July 2008 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The General Services Administration (GSA) is proposing to amend the General Services Acquisition Regulation (GSAR) to update the text addressing foreign acquisition. This rule is a result of the General Services Administration Acquisition Manual (GSAM) Rewrite initiative undertaken by GSA to revise the GSAM to maintain consistency with the FAR, and to implement streamlined and innovative acquisition procedures that contractors, offerors and GSA contracting personnel can utilize when entering into and administering contractual relationships. The GSAM incorporates the General Services Administration Acquisition Regulation (GSAR) as well as internal agency acquisition policy. GSA will rewrite each part of the GSAR and GSAM, and as each part is rewritten, will publish it in the Federal Register. This part is a continuance in a series of revisions. It covers the rewrite of GSAR Part 525, Foreign Acquisition.

The Department of the Treasury, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed and continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, 44 U.S.C. 3507. The Office of Thrift Supervision within the Department of the Treasury will submit the proposed information collection requirement described below to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. Today, OTS is soliciting public comments on its proposal to extend this information collection.

This rule proposes to change the rules and procedures concerning the standards of representation and professional conduct for attorneys and other practitioners who appear before the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), which includes the immigration judges and the Board of Immigration Appeals (Board), and to clarify who is authorized to represent and appear on behalf of individuals in proceedings before the Board and the immigration judges. Current regulations set forth who may represent individuals in proceedings before EOIR and also set forth the rules and procedures for imposing disciplinary sanctions against attorneys or other practitioners who engage in criminal, unethical, frivolous, or unprofessional conduct before EOIR. The proposed revisions would increase the number of grounds for discipline and improve the clarity and uniformity of the existing rules while incorporating miscellaneous technical and procedural changes. The changes proposed herein are based upon the Attorney General's recent initiative for improving the adjudicatory processes for the immigration judges and the Board, as well as EOIR's operational experience in administering the disciplinary program since the current process was established in 2000.

This notice announces EPA's order for the amendments to terminate certain uses, voluntarily requested by the registrant and accepted by the Agency, of products containing the pesticide disulfoton, pursuant to section 6(f)(1) of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), as amended. This termination order follows a May 21, 2008 Federal Register Notice of Receipt of Requests from the disulfoton technical registrant to voluntarily amend to terminate certain uses of their disulfoton product registrations. The request included termination of all disulfoton use on barley and wheat. Additionally, the use of the granular formulation of disulfoton, Di-Syston 15G (EPA Reg. No. 264-723), on broccoli and commercial ornamentals is being terminated. This order also terminates the use of Di-Syston 15G and the emulsifiable concentrate formulation of disulfoton, Di-Syston 8 EC, (EPA Reg. No. 264-734) on potatoes. This order also amends the disulfoton technical product registration (EPA Reg. No. 264-734) to terminate potato, barley, and wheat uses. These are not the last disulfoton uses or products registered in the United States. In the May 21, 2008 notice, EPA indicated that it would issue an order implementing the amendments to terminate uses, unless the Agency received substantive comments within the 30 day comment period that would merit its further review of these requests, or unless the registrant withdrew their requests within this period. The Agency received comments on the notice but none merited its further review of the requests. The comments received by the Agency are described in Unit III. of this notice. Further, the registrant did not withdraw their requests. Accordingly, EPA hereby issues in this notice a cancellation order granting the requested amendments to terminate uses. Any distribution, sale, or use of the disulfoton products subject to this cancellation order is permitted only in accordance with the terms of this order, including any existing stocks provisions.

We are adopting a new airworthiness directive (AD) for certain Hawker Beechcraft Corporation Model 390 airplanes. This AD requires you to repetitively do a post-flight check (owner/operator holding at least a private pilot certificate checking for residual heat in the angle-of- attack (AOA) probes or an appropriately-rated mechanic doing a maintenance manual operational test of the heat of the AOA probes) after every flight and replace or modify (upload software) the stall warning AOA transmitters. This AD results from reports of the potential for unannunciated loss of the heating function in the left-hand (LH) and right-hand (RH) stall warning AOA transmitters of Model 390 airplanes. We are issuing this AD to correct potentially inadequate stall warning with loss of stick pusher function.

The Department of Defense is publishing the unclassified text of a section 36(b)(1) arms sales notification. This is published to fulfill the requirements of section 155 of Public Law 104-164 dated 21 July 1996.

We are adopting a new airworthiness directive (AD) for BHTC Model 430 helicopters. This AD results from mandatory continuing airworthiness information (MCAI) originated by an aviation authority of another country to identify and correct an unsafe condition on an aviation product. The aviation authority of Canada, with which we have a bilateral agreement, states in the MCAI: ``It has been determined that the existing rigging procedures for the tail rotor pitch change mechanism have to be changed due to possibility of parts interference.'' The cumulative effect of individual part tolerances resulting in the total assemblage of those parts being out of tolerance could result in the tail rotor yoke striking another part other than the flapping stop (parts interference) cited in the MCAI. Also, the misalignment of the tail rotor counterweight bellcrank may result in higher tail rotor pedal forces and a higher pilot workload after failure of the 1 hydraulic system. Both parts interference and the misaligned counterweight bellcrank create an unsafe condition. This AD require actions that are intended to address these unsafe conditions.

