Tetra Tech loses EPA protest over technician the agency already approved

Tetra Tech learned the hard way that the government’s approval on an incumbent contract does not mean anything when the work is recompeted.

The Government Accountability Office has denied the company’s protest of an Environmental Protection Agency contract awarded went to Weston Solutions.

Tetra Tech was the incumbent on the Superfund Technical Assessment and Response Team VI contract, but its proposal for START VII was found to be unacceptable because it did not meet the requirements for key personnel.

EPA required bidders to propose eight qualified environmental technicians. The solicitation included minimum education and experience requirements.

One of those qualifications was a bachelor of science degree in environmental science.

A technician at Tetra Tech was rejected because she had a bachelor of arts degree, not a bachelor of science, and only about two months of experience.

In its proposal, Tetra Tech said the agency had recently approved the person to work on the current version of START.

Tetra Tech argued that because evaluators knew EPA had already approved her for the same position, they had no basis to find her unqualified.

While that seems logical, GAO said that the solicitation had clear qualification requirements.

There is no requirement in the RFP for EPA to consider performance on the current contract as a “substitute for meeting the position’s minimum qualification requirements,” GAO said.

GAO also rejected Tetra Tech’s argument that EPA needs to justify both the difference in treatment from the agency’s approval of the technician under the incumbent contract and its rejection of the same person for the new contract.

There is nothing to reconcile, according to Tetra Tech. One decision is a matter of contract administration, while the other is the evaluation of a proposal.

But GAO pushed back and pointed out that Tetra Tech “did not meaningfully dispute” that the person failed to meet the solicitation’s minimum requirements.

Tetra Tech was not in line for the award because its proposal was unacceptable under the key personnel factor, the most important in the evaluation. That sunk the rest of Tetra Tech's protest.

GAO dismissed Tetra Tech's challenges to its past performance evaluation and the best-value decision, ruling that the company was not an interested party.

This was Tetra Tech's second protest of the award. EPA first picked Weston in November 2025, then took corrective action after Tetra Tech protested. EPA named a new evaluation team, but the result was the same.

Given GAO’s ruling, the lesson is pretty clear: Each procurement stands on its own and every resume has to be checked against the new solicitation.