Justia Government Contracts Opinion Summaries

The Authority was formed under Ga. Code 46-4-82(a) to provide member municipalities with natural gas. It operates as a non-profit, distributing profits and losses to member municipalities: 64 in Georgia, two in Tennessee, 12 in other states. It pays its own operating expenses and judgments; it is exempt from state laws on financing and investment for state entities and has discretion over accumulation, investment, and management of its funds. It sets its governance rules; members elect leaders from among member municipalities. Smyrna, Tennessee has obtained gas from the Authority since 2000, using a pipeline that does not run through Georgia. The Authority entered a multi-year “hedge” contract for gas acquisition, setting price and volume through 2014, and passed the costs on. The market price of natural gas then fell due to increased hydraulic fracturing (fracking), but Smyrna was still paying the higher price. Smyrna sued for breach of contract, violations of the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act, breach of fiduciary duty, and unjust enrichment. The district court denied the Authority’s motion to dismiss based on sovereign immunity under Georgia law and the Eleventh Amendment. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, stating that the Authority’s claim that any entity referred to as a state “instrumentality” in a Georgia statute is entitled to state-law sovereign immunity “requires quite a stretch of the imagination.” View "Town of Smyrna, TN v. Mun. Gas Auth. of GA" on Justia Law

Blackout performs asphalt paving work and other construction services and had contracts with the Chicago Transit Authority that were terminable at will. The CTA informed Blackout that it would not do business with the firm for the next year (debarment) and did not give a reason. Illinois law allows judicial review of debarment by public bodies, but Blackout did not avail itself of that process, nor did it sue for libel, although it insists that public announcement of debarment is defamatory, but filed suit in federal court under 42 U.S.C. 1983, claiming deprivation of “occupational liberty” without due process. The district court dismissed, noting that that inability to work for a single employer is not deprivation of occupational liberty and that there was no allegation of inability to work for public or private entities other than the CTA. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, noting that Blackout won a school district contract after the CTA debarment. View "Blackout Sealcoating, Inc. v. Peterson" on Justia Law

McDonough is an engineering firm that frequently does design jobs for the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT). The Illinois Procurement Code provides that, absent required signatures, a contract of the type in dispute is not valid and not an enforceable debt, 30 ILCS 500/20-80(d). McDonough claimed that IDOT owed it $2 million for additional work on three projects, none of which had a supplemental agreement that was fully executed. McDonough claimed that it continued working without the agreements because it was IDOT’s normal business practice always to sign an agreement after a prior approval letter was sent. Based on findings that McDonough had made accounting errors that called its business integrity into question, the chief procurement officer suspended McDonough’s status as a “prequalified vendor” automatically eligible to bid on IDOT projects. McDonough claimed that refusal to sign the agreements deprived it of property interests in the debts without due process of law. Faced with threats, of bankruptcy, the district court entered a temporary restraining order, effectively ordering state officials to pay. The Seventh Circuit vacated, finding that the suit is, in substance, an effort to have a federal court order state officials to make payments from the state treasury to remedy alleged breaches of contract and is prohibited by the Eleventh Amendment. View "McDonough Assocs., Inc. v. Schneider" on Justia Law

The pro se plaintiff filed a qui tam suit against the university and nine chemistry professors, charging that they defrauded the United States in violation of several federal statutes by obtaining federal grant money on the basis of plagiarized research papers. He does not allege that the fraud harmed him, but apparently sought a “bounty,” 37 U.S.C. 3730(d)(1-2). The district court dismissed. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, stating that to maintain a suit on behalf of the government, a qui tam plaintiff has to be either a licensed lawyer or represented by a lawyer. Georgakis is neither and cannot maintain the suit in his individual capacity because he does not claim to have been injured. View "Georgakis v. IL State Univ." on Justia Law

USM builds military boats. Working with VT Halter, USM designed a special-operations craft with a hull made out of composite materials for use in competing for the Navy's “MK V Special Operations Craft and Transporter System Contract.” With its 1993 bid, VT Halter submitted drawings stamped with a “Limited Rights Legend” to invoke Defense Federal Acquisition Regulations Supplement Section 252.227-7013(a)(15), which limits governmental use and disclosure of certain information. VT Halter won the contracts and delivered 24 Mark V special-operations craft. In 2004, the Navy awarded University of Maine a research grant to improve the ride and handling of the Mark V and provided detailed design drawings of the Mark V to contractors, stamped with the DFARS Limited Rights Legend, but did not obtain VT Halter’s consent for disclosure. The Navy awarded Maine Marine a contract to design and construct a prototype Mark V.1. USM sued under the Federal Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C. 1346(b), alleging misappropriation of trade secrets. The district court awarded damages, but the Fifth Circuit held that the matter lay exclusively within the jurisdiction of the Court of Federal Claims under the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C. 1491(a)(1). The Fifth Circuit vacated the judgment and ordered transfer. The Federal Circuit affirmed. View "U.S. Marine, Inc. v. United States" on Justia Law