We are adopting a new airworthiness directive (AD) for Eurocopter Deutschland GMBH (Eurocopter) Model MBB-BK 117C-2 helicopters. This AD results from mandatory continuing airworthiness information (MCAI) originated by an aviation authority of another country to identify and correct an unsafe condition on an aviation product. The European Aviation Safety Agency for the Republic of Germany, with which we have a bilateral agreement, states in the MCAI:

This is Notice of Bull Mountain Coal Properties Coal Lease Application MTM 97988 for certain coal resources within the Bull Mountain Mine. The land included in Coal Lease Application MTM 97988 is located in Musselshell County, Montana, and is described as follows:

The Board is proposing to amend Regulation C (Home Mortgage Disclosure) to revise the rules for reporting price information on higher-priced loans. The rules would be conformed to the definition of ``higher-priced mortgage loan'' adopted by the Board under Regulation Z (Truth in Lending) contemporaneously with this proposal. Regulation C currently requires lenders to report the spread between the annual percentage rate (APR) on a loan and the yield on Treasury securities of comparable maturity if the spread meets or exceeds 3.0 percentage points for a first-lien loan (or 5.0 percentage points for a subordinate-lien loan). Under the proposal, a lender would report the spread between the loan's APR and a survey-based estimate of rates currently offered on prime mortgage loans of a comparable type if the spread meets or exceeds 1.5 percentage points for a first-lien loan (or 3.5 percentage points for a subordinate-lien loan).

This advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) presents information relevant to, and solicits public comment on, how to respond to the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Massachusetts v. EPA. In that case, the Supreme Court ruled that the Clean Air Act (CAA or Act) authorizes regulation of greenhouse gases (GHGs) because they meet the definition of air pollutant under the Act. In view of the potential ramifications of a decision to regulate GHGs under the Act, the notice reviews the various CAA provisions that may be applicable to regulate GHGs, examines the issues that regulating GHGs under those provisions may raise, provides information regarding potential regulatory approaches and technologies for reducing GHG emissions, and raises issues relevant to possible legislation and the potential for overlap between legislation and CAA regulation. In addition, the notice describes and solicits comment on petitions the Agency has received to regulate GHG emissions from ships, aircraft and nonroad vehicles such as farm and construction equipment. Finally, the notice discusses several other actions concerning stationary sources for which EPA has received comment regarding the regulation of GHG emissions. The implications of a decision to regulate GHGs under the Act are so far-reaching that a number of other federal agencies have offered critical comments and raised serious questions during interagency review of EPA's ANPR. Rather than attempt to forge a consensus on matters of great complexity, controversy, and active legislative debate, the Administrator has decided to publish the views of other agencies and to seek comment on the full range of issues that they raise. These comments appear in the Supplemental Information, below, followed by the June 17 draft of the ANPR preamble prepared by EPA, to which the comments apply. None of these documents represents a policy decision by the EPA, but all are intended to advance the public debate and to help inform the federal government's decisions regarding climate change.

NMFS is prohibiting directed fishing for Pacific ocean perch by trawl catcher vessels participating in the rockfish entry level fishery in the Central Regulatory Area of the Gulf of Alaska (GOA). This action is necessary to prevent exceeding the 2008 total allowable catch (TAC) of Pacific ocean perch allocated to trawl catcher vessels participating in the rockfish entry level fishery in the Central Regulatory Area of the GOA.

This document makes a correction to a proposed airworthiness directive (AD), which was published in the Federal Register on July 3, 2008 (73 FR 38160), and applies to certain Stemme GmbH & Co. KG (Stemme) Model S10-VT powered sailplanes. This document proposed to require replacement of the single ear clamps in the fuel system with improved design parts. The FAA incorrectly referenced the docket number of this proposed AD as ``FAA-2008-0685'' instead of ``FAA-2008-0788.'' This document corrects the docket number.

This notice announces actions taken by the FHWA and other Federal agencies that are final within the meaning of 23 U.S.C. 139(l)(1). These actions relate to the proposed replacement of the existing non-standard connector, from the southbound San Diego Freeway (Interstate-405 PM 39.4/40.5) to the northbound Ventura Freeway (U.S. Highway-101 PM 17.0/19.4), with an upgraded connector. The new 50 mph two-lane connector would replace the current 20 mph single-lane connector. The project area is located in the communities of Encino and Sherman Oaks, in the City of Los Angeles, in the County of Los Angeles, in the State of California.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) announces approval of Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) Publication 198-1, The Keyed-Hash Message Authentication Code (HMAC), a revision of FIPS 198. The FIPS specifies a mechanism for message authentication using cryptographic hash functions in federal information systems. The technical information about the security provided by the HMAC algorithm, and the length limit and security implications of truncated HMAC outputs have been removed from the revised standard. This information may need frequent updating, and its removal from the specification will enable NIST to employ a more effective process for keeping the information current. NIST will provide specific guidelines about the security provided by the HMAC and the use of truncation techniques for it in Special Publication (SP) 800-17, which can be updated in a timely manner as the technical conditions change.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is requesting comments relevant to the implementation of section 912 of the Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (FDAAA). Section 912 of FDAAA establishes section 301(ll) in the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the act), which prohibits the interstate shipment of certain foods to which an approved drug or a licensed biological product has been added. Section 301(ll) also prohibits the interstate shipment of foods containing an added drug or a biological product that has been the subject of substantial clinical investigations, the existence of which has been made public. FDA requests that interested persons submit data, information, and comments that will help provide a context for the agency's decisions on implementation of this provision. To encourage responsive comments, FDA is including a series of questions for interested persons to consider in preparing comments.