Justia Government Contracts Opinion Summaries

Access to the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario necessitated traversing city streets. The state contracted with the Company, which owns the Bridge, to construct new approaches from interstate roads. The contract specified separate jobs for the state and the Company. In 2010, the state obtained a state court order, finding the Company in breach of contract and requiring specific performance. The Company sought an order to open ramps constructed by the state, asserting that this was necessary to complete its work. The court denied the motion and held Company officials in contempt. In a 2012 settlement, the court ordered the Company to relinquish its responsibilities to the state and establish a $16 million fund to ensure completion. Plaintiffs, trucking companies that use the bridge, sought an injunction requiring the state to immediately open the ramps. The district court dismissed claims under the dormant Commerce Clause, the motor carriers statute, 49 U.S.C. 14501(c), and the Surface Transportation Assistance Act, 49 U.S.C. 31114(a)(2). The Sixth Circuit affirmed. For purposes of the Commerce Clause and statutory claims, the state is acting in a proprietary capacity and, like the private company, is a market participant when it joins the bridge company in constructing ramps. View "Mason & Dixon Lines Inc. v. Steudle" on Justia Law

The Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (ISDA), 25 U.S.C. 450 et seq., directed the Secretary of the Interior to enter into contracts with willing tribes, pursuant to which those tribes would provide services such as education and law enforcement that otherwise would have been provided by the Federal government. ISDA mandated that the Secretary shall pay the full amount of "contract support costs" incurred by tribes in performing their contracts. At issue was whether the Government must pay those costs when Congress appropriated sufficient funds to pay in full any individual contractor's contract support costs, but not enough funds to cover the aggregate amount due every contractor. The Court held that, consistent with longstanding principles of Government contracting law, the Government must pay each tribe's contract support costs in full. View "Salazar v. Ramah Navajo Chapter" on Justia Law

In 1983, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, 42 U.S.C. 10101-10270, authorized the Department of Energy to contract with nuclear facilities for disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high level radioactive waste. The Standard Contract provided that rights and duties may be assignable with transfer of SNF title. Plaintiff entered into the Standard Contract in 1983 and sold its operation and SNF to ENVY in 2002, including assignment of the Standard Contract, except one payment obligation. Plaintiff transferred claims related to DOE defaults. As a result of DOE’s breach, ENVY built on-site dry-storage facilities. The Claims Court consolidated ENVY’s suit with plaintiff’s suit. The government admitted breach; the Claims Court awarded ENVY $34,895,467 (undisputed damages) and certain disputed damages. The Federal Circuit affirmed in part. Plaintiff validly assigned pre-existing claims; while partial assignment of rights and duties under the contract was not valid, the government waived objection. The assignment encompassed claims against the government. Legal and lobbying fees to secure Vermont approval for mitigation were foreseeable, but other expenses were not recoverable. ENVY failed to prove costs of disposing of contaminated material discovered due to the breach and its characterization of spent fuel moved to dry storage. ENVY is not entitled to recover cost of capital for funding mitigation, or Resource Code 19 payroll loader overhead costs, but may recover capital suspense loader overhead costs,.View "VT Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. United States" on Justia Law

In 1957 the Commonwealth constructed the Quehanna Wild Area Nuclear Site. Part of the site was donated to Pennsylvania State University. Until 1967 Penn State leased to a Lockheed predecessor, conducting work under Atomic Energy Commission contracts, involving Strontium-90, a radioactive isotope. The predecessor partially decontaminated. According to Lockheed, the Commonwealth was aware that Strontium-90 remained and could not be removed without dismantling the facility. In the 1990s, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission ordered the Commonwealth, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, and the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to decommission the facility. This cost more than $20 million. PADEP sued Lockheed under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, 42 U.S.C. 9607(a). Lockheed defended that the Commonwealth should recover less than its demand based on its own conduct and liability and the doctrines of unclean hands, estoppel, waiver, and laches. Lockheed also alleged that PADEP was liable under CERCLA as an owner-operator and as having arranged for or transported hazardous substances. The district court dismissed Lockheed’s third-party complaint, concluding that the Commonwealth and DCNR retained Eleventh Amendment immunity when PADEP filed a federal suit. The Third Circuit vacated with instructions to dismiss the third party complaint as moot, based on the sufficiency of Lockheed’s affirmative defenses. View "Commonwealth of PA Dep' of Envtl. Prot. v. Lockheed Martin Corp." on Justia Law

The Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles sought proposals from contractors to print and send registration renewal notices along with advertisements to raise revenue to defray costs. RMV would provide the contractor with information (name, address, date of birth, and license number) that was generally exempt from public disclosure under the Driver's Privacy Protection Act, 18 U.S.C. 2721-25, and Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 4, sect. 7, cl. 26(n), that the contractor would need to safeguard from unlawful public disclosure. Defendant's winning bid indicated that it understood and accepted the terms. The contract specified that Massachusetts would continue to exercise ownership over all personal data, and that a violation of the DPPA or the Massachusetts privacy law would cause the contract to terminate. Plaintiff, who received a registration renewal notice that included advertisements, filed a putative class action on behalf of himself and other drivers who, without providing consent, had received advertisements from defendant. The district court granted defendant judgment on the pleadings based on failure to join the Commonwealth as an indispensable party. The First Circuit affirmed, finding no violation of the DPPA. Defendant does not disclose the information it legitimately receives, as the state's contractor, to others. View "Downing v. Globe Direct LLC" on Justia Law

