Please reference Request for Proposal Number VA-791-08-RP-0058. THIS IS A PRE-SOLICITATION ANNOUNCEMENT TO RAISE AWARENESS FOR POTENTIAL OFFERORS AND CONTINUE MARKET RESEARCH OF POTENTIAL SOURCES. ANY SOLICITATION FOR THIS REQUIREMENT WILL BE ISSUED AT A LATER DATE. The Veterans Administration (VA), Denver Acquisition and Logistics Center, 155 Van Gordon St, Lakewood, CO, 80228, is contemplating a soliciting for proposals from well qualified and experienced sources from any size business who is capable of providing Assistance and Advisory Services (A&AS) for the review, analysis, and development of the Veterans Affairs (VA) Polytrauma Rehabilitation Center (PRC) Assistive Technology Labs programs located at the VA's four VA PRCs in Richmond, VA; Tampa, FL; Palo Alto, CA; and Minneapolis, MN. The PRCs serve some of the most severely injured veterans and active duty service members. Due to the severity of their injuries, these individuals often suffer long-term physical, cognitive, and psychosocial disabilities that impact their ability to live independently and to participate in everyday community activities. These difficulties can be alleviated with the use of Assistive Technology (AT), which has been shown to be effective in increasing access to or participation in employment options, education, and independent living. Clinical providers at the PRCs are actively involved in fitting and prescribing AT devices and services for veterans and service members with disabilities. They have access to the most advanced rehabilitation equipment and devices. At the same time, there is an urgent need to guide existing efforts and develop a coherent, standardized program for all aspects of AT service delivery at the PRCs, including clinical services, outreach, education, and outcomes management. This goal can be achieved through the development and standardization of processes within the AT Labs at the PRCs. The mission of the AT Labs at the VA PRCs is to effectively support veterans and active duty service members with cognitive, sensory, and/or physical disabilities to reach their highest potential at home, school, and work through the addition of appropriate assistive technologies to their lives. The successful offeror will be required to provide all resources necessary to accomplish the program review, analysis, and development services, submission of proposed standardized program to the VA, training of VA personnel in adopted processes, and documentation requirements contained within the VA Statement of Objectives (SOO), as further delineated in the offeror's proposed Performance Work Statement (PWS), which will be incorporated into the contract. This contract will include the eleven milestones described below with their associated deliverables to be completed as requirements of this SOO. Those milestones are; 1) Initialize Project; 2) Develop Design Plan for AT Labs; 3) Develop Work Plan; 4) Develop Payment Schedule; 5) Provide Educational Services; 6) Provide Standardized Procedures for Evaluation; 7) Provide Consultation Services; 8) Provide Evaluation of AT Devices; 9) Develop AT Outcomes Data Collection and Management; 10) Provide Briefings to VA key personnel and management; 11) Provide Final Report. The successful offeror will include a Performance Work Statement, proposed costs to be based upon completion of milestones/deliverables, and estimated travel costs in their proposals. Important note: successful contractor will be reviewing and analyzing processes and staff training requirements, and then presenting an AT program for acceptance and implementation within the PRC's. There will be no direct patient care or access to patient records. Although offerors will propose a completion schedule for this project in their RFP response, the VA estimates project duration at between 18 to 36 months. Subject procurement is being procured as a commercial item as defined by FAR Part 12. Subject contract award will be made in accordance with FAR Parts 13 and 15. Subject announcement is provided in order to satisfy the requirements of FAR Part 5. The North American Classification Code is 622310 (Specialty (except Psychiatric and Substance Abuse) Hospitals) and Small Business Size Standard is $31.5 million. The potential requirement package will likely be issued as a 'full and open' solicitation for any and all qualified, experienced, and knowledgeable educational or business entity who can meet the requirements for this type of process review, analysis, and training A&AS project. All qualified, eligible and responsible sources may submit a timely proposal in response to the solicitation for consideration of award. The VA will be issuing a Request for Proposals in accordance with FAR Part 12, Acquisition of Commercial Items and FAR Part 15, Contracting by Negotiation. This acquisition will be procured as a 'Best Value' type of acquisition where price and technical superiority allow for evaluation trade-offs to achieve the best value contract for the government. Non-price factors (technical proposal, past performance, and subcontracting opportunities), when combined, will be considered significantly more important than price. Solicitation documents will be available electronically on or about October 15, 2008 at the FedBizOpps website at http://www.fedbizopps.gov. NO HARD COPIES OF THIS SOLICITATION WILL BE ISSUED. The anticipated RFP closing date is estimated to be on or about December 2, 2008 at 2:00 p.m. (Mountain Time). Upon review of the solicitation documents, prospective offerors are encouraged to provide questions and/or comments, in writing, in regards to the solicitation documents prior to submission of a proposal. A pre-proposal conference is anticipated in Denver, CO, on October 23, 2008. Both in-person and tele-conference attendees may be permitted based on feedback from potential respondents to the solicitation. Please review solicitation for conference details once the document is issued. The Contracting Officer for this acquisition is Mr. Ray Blomquist (
contact@example.gov). Please submit questions via e-mail, no phone calls please. Interested firms are reminded that in accordance with FAR Part 4.11, prospective contractors are required to have an active registration in the Central Contractor Registration (CCR) and FAR Part 4.12, prospective contractors must complete electronic on line annual representations and certifications (ORCA) databases prior to award of a contract and can be accessed at the Business Partner Network (BPN) website at http://www.bpn.gov/.
