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• 04/26/2013
• House Resolves to Crack Down On Tax Delinquent Contractors (Again)

  After the defeat of similar legislation in the previous session of Congress, the unanimous passage of the Contracting and Tax Accountability Act of 2013 by the House of Representatives may mark a sea change in Washington’s attitude towards tax-delinquent contractors.  If approved, the Act would, with a few exceptions, prohibit the award of federal contracts above the simplified acquisition threshold to any contractor with an IRS lien for federal tax debt.  The Act is the survivor of a pair of anti-tax delinquency bills before the House; the other, a measure to prohibit federal employment for anyone with outstanding tax debt, failed to secure the necessary two-thirds approval for passage.  Yet, as the 407-0 House vote indicates, the contractor portion of the bills enjoys widespread bipartisan support.

• 04/25/2013
• Planning a Dinner Party without a Guest List

  It’s easy to imagine what a banquet hall owner would say if you asked him or her to provide a cost per-plate estimate for your next event but couldn’t say, even vaguely, how many people would be attending: “If you want your event here, you’ll have to pick a number (or at least a range!).”  Under roughly the same circumstances, though, the Federal Court of Claims in the State of North Carolina Business Enterprises case (“the NCBE case”) upheld an RFP that didn’t specify headcount and told a group of offerors that they could either bid blindly or not at all.