Los Alamos National Laboratory. Courtesy photo

Editor’s note: The Centerra Group has taken over the secuirty contract at LANL, however, the protest of this decision by previous contractor SOC remains active.

Los Alamos National Laboratory notified its workforce of more than 10,000 people Tuesday that a new contractor, the Centerra Group, had taken over the protective force responsibilities at the laboratory. At about the same time, from company headquarters in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., Centerra announced that it had been selected to manage a five-year security contract at the Northern New Mexico nuclear weapons laboratory.

Centerra, a global security provider formerly known as Wackenhutt, succeeds SOC, also an international security company, formerly Protective Technology of Los Alamos.The selection had been announced originally Sept. 11, 2015, when a transition period began aiming for a Dec. 1, 2015 transfer date. Meanwhile the departing contractor protested the decision, leading to a degree of uncertainty in the process until the original outcome was affirmed on Tuesday.

The LANL announcement said the transition period had been smooth and complemented Centerra for their professionalism. “We greatly appreciate the professionalism that Centerra has demonstrated during this contract transition,” said Mike Lansing, Associate Director for Mission Assurance, Security and Emergency Response. “Both the laboratory and NNSA would like to express their sincere thanks to SOC, the previous contractor, for 18 years of excellent service to the laboratory and the nation.”

Centerra said they had coordinated efforts with the outgoing contractor and with Los Alamos National Security, the partnership that manages and operates the lab, in order to maintain existing protective force personnel. They said they had been able to retain nearly 90 percent of the work force.

Andrea Romero, executive director of the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities said today that their organization has not been able to obtain specific information about the terms of the contract and has requested a community liaison to provide an introductory briefing at a future meeting.

“We would like to know how much the contract was worth, what the bid was,” she said, noting that the previous contract was said to be about $251 million a year. “What are the projections on hiring? How are the things we value as a community?”

The organization discussed issues related to the contract award and the protest that was under review at the time of their Nov. 13 meeting in Hernandez, N.M. The board approved a letter of concern to NNSA Administrator General Frank Klotz seeking assurances that terms and levels of employment would be maintained.

Centerra continues to add to its portfolio of defense-related and government departments and other high security agencies. Current DOE clients include Nevada Test Site and Savannah River Site.

“We will share with LANS all best practices and lessons learned from the accumulation of these five decades of adaptive change to ensure we support their critical priorities,” Centerra President & CEO Paul Donahue said.