(A) Any person who is aggrieved in connection with the solicitation or award of a contract shall make a protest to the procurement officer.
(B) Protest with respect to a solicitation shall be submitted in writing at least two (2) working days prior to the opening of bids or the closing date for receipt of proposals. Protest with respect to the award of a contract shall be submitted in writing within ten (10) calendar days after the contract award.
(C) All protests will be made in accordance with the procedures outlined in ATTACHMENT A.
ATTACHMENT A
Rejection of Bids and Offers
(a) Any bid or offer that fails to confoilu to the essential requirements of the invitation for bids (IFB) or request for proposal (RFP) shall be rejected.
(b) Any bid or offer that does not confoiiu to the applicable specifications or requirements shall be rejected unless the IFB or RFP authorized the submission of alternate bids and the supplies offered as alternates meet the requirements specified in the IFB or RFP.
(c) Any bid or offer that fails to confoini to the delivery schedule or permissible alternates stated in the IFB or RFP shall be rejected.
(d) A bid or offer shall be rejected when the bidder/offeror imposes conditions that would modify requirements of the invitation or limit the bidder’s liability to the City of Mt. Vernon, since to allow the IFB or RFP to impose such conditions would be prejudicial to other bidders/offerors. For example, bids shall be rejected in which the bidder/offeror—
(1) Protects against future changes in conditions, such as increased costs, if total possible costs to the City of Mt. Vernon cannot be determined;
(2) Fails to state a price and indicates that price shall be price in effect at time of delivery;
(3) States a price but qualifies it as being subject to price in effect at time of delivery;
(4) When not authorized by the IFB or RFP, conditions or qualifies a bid or offer by stipulating that it is to be considered only if, before date of award, the bidder/offeror receives (or does not receive) award under a separate solicitation;
(5) Requires that the City of Mt. Vernon is to determine that the bidder’s/offeror’s product meets applicable specifications; or
(6) Limits rights of the City of Mt. Vernon under any contract clause.
(f) Any bid/offer may be rejected if the procurement officer deteilnines in writing that it is unreasonable as to price. Unreasonableness of price includes not only the total price of the bid, but the prices for individual line items as well.
Bids or offers received from any person or concern that is suspended, debarred, proposed for debarment, or declared ineligible as of the bid opening date shall be rejected.
Further considerations for sealed bids:
A low bidder may be requested to delete objectionable conditions from a bid provided the conditions do not go to the substance, as distinguished from the form, of the bid, or work an injustice on other bidders. A condition goes to the substance of a bid where it affects price, quantity, quality, or delivery of the items offered.
When a bid guarantee is required and a bidder fails to furnish the guarantee in accordance with the requirements of the invitation for bids.
Low bids received from concerns determined to be not responsible shall be rejected.
After submitting a bid, if all of a bidder’s assets or that part related to the bid are transferred during the period between the bid opening and the award, the transferee may not be able to take over the bid/offer. Accordingly, the procurement officer shall reject the bid unless the transfer is affected by merger, operation of law.
Notification: Any bid or offers that are rejected or otherwise excluded from the competitive range shall be notified promptly in writing by the procurement officer. The notice shall state the basis for the determination and that a proposal revision will not be considered.
Record Keeping: The originals of all rejected bids/offers, and any written findings with respect to such rejections, shall be preserved with the papers relating to the acquisition.
Solicitation and Award Protest Procedures
1. The following procedures are established to resolve agency protests effectively, to build confidence in the City of Mt. Vernon procurement system, and to reduce protests outside of the City of Mt. Vernon:
A. Protests shall be concise and logically presented to facilitate review by the City of Mt. Vernon. Failure to substantially comply with any of the requirements of paragraph (1)(B) of this section may be grounds for dismissal of the protest.
B. Protests shall include the following infoiniation:
i. Name, address, and fax and telephone numbers of the protester.
ii. Solicitation or contract number.
iii. Detailed statement of the legal and factual grounds for the protest, to include a description of resulting prejudice to the protester.
iv. Copies of relevant documents.
v. Request for a ruling by [city, town, county, organization].
vi. Statement as to the form of relief requested.
vii. All information establishing that the protester is an interested party for the purpose of filing a protest.
viii. All information establishing the timeliness of the protest.