This case involved the competitive bidding for an airport advertising concession. After the completion of the bid process, plaintiff - the second-place finisher - brought this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging a conspiracy to violate plaintiff's equal protection rights during the bid process. The court concluded that plaintiff's conspiracy claim failed against defendants because the underlying proposed equal protection claim failed, lacking the sufficient identifiable group required. Therefore, the court concluded that the facts and inferences in this case pointed overwhelmingly in favor of defendants. Accordingly, the court vacated the district court's post-verdict order denying judgment as a matter of law and remanded with instructions to grant judgment as a matter of law to defendants. View "Corey Airport Services, Inc. v. Clear Channel Outdoor, Inc." on Justia Law

Andrews was designated as contractor for improvements to the sewage system, in a no-bid process involving kickbacks and bribery, having made numerous false statements in the bond application package. After the contract was terminated, he submitted a claim of $748,304, based on false statements and duplicate charges. Evidence indicated that Andrews was not capable of the project work and that the entire scheme was fraudulent. He was convicted of one count of conspiracy, 18 U.S.C. 371, four counts of wire fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1343, 1346, and 2, one count of program fraud, 18 U.S.C. 666(a)(1)(B) and 2, one count of making a false claim upon the Government of the Virgin Islands, 14 V.I.C. 843(4), and one count of inducing a conflict of interest, 3 V.I.C. 1102, 1103, and 1107. The Third Circuit affirmed the conviction, but remanded for resentencing. Errors in the indictment and jury instructions concerning honest services fraud did not affect substantial rights. Although the 151-month term of imprisonment was within the statutory maximum for Counts Two through Five, it exceeded the statutory maximum for Counts One and Six; it was not possible to determine whether the sentence was legal as to each count View "United States v. Andrew" on Justia Law

Suppliers appealed the district court's dismissal of their action against the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services and the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Suppliers challenged a regulation addressing the "applicable financial standards" that a durable medical equipment, prosthetics, orthotics and supplies (DMEPOS) supplier must meet to be eligible for a Medicare contract under the competitive process established in 42 U.S.C. 1395w-3 (DMEPOS Statute). The court affirmed the district court's dismissal on the ground that section 1395w-3(11) precluded judicial review of the Secretary's financial standards regulation and that the district court therefore lacked subject matter jurisdiction. View "Texas Alliance For Home Care, et al. v. Sebelius, et al." on Justia Law

In February, 2002, the Navy awarded GM&W a contract for floor coating at a military base. GM&W subcontracted with FloorPro, which completed the work on February 27, 2002 and billed GM&W. On March 8, the Navy informed GM&W that the work was completed satisfactorily. On April 17, FloorPro informed the Navy’s contracting officer that it had not been paid. GM&W had claims pending and was not sure whether funds that the Navy directly deposited would be available to FloorPro. In April 2002, the Navy and GM&W entered into contract modification providing for mailing to FloorPro of a check payable to GM&W and Floor-Pro. The Navy paid GM&W directly by electronic transfer and informed FloorPro that its recourse was to sue GM&W. In December 2002, FloorPro submitted a claim to the Navy’s contracting officer. On March 27, 2003, FloorPro filed at the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals, which awarded $37,500. The Federal Circuit reversed, holding that under the Contract Disputes Act, 41 U.S.C. 7101, ASBCA has no jurisdiction over a claim by a subcontractor. In 2009, FloorPro filed in the Court of Claims, which ruled in favor of FloorPro. The Federal Circuit vacated, ordering dismissal under the six-year limitations period of 28 U.S.C. 2501. View "FloorPro, Inc. v. United States" on Justia Law

Medicare pays teaching hospitals for work by residents when a teaching physician supervises. During the 1990s, HHS concluded that many hospitals were billing for unsupervised services and began to audit invoices. There was also a GAO report and private litigation: qui tam suits under the False Claims Act, allowing relators to collect a bounty. Under 31 U.S.C. 3730(e)(4)(A), suits cannot be based upon public disclosure of allegations or transactions in public agencies’ official reports unless the relator is an original source of information. A prior case concluded that the 1998 GAO report and similar public documents disclosed that billing for unsupervised work was common practice. The district court dismissed a suit filed against a teaching hospital in 2004, claiming to describe conduct, such as inadequate supervision, not previously disclosed. The Seventh Circuit vacated. No one who read the GAO report, or followed the progress of the audits, would suspect that Rush University was misrepresenting "immediate availability" of teaching physicians during concurrently scheduled procedures. The complaint alleged a kind of deceit that the GAO report does not attribute to any teaching hospital. View "Goldberg v. Rush Univ. Med. Ctr." on Justia Law