DHS moves IT services to governmentwide contracts

The chief procurement officer at the Department of Homeland Security plans to move to established contract vehicles outside DHS to support the agency's IT services needs, instead of recompeting its big EAGLE II contract.

In a notice to industry posted Feb. 27, DHS procurement chief Soraya Correa said the agency had formally adopted governmentwide acquisition contracts run by the General Services Administration and National Institutes of Health to replace one of the agency's primary IT services contracts. She said the agency will not renew its $22 billion Security Enterprise Acquisition Gateway for Leading-Edge Solutions II (EAGLE II) contract.

"EAGLE I and II have served their purpose. The Department will not pursue a re-competition of EAGLE II," she said. Instead, DHS will let EAGLE II run its course until it expires in 2020.

DHS has been mulling how to proceed with a follow-on to EAGLE II after a planned successor, the Flexible Agile Support for the Homeland (FLASH) contract, was cancelled in June 2017. Last summer, Correa had said she was looking to incorporate federal category management and "best-in-class" contracting activities in EAGLE II's replacement combining some of the more agile aspects of the failed FLASH contract.

The impetus behind the shift to GWACs instead of a stand-alone successor contract for the EAGLE II IT services contract, she said, was the Office of Management and Budget's move toward reducing contract duplication through its category management initiatives, as well as Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA) rules that emphasize IT modernization, data-backed accountability and transparency.

DHS adopted GSA's Alliant 2, Alliant 2 Small Business, 8(a) STARS II and VETS 2 and the National Institutes of Health's CIO-SP3 and CIO-SP3 Small Business vehicles as of Feb. 4.

Correa said DHS plans another announcement by the end of March on how it will handle its FirstSource IT gear contract.