Review of High-Risk Solicitations and Contracts

As of July 1, 2019, the General Assembly added a provision to the Virginia Public Procurement Act requiring review of solicitations and contracts defined as high risk.  By statute, a "high risk” contract is defined as one of the following:

1. A contract which is anticipated to cost in excess of $10 million over its initial term, or
2. A contract which is anticipated to cost in excess of $5 million over the its initial term of the contract and meets at least one of the following criteria:

• the goods, services, insurance, or construction that is the subject of the contract is being procured by two or more state public bodies; or
• the anticipated term of the initial contract, excluding renewals, is greater than five years; or
• the state public body procuring the goods, services, insurance, or construction has not procured similar goods, services, insurance, or construction within the last five years.

There are two points in the procurement process when a review by the Office must be requested:  prior to issuance of the solicitation for a high-risk contract, the solicitation must be submitted for review; and prior to award of a high-risk contract, the proposed contract must be submitted for review.  Additionally, for high-risk contracts awarded prior to July 1, 2019, if the contract has two or more remaining renewal provisions, the contract must be submitted for renew prior to exercising a renewal.

To request a review, complete the required form (available here).  The completed form, along with all documents comprising the solicitation or contract, should be emailed to your assigned agency counsel at the Office, with a copy to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The high-risk contracting statute allows the Office 30 business days to complete the review.  The 30-day review period will begin once OAG has received the completed submission and review form and all documents necessary to complete the review.  We will make every effort to complete reviews as quickly as is practicable.  Agencies should consider this when planning their timelines.  Note that where agencies are also required to obtain a review by DGS or VITA, that request should be sent separately to the applicable reviewing agency.