September 1, 2016
VA doesn’t waste time in implementing Supreme Court decision
Source: Federal News Radio, Jason Miller, August 15, 2016
The Veterans Affairs Department acted unusually quickly to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s “rule of two” decision in the Kingdomware case.
So much so that it both surprised observers and had them wondering if VA was acting too hastily.
VA issued new acquisition regulations July 25, just more than a month after the decision, which found VA’s interpretation of a law requiring the agency to set-aside all procurements if at least two veteran-owned small businesses are qualified was flawed. The nation’s highest court reversed the lower court’s decision on June 16 by an 8-0 vote, finding VA must use the “rule of two” for supply schedule contracts even if it has met its statutory contracting goals.
“We expect to set aside a greater volume of VA contracts to service disabled veteran-owned small business and veteran-owned small business suppliers,” said a VA spokesman in response to questions from Federal News Radio. “VA senior officials will be developing market research principles during a two-day integrated process team meeting Aug. 10-11. These principles will be transformed into a comprehensive policy, which will be used by all VA requirements personnel in the conduct of market research. In addition, a training course is currently being developed by the VA Acquisition Academy, and training will be conducted for required VA personnel during August 2016. The Office of Small Disadvantaged Business Utilization (OSDBU) is improving its existing market research platform to provide more robust research and analysis capability.”
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