GSA Issues Sources Sought Notices for San Luis POE

By Tasha Anderson for AZBEX 
The General Services Administration (GSA) recently issued two Sources Sought notices for the San Luis I Land Port of Entry Expansion and Modernization project. 
The sources sought notices are for architectural, engineering, construction, and other related services as well as construction management services. The GSA is looking specifically for small business firms interested in providing those services. 
The San Luis I Land Port of Entry, located on 12.1 acres at the intersection of Highway 95 and the International Border with Mexico in San Luis, “is the second busiest non-commercial land port of entry in Arizona and processes more than 3 million POVs and 2.5 million pedestrians each year,” according to the sources sought notices. 
With the anticipation of a steady rise in those numbers and the age and declining structural quality of the current facility, a project involving the renovation of existing facilities and construction of new ones is being proposed. 
The GSA notes the scope of work to include the expansion and modernization of the existing POE, including relocated, expanded, and new travel lanes; inspection facilities, headhouse building, main building, family/UAC holding building, processing building and canopies; seizure vault and impound lot; parking; site development and infrastructure; and additional work. 
According to the project page on the GSA website, a master plan will be created for the project with the work being broken into two phases. “Phase I will include site development and infrastructure, expanded northbound (NB) privately owned vehicle (POV) lanes, NB primary and preprimary inspection canopies, associated NB secondary processing, expanded southbound (SB) POV lanes, SB primary and secondary inspection and processing building, parking and more. Phase II will focus on pedestrian, administrative, and other facilities.” 
Under the architectural engineering, and construction notice, other services could include site planning, utility relocation, testing and inspection during construction, and commissioning. Under the construction management notice, the services are expected to include design review, cost estimating, project management, construction administration and observation, project commissioning and closeout. 
According to the notices, the small business sources must be under, “NAICS code 236220 Commercial and Institutional Building Construction” and the size standard is $39.5M. The same rules also apply to joint ventures. 
All interested firms must submit their responses by 4:00 p.m. PST on Friday, January 22nd, 2021. The GSA expects to award a contract some time in Q2 2021. 
Preservation of Funding 
A December 14th, 2020 article published by the Yuma Sun noted that a proposal in the Senate Appropriations Committee was looking to postpone funding for the Port of Entry improvements until at least 2022.  
In 2019, Congress allocated $152.4M to create the additional car lanes and earmarked another $90M for more improvements. San Luis officials were lobbying to preserve that funding in this year’s federal budget as any delay in the expansion would only drive up the cost, the article stated.