Supreme Court of Alabama

Case no.: SC-2025-0511
Date filed: December 12, 2025

The Alabama Supreme Court has ordered a lower court to hear a protest on the exclusion of a bid for the bidder’s failure to include a duplicate original bid form. The bid was alleged to be $750,000 lower than the low posted bid.

The Armory Commission of Alabama solicited bids for construction of the Huntsville Readiness Center. At the prebid meeting, the commission’s contracting officer informed bidders the commission wanted two original bid forms to be submitted.

Nearen Construction Company LLC alleged that it submitted only one original bid form due to an oversight. The commission’s contracting officer excluded the bid from consideration. He also refused to read the bid publicly or post it on the bid tabulation abstract.

Nearen contended that its bid otherwise conformed to all requirements of the solicitation. The contractor was a qualified responsible bidder and had recently completed a readiness center for the commission in another community. Nearen said its bid was more than $750,000 lower than the low posted bid and should have been considered notwithstanding the minor deviation of not including a second original bid form.

Nearen exhausted its administrative bid protest avenues with the commission and filed suit in the Montgomery County Circuit Court, seeking an injunction against contract award pending a judicial determination of the low responsive bid on the project. The commission moved to dismiss Nearen’s suit. The court sided with the commission, and Nearen Construction appealed.

The Supreme Court of Alabama said the state public works statute requires contract award to the lowest responsible and responsive bidder. The statute specifically states, “A responsive bidder is one who submits a bid that complies with the terms and conditions of the invitation for bids. Minor irregularities in the bid shall not defeat responsiveness.” Ala. Code 1975, section 39-2-6(a).

The court noted Nearen had not had the opportunity to establish the facts supporting its allegation that it had been the lowest responsible, responsive bidder. The circuit court had dismissed the suit without considering the merits. This had been error. The high court reversed the dismissal and remanded the matter to the circuit court.

“In viewing the allegations in Nearen’s complaint most strongly in its favor…. Nearen’s failure to include a second completed bid form was a minor irregularity that does not defeat the adequacy of the entire bid. Although the parties dispute who has the discretion to determine what a minor irregularity is, at this stage of the proceedings this Court’s task is not to make such a determination; rather, our task is to assess the sufficiency of the pleadings to determine whether Nearen might succeed if the allegations in the complaint are factually established and if, under the law, those established facts would entitle it to relief.”

There is no indication of the dealings between the commission and this bidder on the recently completed project. That history may offer some insight as to why the commission seemingly went out of its way to exclude the bid despite the $750,000 price spread.

This case illustrates the importance of assiduous attention to detail during bid preparation and submittal. If the public project owner was in fact prejudiced against the bidder, the bidder should have gone out of its way to avoid any excuse for bid exclusion or rejection.

Participants: No attorneys of record listed

Before: Judges Sellers, Stewart, Wise, Mendheim, and Cook

Opinion by: Judge Sellers

Outcome: Lower court reversed; matter remanded

Source: Please click here to read the complete opinion.