements and deployment objectives of in-scope Service Components (SCs)." Id. at 11179. Plaintiff provided detailed responses to each of the four solicitation factors, particularly highlighting its technical experience as the existing RHRP provider. Id. at 11180 ( ). Plaintiff also discussed its network size, audiology vans, transition-in plan, and proposed prices. See, e.g., id. at 11188, 11250, 11323, 11424. Plaintiff's final price estimate was $848,582,938.30. Id. at 11424.
QTC's proposal stressed its "specific expertise and core competencies required for successful execution of RHRP-3" and "proven history of working . . . on other federal medical service contracts." AR at 10577 (QTC Proposal). QTC specifically detailed its experience working with the Department of Veterans Affairs for over 20 years, "perform[ing] 5 million disability and separation health assessments . . . for SMs and Veterans using group event and in-clinic settings." Id. at 10579. QTC emphasized having a sizeable team from which it could draw personnel, detailing its "prime offeror, major subtractors, and small business subcontractors." Id. at 10577-78. QTC, like plaintiff, discussed its network size, audiology vans, transition-in plan, and proposed prices. See e.g., id. at 10692, 10608, 10727-28, 10835. QTC's final price estimate was $899,533,755.74. Id. at 10835.
On 2 March 2018, plaintiff filed an Army Material Command ("AMC") pre-award protest on the terms of the RFP. AR at 2704. Plaintiff protested: (1) the technical evaluation for being "based exclusively on two narrowly-drawn [sic] scenarios"; (2) the RFP for using fixed amounts for various costs when "it is highly likely that other offerors' actual cost would be far higher than that amount"; and (3) the RFP for "contain[ing] ambiguities regarding which documents count towards the page limitations." Id. at 2705-06. On 15 March 2018, plaintiff filed a protest on the same issues at the GAO. Id. at 2671-73. The AMC dismissed plaintiff's protest on 4 April 2018 because "LHI also filed the exact same protest at the Government Accountability Office ('GAO') challenging the same solicitation at issue in LHI's AMC-Level protest," and "if a protest is filed with an external forum on the same solicitation at issue in an AMC-Level protest, the AMC-Level protest will be dismissed." Id. at 2731. The GAO dismissed plaintiff's protest on 13 April 2018, stating Id. at 2703.
After amending the solicitation, the government received three proposals, including proposals from LHI and QTC, and on 19 December 2018 the government "determined that all 3 shall remain in the competitive range and discussions will be conducted" in accordance with FAR 15.306(d). Id. at 12318. Discussion letters were sent on 11 February 2019 for the initial evaluation phase and on 7 June 2019 for the interim evaluation phase, and discussions were held with all three offerors. Id. at 3118. The government closed discussions and requested final...
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