Administrative Law Judge Marie Alalilima has pushed back till next week a hearing on ASG’s motion to dismiss the appeal filed by Klaod Solutions LLC over the award of the TalofaPass system contract to Hawaii company Datahouse Consulting Inc.
The hearing had been scheduled for this past Monday but is now set for January 31st.
Klaod Solutions has filed a brief in opposition to the motion to dismiss contending that the ALJ has jurisdiction to hear its appeal.
The government had argued that the appellant had failed to fulfill the second step of the law which is for the Governor to send the appeal of the Chief Procurement Officer’s decision in this award to the ALJ.
Klaod Solutions says while the ALJ did rule it did not have jurisdiction to hear appeals in two recent decisions that the government cited in its motion to dismiss, the same court heard a case which was filed directly with the ALJ and did not go first to the Governor and then submitted to the ALJ.
The appellant also cites a notice of a proposed amendment to the ALJ statute to remove the requirement for the Governor to submit appeals of CPO decisions to the ALJ.
In mid-October 2021 the Government posted to its official website a Notice of Intended Action relating to the amendment of A.S.A.C. 1,0.0282(c).1
The Notice said: “A’S.C.A. S 10.0282 was promulgated in 1984. Since then the legislature passed the Administrative Law Judge Act of 1998 which included A.S.C.A. S 4.0604 which gives the Administrative Law Judge the jurisdiction to ‘Take appeals of procurement officer’s final decision in u procurement bidding dispute as described in section 10.0282 A.S.C.A.[sic) s 4.0604(f) further states,’The Governor’s authority to appoint a three member board to hear disputes of matters pertaining to procurement disputes is hereby repealed.”
The appellant says, lIn order to carry out the Legislature’s instruction to mandate the repeal , the Office of procurement irrtends to amend A.S.A.C. S 10.0282 as follows:
‘1.0.0282 Disputes and appeals. ..
(c) Appeals. Appeals of a procurement officer’s final decision in a dispute may be made within 60 days of the date of the decision, provided such appeal is submitted in writing to the Administrative Law judge.”
Klaod Solutions asks that in the alternative, the ALJ stay the proceedings until the referral of Appellant’s appeal by the Governor.
It argues that dismissal of this case at this stage would only mean refilling at a later date which woukd “needlessly expend this tribunal’s, and the parties’ resources.”
