July 13, 2012 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This document amends the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) regulations concerning the standards of ethical conduct and related responsibilities of its employees by adding a new subpart for VA's Core Values and Characteristics. These foundational values and organizational characteristics define VA employees and articulate what VA stands for, respectively, and they are a set of guidelines that will be applied Department-wide to all VA employees. This final rule establishes VA's Core Values and Characteristics, and ensures their proper application to the VA workforce.

The Postal Service proposes to amend the rules concerning the manufacture and distribution of postage evidencing systems to clarify that effective January 1, 2016, all postage evidencing systems (postage meters and PC Postage[supreg] products) will be required to produce Information-Based Indicia (IBI) or Intelligent Mail[supreg] Indicia (IMI) for evidence of pre-paid postage, and that indicia from noncompliant systems will not be recognized as valid postage.

FinCEN is announcing the first in an intended series of public hearings to continue gathering information on its Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) on Customer Due Diligence (CDD) Requirements for Financial Institutions, published in the Federal Register on March 5, 2012.\1\ In particular, FinCEN seeks further clarification on the issues described in this Notice. FinCEN invites various components of the law enforcement and regulatory communities to participate. In addition, FinCEN invites other interested parties, including industry representatives, to attend and/or provide comments at this first public hearing, to be held on July 31, 2012 at the U.S. Department of the Treasury building in Washington, DC FinCEN will also provide information in this Notice about how to submit comments and/or attend the hearing and what procedures to follow to submit information to the Treasury Department to obtain entry to the hearing site.

The OCC, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on a continuing information collection, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995. An agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a respondent is not required to respond to, an information collection unless it displays a currently valid OMB control number. The OCC is soliciting comment concerning its information collection titled, ``Procedures to Enhance the Accuracy and Integrity of Information Furnished to Consumer Reporting Agencies under Section 312 of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACT Act).'' The OCC is also giving notice that it has submitted this collection to OMB for review.

This rule identifies communities where the sale of flood insurance has been authorized under the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) that are scheduled for suspension on the effective dates listed within this rule because of noncompliance with the floodplain management requirements of the program. If the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) receives documentation that the community has adopted the required floodplain management measures prior to the effective suspension date given in this rule, the suspension will not occur and a notice of this will be provided by publication in the Federal Register on a subsequent date.

BOEM announces the availability of the Proposed Final Five Year OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2012-2017 (PFP). This is the third and last proposal that is part of the multi-step process required by law before the Secretary of the Interior may approve a new Five Year Program. BOEM is publishing a Notice of Availability of the Five Year Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement concurrently with this notice. Pursuant to section 18 of the OCS Lands Act, this PFP was submitted to the President and Congress. After a period of at least 60 days from the date it was submitted to the President and Congress, the Secretary may approve the program, at which time it will become effective.

This document amends U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) regulations to reflect the extension of import restrictions on Pre- Classical and Classical archaeological objects and Byzantine ecclesiastical and ritual ethnological materials from Cyprus. These restrictions, which were last extended by CBP Dec. 07-52, are due to expire on July 16, 2012, unless extended. The Assistant Secretary for Educational and Cultural Affairs, United States Department of State, has determined to extend the bilateral Agreement between the Republic of Cyprus and the United States to continue the imposition of import restrictions on cultural property from Cyprus. The Designated List of cultural property described in CBP Dec. 07-52 is revised in this document to reflect that the types of ecclesiastical and ritual ethnological articles dating from the Byzantine period previously listed on the CBP Dec. 07-52 Designated List as protected are now protected also if dating from the Post-Byzantine period (c. 1500 A.D. to 1850 A.D.) The revised Designated List also clarifies that certain mosaics of stone and wall hangings (specifically, to include images of Saints among images of Christ, Archangels, and the Apostles) are covered under the import restrictions published today. The import restrictions imposed on the archaeological and ethnological materials covered under the Agreement will remain in effect for a 5-year period, and the CBP regulations are being amended accordingly. These restrictions are being extended pursuant to determinations of the State Department under the terms of the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act in accordance with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA or the Agency) is adding some new data elements and revising some existing data elements on the Emergency and Hazardous Chemical Inventory Forms (Tier I and Tier II) under Section 312 of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA). State and local implementing agencies requested that EPA add the new data elements since the additional information would be useful to develop or modify their community emergency response plans. EPA is also revising some existing data elements in the chemical reporting section of the Tier II inventory form to make reporting easier for facilities and make the form more user-friendly for state and local officials.

