Independent External Peer Reviews of Water Resource Projects

Please see the attached Questions and Answers for answers to all questions asked by all vendors. A Pre-Proposal Teleconference is being hosted by HECSA Contracting and the Institute of Water Resources to provide additional information about the Independent External Peer Review program that supports USACE Water Resources Projects. The teleconference is scheduled for Tuesday 31 March 2020 at 1130am EDT. Webmeeting: https://usace.webex.com/meet/bradley.t.hudgens Select "have meeting call me" or call in directly at: Call-in number: 888-363-4749 Access code: 4138229 Security code: 1234 ****Tuesday 31 March 2020 at 1130am EDT**** Please contact the Contract Specialist David A. Kaplan at email [email protected] or the Contracting Officer Wesley D. (Dale) Dewar at [email protected] if you have questions about the teleconference. ***************************************************************************************************************** The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) requires professional technical services in support of independent external peer reviews (IEPR) for its water resources projects. The Institute for Water Resources (IWR) and Humphreys Engineer Center Support Activity (HECSA) will administer Blanket Purchase Agreements (BPA) on behalf of USACE to obtain these services. These BPAs will serve the needs of the entire USACE consistent with the general scope of work outlined below. The purpose of this BPA is to provide IEPR services to USACE for scientific assessments and water resource projects. The Office of Management and Budgets (OMB) Bulletin M-05-03, Final Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review, (2004) and the Water Resources Development Act of 2007 (WRDA 2007), as amended, mandate that certain scientific assessments and project studies conducted by USACE shall be subject to peer review by an independent panel of experts. In addition, these authorities and directives and related USACE guidance on review processes allow that USACE may choose to perform IEPR on certain work products. USACE requires the Contractor to provide management and/or technical services in support of IEPRs for water resources projects, scientific assessments and related work products consistent with OMB Bulletin M-05-03 and WRDA 2007, as amended, and related USACE guidance. For each order under this BPA, the Contractor will be required to establish a panel of experts, typically in accordance with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) policy for selecting committee members, and manage peer reviews for project studies, scientific assessments and/or related work products. Specific requirements will be detailed in each order. In accordance with the WRDA 2007, as amended, Offerors must be an eligible 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Business to submit a proposal as a prime contractor for this requirement. All proposals must be received no later than 4:30PM on Monday, 20 April 2020. All requests for clarifications must be submitted no later than 4:30PM on Thursday, 2 April 2020. Questions received after 4:30PM on Thursday, 2 April 2020 may or may not receive a response. Submit all questions and inquiries to the Points of Contact listed in the Solicitation. See the attached Solicitation and other documents for additional information. Note for Attachment 4 - Example BPA Call Price Sheet, Offerors must manually input the hours for each option or place a zero into the cell. Offerors may use attachment 4 or submit their own substantially similar Excel file in lieu of attachment 4 which shows all of the required information.