March 9, 2022 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

NHTSA's New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) provides comparative information on the safety performance of new vehicles to assist consumers with vehicle purchasing decisions and to encourage safety improvements. In addition to star ratings for crash protection and rollover resistance, the NCAP program recommends particular advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) technologies and identifies the vehicles in the marketplace that offer the systems that pass NCAP performance test criteria for those systems. This notice proposes significant upgrades to NCAP, first, by proposing to add four more ADAS technologies to those NHTSA currently recommends. The new technologies are blind spot detection, blind spot intervention, lane keeping support, and pedestrian automatic emergency braking. Other plans on updating NCAP are discussed in the Supplementary Information.

The Farm Service Agency (FSA) amends the Farm Loan Programs (FLP) regulations to implement certain provisions authorized by the Agricultural Improvement Act of 2018 (2018 Farm Bill). This rule revises the provisions on FLP loan limits, allows additional flexibility for loan applicants to meet the required farming experience, provides higher guarantee rates for lenders to provide credit to beginning farmers and socially disadvantaged farmers, provides additional program benefits for veterans, provides equitable relief to certain borrowers, allows borrowers who have received debt restructuring with a write down to receive Emergency loans (EM), and expands those issues that are covered under the agricultural Certified Mediation Program. In addition to the 2018 Farm Bill changes, FSA also amends the regulations for loan servicing relating to accepting cash payments and establishing a fee for dishonored checks; these are discretionary changes. The result of these changes will increase loan limits or improve the various loan programs to relieve some restrictions to participation or otherwise encourage participation. This rule also revises the way FSA will establish the maximum interest rates in response to the discontinuing publication of the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) interest rates. The result of these changes will enable FSA to provide clearer guidance on maximum interest rates and allow for more consistency across all lenders participating in the guaranteed loan program. In addition, this rule corrects references to supervised credit in the regulations.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is finalizing approval of a State Implementation Plan (SIP) revision to the Jefferson County portion of the Kentucky SIP submitted by the Commonwealth of Kentucky through the Kentucky Division for Air Quality (KDAQ) to EPA on August 12, 2020. The SIP revision was submitted by KDAQ on behalf of the Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District (LMAPCD) to address the emissions statement requirements for the 2015 8-hour ozone national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for the Jefferson County portion of the Louisville, Kentucky 2015 8-hour ozone nonattainment area (hereinafter referred to as ``Jefferson County''). Jefferson County is part of the Kentucky portion of the Louisville, Kentucky-Indiana 2015 8-hour ozone nonattainment area (hereinafter referred to as ``the Louisville, KY Area'') which is comprised of Bullitt, Jefferson, and Oldham Counties in Kentucky. EPA will consider the emissions statement requirements for the Bullitt and Oldham portions of the Louisville, KY Area in a separate action. This action is being taken pursuant to the Clean Air Act (CAA or Act).