September 18, 2006 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The interpretations in this Staff Accounting Bulletin express the staff's views regarding the process of quantifying financial statement misstatements. The staff is aware of diversity in practice. For example, certain registrants do not consider the effects of prior year errors on current year financial statements, thereby allowing improper assets or liabilities to remain unadjusted. While these errors may not be material if considered only in relation to the balance sheet, correcting the errors could be material to the current year income statement. Certain registrants have proposed to the staff that allowing these errors to remain on the balance sheet as assets or liabilities in perpetuity is an appropriate application of generally accepted accounting principles. The staff believes that approach is not in the best interest of the users of financial statements. The interpretations in this Staff Accounting Bulletin are being issued to address diversity in practice in quantifying financial statement misstatements and the potential under current practice for the build up of improper amounts on the balance sheet.

We, OSM, are announcing the receipt of a proposed amendment to the West Virginia Abandoned Mine Land Reclamation (AMLR) Plan under the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 (SMCRA or the Act). The proposed amendment makes numerous revisions throughout the State's AMLR Plan. The amendment is intended to update and improve the effectiveness of the West Virginia AMLR Plan. This document gives the times and locations that the West Virginia AMLR Plan and proposed amendment is available for your inspection, the comment period during which you may submit written comments, and the procedures that will be followed for the public hearing, if one is requested.

We are approving an amendment to the Colorado abandoned mine land reclamation (AMLR) plan (hereinafter referred to as the ``Colorado plan'') under the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 (SMCRA or the Act).

The Office of Personnel Management is issuing final regulations to provide Federal agencies with the authority to grant a newly appointed or reappointed employee credit for prior work experience that otherwise would not be creditable for the purpose of determining the employee's annual leave accrual rate. An agency may use this authority to recruit an individual with the skills and experience necessary to achieve an important agency mission or performance goal.

The FAA issues these special conditions for Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation Model G150 airplanes modified by Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation, Dallas, Texas. These modified airplanes will have novel or unusual design features when compared with the state of technology envisioned in the airworthiness standards for transport category airplanes. The modification consists of installing an electronic laser inertial reference system. The applicable airworthiness regulations do not contain adequate or appropriate safety standards for protecting these systems from effects of high-intensity radiated fields (HIRF). These special conditions contain the additional safety standards that the Administrator considers necessary to establish a level of safety equivalent to that established by the existing airworthiness standards.

This amendment amends Standard Instrument Approach Procedures (SIAPs) for operations at certain airports. These regulatory actions are needed because of changes occurring in the National Airspace System, such as the commissioning of new navigational facilities, addition of new obstacles, or changes in air traffic requirements. These changes are designed to provide safe and efficient use of the navigable airspace and to promote safe flight operations under instrument flight rules at the affected airports.

As part of a comprehensive plan for reducing the serious risk of rollover crashes and the risk of death and serious injury in those crashes, this document proposes to establish a new Federal motor vehicle safety standard (FMVSS) No. 126 to require electronic stability control (ESC) systems on passenger cars, multipurpose vehicles, trucks and buses with a gross vehicle weight rating of 4,536 Kg (10,000 pounds) or less. ESC systems use automatic computer-controlled braking of individual wheels to assist the driver in maintaining control in critical driving situations in which the vehicle is beginning to lose directional stability at the rear wheels (spin out) or directional control at the front wheels (plow out). Based on our own crash data studies, NHTSA estimates that the installation of ESC will reduce single-vehicle crashes of passenger cars by 34 percent and single vehicle crashes of sport utility vehicles (SUVs) by 59 percent, with a much greater reduction of rollover crashes. Preventing single-vehicle loss-of-control crashes is the most effective way to reduce deaths resulting from rollover crashes. This is because most loss of control crashes culminate in the vehicle leaving the roadway, which dramatically increases the probability of a rollover. NHTSA estimates that ESC has the potential to prevent 71 percent of passenger car rollovers and 84 percent of SUV rollovers in single-vehicle crashes. NHTSA estimates that ESC would save 5,300 to 10,300 lives and prevent 168,000 to 252,000 injuries in all types of crashes annually if all light vehicles on the road were equipped with ESC systems. ESC systems would substantially reduce (by 4,200 to 5,400) of the more than 10,000 deaths each year on American roads resulting from rollover crashes. About 29 percent of model year (MY) 2006 light vehicles sold in the U.S. were equipped with ESC, and manufacturers intend to increase the number of ESC installations in light vehicles to 71 percent by MY 2011. This rule would require a 100 percent installation rate for ESC by MY 2012 (with exceptions for some vehicles manufactured in stages or by small volume manufacturers). Of the overall projected annual 5,300 to 10,300 highway deaths and 168,000 to 252,000 injuries prevented, we would attribute 1,536 to 2,211 prevented fatalities (including 1,161 to 1,445 involving rollover) to this proposed rulemaking, in addition to the prevention of 50,594 to 69,630 injuries.