Task Order Charter

1. Purpose & Business Case

FOPBA's legacy benefits enrollment portal runs on an unsupported COTS platform that cannot meet current Section 508 accessibility standards or federal Authority to Operate (ATO) security requirements without significant remediation. Manual accessibility workarounds and compensating security controls have accumulated cost and risk that the agency can no longer sustain under normal operations funding.

This Task Order authorizes Acme Federal Systems, under IDIQ Contract Vehicle GS-00F-XXXX, to modernize the BenefitConnect portal: legacy data migration, a Section 508/WCAG-conformant rebuild of the citizen-facing enrollment experience, and a full ATO package to authorize the modernized system for production use. The business case is that a conformant, ATO'd platform eliminates the compensating-control cost burden, reduces the agency's accessibility-complaint exposure, and positions FOPBA to meet growing enrollment volume without a parallel increase in manual processing staff.

2. Task Order Objectives & Success Criteria

• Achieve full Section 508/VPAT conformance on the modernized portal prior to Milestone Gate 1.
• Obtain Authority to Operate (ATO) with zero open Critical/High security findings at the Milestone Gate 1 review.
• Migrate legacy applicant/enrollment data with full field-level validation prior to cutover.
• Complete the Task Order within the approved Firm-Fixed-Price value and the approved Period of Performance (Base 12 months + Option 6 months), reconciled to $0 variance on the baseline.
• Achieve a Satisfactory or better CPARS rating sufficient to justify Option Period exercise.

3. High-Level Scope

In Scope

• Legacy applicant/enrollment data migration and validation.
• Section 508/WCAG-conformant rebuild of the citizen-facing portal.
• Full ATO package: System Security Plan, Security Control Assessment, POA&M process, and supporting CDRLs.
• Cloud hosting/infrastructure setup, including disaster recovery / COOP testing.
• Multi-factor authentication and identity-assurance controls per current OMB guidance.

Out of Scope

• Any FOPBA system outside the BenefitConnect enrollment portal.
• Ongoing operations and maintenance beyond the Option Period, absent a separate follow-on Task Order.
• Policy or eligibility-rules changes not directly required by the platform modernization.

4. High-Level Requirements

• The modernized portal must achieve full Section 508/WCAG 2.1 AA conformance, independently verified by a government auditor rather than contractor self-attestation.
• The system must pass a Security Control Assessment and obtain ATO prior to production Go-Live.
• All Task Order staffing must be onshore (US-based) given the system's handling of applicant PII.
• Legacy data migration must be validated at the field level prior to cutover, with documented cleansing rules for any formatting inconsistencies found.

5. High-Level Risks

• ATO assessment could surface a security finding that delays Milestone Gate 1 (highest-rated risk at Charter approval — see RAIDD R-01).
• Legacy applicant data has known formatting inconsistencies that could complicate migration validation.
• The all-onshore staffing requirement limits surge capacity if a resource attrites mid-Option-Period, with no offshore substitution permitted regardless of severity.
• Contract modification growth over the Task Order's life could mask underlying scope creep if not actively tracked against the original PWS baseline.

6. Summary Milestone Schedule

7. Summary Budget

This is the original baseline authorized at Charter approval. See the Task Order Budget for the current, mod-adjusted value ($3,664,000 after 10 approved modifications).

8. Key Stakeholders

9. Task Order PM Authority

C. Tyrrell is hereby authorized to apply organizational resources to Task Order activities, manage the approved budget within the Firm-Fixed-Price baseline (escalating to the Contracting Officer for any change requiring a contract modification), and approve task-level schedule adjustments that do not affect a CDRL due date or Milestone Gate. Changes to scope, price, or a CDRL-mandated deliverable require a formal Contract Modification approved by the Contracting Officer — no verbal or informal scope changes are recognized under this Task Order.

10. Assumptions & Constraints

• FOPBA will provide legacy system read access within 15 days of Task Order start.
• The Option Period will be exercised based on satisfactory Base Period performance (CPARS rating of Satisfactory or better).
• No additional offshore staffing will be authorized at any point during the Option Period, consistent with the PHI/ATO onshore-only requirement.
• FOPBA's existing network and security infrastructure is sufficient to support the modernized portal without a separate agency capital investment.

11. Approval

This charter authorizes the Task Order PM to proceed with planning and execution of the BenefitConnect Portal Modernization Task Order as described above.