Under Contract

• The National Institutes of Health is paying the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill up to $28 million to provide the space and researchers for the continuation of a multiyear study on the low rate at which Hispanics die from heart and pulmonary diseases. Researchers will look at patients’ medical data, as well as the impact of access to care, socioeconomic factors, risk behavior, cultural values and the “protective factors related to migrating,” and the length of time subjects have lived in the United States.

• The U.S. Agency for International Development began a $24 million contract last week with the Research Triangle Institute (RTI) to assist its mission to help the government of Malawi improve reading comprehension scores. Most people in Malawi remain unable to answer basic questions or identify any letters in the three most common languages spoken in the country, which are Chichewa, Tumbuka and Yao.

{mosads}• The energy office within the Defense Logistics Agency has contracted with Precision Planning and Simulations to provide “oil spill response training.” Over the course of the multiyear, $2.3 million contract, training and tabletop exercises will ensure that workers know how to respond to spills. Year one, the plan covers a small, 2,100-gallon or 50-barrel spill, and gets subsequently more difficult; in year three, students respond to a “worse case discharge” — or one exceeding 36,000 gallons, or 1,200 barrels. A law from 1990 requires agencies and corporations to have the emergency plans in place.

• The U.S. Court of Federal Claims awarded a $2.1 million contract to For the Record, a family-owned business in Maryland, to provide court transcript services. In the yearlong agreement, the government says as many as 10 court reporters need to be available at any time, but no more than three are usually used concurrently. Though most of the cases take place in Washington, D.C., travel may be necessary, the documents say.

Contract information compiled from General Services Administration data and government press releases. Send announcements about government contracts to mwilson@digital-staging.thehill.com.