EPA is approving the State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision submitted by the State of Maryland. This revision pertains to the requirements for meeting reasonably available control technology (RACT) for oxides of nitrogen (NOX) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) for the 1997 8-hour ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS). These requirements are based on: A certification that previously adopted RACT controls in Maryland's SIP, which were approved by EPA under the 1-hour ozone NAAQS, are based on the currently available technically and economically feasible controls and continue to represent RACT for the 1997 8-hour ozone NAAQS implementation purposes; a negative declaration demonstrating that no facilities exist in Maryland for the applicable control technique guideline (CTG) categories; and adoption of new or more stringent RACT determinations. This action is being taken in accordance with the requirements of the Clean Air Act (CAA).

This action modifies Class E airspace at Plentywood Sher-Wood Airport, Plentywood, MT. Controlled airspace is necessary to accommodate aircraft using Area Navigation (RNAV) Global Positioning System (GPS) standard instrument approach procedures at Plentywood Sher-Wood Airport. This improves the safety and management of Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) operations at the airport. This action also makes a minor adjustment to the geographic coordinates of the airport.

Under the authority of the Mineral Leasing Act, as amended, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has prepared a draft Order of the Secretary of the Interior (Secretary's Order) to address oil, gas, and potash leasing and development within the Designated Potash Area in Eddy and Lea counties in New Mexico. The draft Secretary's Order would supersede the current Secretary's Order that addresses those issues. By this notice, the BLM announces the opening of a 30-day public comment period regarding the draft Secretary's Order. The revised guidelines in the draft Secretary's Order are designed to further promote the efficient development of potash, oil, and gas resources, while minimizing conflict between the industries and ensuring the safety of operations. Among other benefits, the revised guidelines are expected to enhance the safety of underground potash miners and allow for full development of oil and gas leaseholds with fewer environmental impacts.

This proposed rule would update the Home Health Prospective Payment System (HH PPS) rates, including the national standardized 60- day episode rates, the national per-visit rates, the low-utilization payment amount (LUPA), and outlier payments under the Medicare prospective payment system for home health agencies effective January 1, 2013. This rule also proposes requirements for the Hospice quality data reporting program. This proposed rule would also establish requirements for unannounced, standard and extended surveys of home health agencies (HHAs) and provide a number of alternative (or intermediate) sanctions that could be imposed if HHAs were out of compliance with Federal requirements. This proposed rule would set forth alternative sanctions that could be imposed instead of or in addition to termination of the HHA's participation in the Medicare program, which could remain in effect up to a maximum of 6 months, until the HHA achieved compliance with the HHA Conditions of Participation (CoPs), or until the HHA's provider agreement was terminated.

During a review of Louisiana's regulations, the EPA identified a variety of State-initiated changes to its hazardous waste program under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). We have determined that these changes are minor and satisfy all requirements needed to qualify for Final authorization and are authorizing the State-initiated changes through this direct Final action. In addition, this document corrects technical errors made in the May 20, 2009, Federal Register authorization document for Louisiana. The Solid Waste Disposal Act, as amended, commonly referred to as the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), allows the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to authorize States to operate their hazardous waste management programs in lieu of the Federal program. The EPA uses the regulations entitled ``Approved State Hazardous Waste Management Programs'' to provide notice of the authorization status of State programs and to incorporate by reference those provisions of the State statutes and regulations that will be subject to the EPA's inspection and enforcement. The rule codifies in the regulations the prior approval of Louisiana's hazardous waste management program and incorporates by reference authorized provisions of the State's statutes and regulations.

In this document, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) finalizes its proposed regulation regarding the FBI Anti-Piracy Warning Seal (APW Seal). The final rule provides a general authorization allowing all copyright holders to use the APW Seal, subject to specific conditions of use.

In accordance with Section 763(a) of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (``Dodd-Frank Act''), the Securities and Exchange Commission (``Commission'') is adopting rules under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (``Exchange Act'') to specify the process for a registered clearing agency's submission for review of any security-based swap, or any group, category, type or class of security-based swaps, that the clearing agency plans to accept for clearing, the manner of notice the clearing agency must provide to its members of such submission and the procedure by which the Commission may stay the requirement that a security-based swap is subject to mandatory clearing while the clearing of the security-based swap is reviewed. The Commission also is adopting a rule to specify that when a security-based swap is required to be cleared, the submission of the security-based swap for clearing must be for central clearing to a clearing agency that functions as a central counterparty. In addition, the Commission is adopting rules to define and describe when notices of proposed changes to rules, procedures or operations are required to be filed by designated financial market utilities in accordance with Section 806(e) of Title VIII of the Dodd-Frank Act and to set forth the process for filing such notices with the Commission. Finally, the Commission is adopting rules to make conforming changes as required by the amendments to Section 19(b) of the Exchange Act contained in Section 916 of the Dodd-Frank Act.