C All protests filed directly with the City of Mt. Vernon will be addressed to the procurement officer or other official designated to receive protests.
D. Interested parties may request an independent review of their protest as an appeal of the procurement officer’s decision on a protest. The City of Mt. Vernon shall designate the official(s) who are to conduct this independent review.
2. Protests based on alleged apparent improprieties in a solicitation shall be filed two (2) working days before the advertised opening of sealed bid or the closing date for receipt of proposals. In all other cases, protests shall be filed no later than ten (10) calendar days after the basis of protest is known or should have been known, whichever is earlier. The agency, for good cause shown, or where it determines that a protest raises issues significant to the City of Mt. Vernon procurement system, may consider the merits of any protest which is not timely filed.
3. Action upon receipt of protest:
A. Upon receipt of a protest before award, a contract may not be awarded, pending the City of Mt. Vernon resolution of the protest, unless contract award is justified, in writing, for urgent and compelling reasons or is determined, in writing, to be in the best interest of the City of Mt. Vernon. Such justification or determination shall be approved at a level above the contracting officer, or by another official pursuant to agency procedures.
B. If award is withheld pending the City of Mt. Vernon resolution of the protest, the procurement officer will inform the bidders or offerors whose bids or offers might become eligible for award of the contract. If appropriate, the bidders or offerors should be requested, before expiration of the time for acceptance of their bids or offers, to extend the time for acceptance to avoid the need for resolicitation. In the event of failure to obtain such extension of bids or offers, consideration should be given to proceeding with award pursuant to paragraph (3)(1) of this section.
C. Upon receipt of a protest within 10 days after contract award or within 5 days after a debriefing date offered to the protester under a timely debriefing request in accordance with competitive proposals debriefing procedure (below), the procurement officer shall immediately suspend performance, pending resolution of the protest within the agency, including any review by an independent higher level official, unless continued performance is justified, in writing, for urgent and compelling reasons or is detenliined, in writing, to be in the best interest of the City of Mt. Vernon. Such justification or determination shall be approved at a level above the procurement officer, or by another official pursuant to agency procedures.
D. The City of Mt. Vernon shall make their best efforts to resolve protests within thirty-five (35) days after the protest is filed. To the extent peiiuitted by law and regulation, the parties may exchange relevant information.
E. The City of Mt. Vernon protest decisions shall be well-reasoned, and explain the City of Mt. Vernon position. The protest decision shall be provided to the protester using a method that provides evidence of receipt.
Competitive Proposal Debriefing Procedure
An offeror, upon its written request received by the agency within three (3) working days after the date on which that offeror has received a notification to of award, shall be debriefed and furnished the basis for the selection decision and contract award.
To the maximum extent practicable, the City of Mt. Vernon will conduct the debriefing within five (5) working days after receipt of the written request.
Debriefmgs of successful and unsuccessful offerors may be done orally, in writing, or by any other method acceptable to the procurement officer.
The procurement officer should noinially chair any debriefing session held. Individuals who conducted the evaluations shall provide support.
At a minimum, the debriefing infoiivation shall include--
(1) The City of Mt. Vernon evaluation of the significant weaknesses or deficiencies in the offeror’s proposal, if applicable;
(2) The overall evaluated cost or price (including unit prices), and technical rating, if applicable, of the successful offeror and the debriefed offeror, and past performance information on the debriefed offeror;
(3) The overall ranking of all offerors, when any ranking was developed by the agency during the source selection;
(4) A summary of the rationale for award;
(5) For acquisitions of commercial items, the make and model of the item to be delivered by the successful offeror; and
(6) Reasonable responses to relevant questions about whether source selection procedures contained in the solicitation, applicable regulations, and other applicable authorities were followed.
The debriefing shall not include point-by-point comparisons of the debriefed offeror’s proposal with those of other offerors. Moreover, the debriefing shall not reveal any information concerning:
(1) Trade secrets;
(2) Privileged or confidential manufacturing processes and techniques;
(3) Commercial and financial information that is privileged or confidential, including cost breakdowns, profit, indirect cost rates, and similar information; and
(4) The names of individuals providing reference information about an offeror’s past performance.
An official summary of the debriefing shall be included in the contract file.
(Ord. 2024-07, passed 3-4-2024)