Court Opinion

ID: 9795923
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 03:42:30.995843+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:41:10.799760
License: Public Domain

FABE, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with the court’s conclusion that procurement officials are entitled only to qualified immunity. I write separately to express my view that the exclusive remedy provision of the procurement code may bar lawsuits such as this one. Under the exclusive remedy provision, the procurement code and its implementing regulations “provide the exclusive procedure for asserting a claim against an agency arising in relation to a procurement.”1 Claims against procurement officials in their individual capacity for performing usual and proper duties might fairly be characterized as “claim[s] against an agency,” even where bad faith is alleged; they would thus be barred by the exclusive remedy provision.2 In this lawsuit, Ba-chner’s allegations of misconduct — improperly scoring proposals, improperly overseeing the scoring process, and improperly deciding to proceed with a contract award — all relate to the usual and proper duties of procurement officials.3 However, the ease is before us on a limited petition for review. We are not presented with the question of the scope of the exclusive remedy provision, nor asked to decide whether it bars this lawsuit. Therefore, I concur with the court’s opinion.

. AS 36.30.690.

. See J & S Servs., Inc. v. Tomter, 139 P.3d 544, 548 (Alaska 2006) (suggesting that "claims against ... a procurement officer acting within the course and scope of his duties” would appear to be barred by the exclusive remedy provision).

.These allegations are distinguishable from those in / & S Services, where we held that the exclusive remedy provision did not necessarily bar a lawsuit against a procurement official in his individual capacity. Id. at 547, 549, 552. There, the procurement official was alleged to have actively assisted the winning bidder (a company formed by one of his friends) and made arrangements to receive kickbacks from the winning bidder.