ITT is a for-profit institution with more than 140 locations and offers post-secondary education. Leveski, who worked at the ITT campus, alleged, under the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act, 31 U.S.C. 3730(b) that ITT knowingly submitted false claims to the Department of Education to receive funds from federal student financial assistance programs under the Higher Education Act, 20 U.S.C. 1001. The district court dismissed for lack of jurisdiction, finding that the allegations had already been publicly disclosed and that Leveski was not the original source of the allegations. The court granted sanctions of $394,998.33 against Leveski's lawyers. The Seventh Circuit reversed, finding the allegations that ITT paid illegal incentive compensation throughout Leveski’s employment as a recruiter and financial aid assistant, sufficiently distinct from prior public disclosures to give the court jurisdiction. The court noted the lack of temporal overlap with allegations by other ITT employees and Leveski’s more detailed allegations. View "Timothy J. Matusheski v. ITT Educational Services, Inc" on Justia Law

Triple A, a Michigan corporation, has offices in Dearborn, Michigan, the Congo (previously known as Zaire), and Sierra Leone. In 1993, Zaire ordered military equipment worth $14,070,000 from Triple A. A South Korean manufacturer shipped the equipment to Zaire at Triple A’s request. For 17 years, Triple A sought payment from Zaire and then the Congo without success. In 2010, Triple A sued the Congo for breach of contract. The district court dismissed the case, citing lack of jurisdiction under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, 28 U.S.C. 1602. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, citing the language of the Act, under which federal courts have jurisdiction “in any case in which the action is based upon” the following: [1] a commercial activity carried on in the United States by the foreign state; or [2] upon an act performed in the United States in connection with a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere; or [3] upon an act outside the territory of the United States in connection with a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere and that act causes a direct effect in the United States. View "Triple A Int'l, Inc. v. Democratic Republic of the Congo" on Justia Law

The Canal Authority appealed the district court's decision to grant summary judgment in favor of Interior, Bureau, San Luis, and Wetlands, in a suit to establish priority water rights under Central Valley Project (CVP) water service contracts. The district court granted summary judgment for defendants, holding that all claims arising before February 11, 2004 were time-barred and that Canal Authority was not entitled to priority water allocation under the CVP contracts. The court affirmed the district court's decision on the alternative basis that California Water Code 11460 did not require the Bureau to provide CVP contractors priority water rights, because contracts between the Canal Authority and Bureau contained provisions that specifically address allocation of water during shortage periods. View "Tehama-Colusa Canal Auth. v. U.S. Dept. of Interior" on Justia Law

ACT brought this suit against PCI and First National, alleging claims of breach of contract, quantum meruit, and recovery on a payment bond under the Miller Act, 40 U.S.C. 3131(b). Because United States ex rel. Celanese Coatings Co. v. Gullard was clearly irreconcilable with intervening higher authority, the court overruled it and held that the Miller Act's statute of limitations was a claim-processing rule, not a jurisdictional rule. Because nothing on the face of ACT's complaint indicated that it did not work on the project or rent equipment to PCI within one year of the date it filed the complaint, the complaint could not have been dismissed if the district court had treated the Miller Act's statute of limitations as a claim-processing rule. Accordingly, the court vacated and remanded. View "Air Control Tech. v. Pre Con Indus." on Justia Law

The 1987 Public Utilities Act, 220 ILCS 5/8-403.1, was intended to encourage development of power plants that convert solid waste to electricity. Local electric utilities were required to enter into 10-year agreements to purchase power from such plants designated as “qualified” by the Illinois Commerce Commission, at a rate exceeding that established by federal law. The state compensated electric utilities with a tax credit. A qualified facility was obliged to reimburse the state for tax credits its customers had claimed after it had repaid all of its capital costs for development and implementation. Many qualified facilities failed before they repaid their capital costs, so that Illinois never got its tax credit money back. The Act was amended in 2006, to establish a moratorium on new Qualified Facilities, provide additional grounds for disqualifying facilities from the subsidy, and expand the conditions that trigger a facility’s liability to repay electric utilities’ tax credits. The district court held that the amendment cannot be applied retroactively. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. The amendment does not clearly indicate that the new repayment conditions apply to monies received prior to the amendment and must be construed prospectively. View "Illinois v. Chiplease, Inc." on Justia Law