Alston & Bird Government Contracts Blog

Advice to Contractors & Grant Recipients

Andy Howard and Jessica Sharron on “The False Claims Act: Recent Trends and Hot Topics” – A Webinar

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On January 27, 2016, Alston & Bird’s Andy Howard and Jessica Sharron presented a live webinar titled “The False Claims Act: Recent Trends and Hot Topics” in connection with Lorman Education Services. In this 90-minute session, the attorneys covered recent developments in False Claims Act (FCA) law; the state of attorney-client privilege in FCA whistleblower (“qui tam”) lawsuits; the growing use of civil investigative demands (CIDs) and how to survive CID audits and investigations, workforce training, and FCA claim mitigation techniques; and the disagreement in various federal appeals [...]Read more

Women-Owned Small Businesses and Sole Source Contracts

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President Obama’s administration has made it a priority to meet the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) prime and subcontracting goals, which include metrics relating to the percentage of government contracts awarded to small businesses, women-owned small businesses (WOSB), small disadvantaged businesses, service disabled veteran-owned small businesses, and historically underutilized business zones. Although in fiscal years 2013 and 2014 government agencies met or exceeded their prime contracting goals for small businesses in general, they did not achieve their goals for WOSBs. One way to [...]Read more

Proposed Rule Requires Prime Contractor to Report Late or Reduced Payments to Small Business Subcontractors

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On January 20, 2016, the Department of Defense, General Services Administration, and NASA issued a proposed rule to amend the FAR and implement a section of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010. This proposed rule, which will implement Section 1334 of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 and the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) implementation of Section 1334, requires that, among other things, a prime contractor (1) notify the contracting officer, in writing, if the contractor makes a reduced or untimely payment to a small business subcontractor; and (2) disclose the reasons for the reduced [...]Read more

Jeff Belkin Quoted on the U.S. Supreme Court Case Kingdomware Technologies, Inc. v. United States

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On November 5, 2015, Jeff Belkin was quoted in Law360 in connection with the Kingdomware case. Belkin was again quoted on December 1, 2015, in Law.com on the same case. At issue for the Court is whether the Federal Circuit court erred in construing 38 U.S.C. § 8127(d)’s mandatory set-aside as discretionary. Subsections (b), (c), and (d) of 38 U.S.C. § 8127 provide authority for the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) contracting officers to restrict competition and make awards directly to service-disabled veteran-owned small business (SDVOSB) and veteran-owned small business (VOSB) firms, [...]Read more