Department of Agriculture December 24, 2014 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is announcing that the National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection (NACMPI) will hold a public meeting on January 13 and 14, 2015, to review and discuss FSIS's identification and management of chemical hazards within the National Residue Program (NRP). The NRP is an interagency program administered by FSIS that is designed to identify, rank, and test for chemical contaminants in meat, poultry, and egg products. FSIS is seeking input on whether or not it should change the way it categorizes chemical hazards and allocates resources. NACMPI will also review and discuss the Cost Calculation Model that FSIS developed with the Economic Research Service (ERS), which provides detailed data about the costs of major foodborne illnesses in the United States.

The Rio Grande National Forest, located in south central Colorado, is initiating the forest planning process pursuant to the 2012 Forest Planning Rule (36 CFR 219). This process results in a Forest Land Management Plan which describes the strategic direction for management of forest resources for the next fifteen to twenty years on the Rio Grande National Forest. The first phase of the process, the assessment phase, has begun and interested parties will be invited to contribute to the development of the assessment (36 CFR 219.6). The Forest hosted a series of informational meetings with key stakeholders and the public in the fall of 2014, and will be hosting additional meetings between January and June 2015. Additional information on public participation opportunities will be available on the project Web site: https://www.fs.usda.gov/riogrande. The trends and conditions identified in the assessment will help in identifying the need for change, in the development of plan components.

The Shasta-Trinity National Forest (STNF) will prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) to document and publicly disclose the environmental effects of implementing a hazardous fuels reduction project on approximately 5,327 acres of National Forest System lands. Activities are proposed within the wildland urban interface or WUI (the zone where structures and other human developments meet, or intermingle with, undeveloped wild lands) of the community of Burnt Ranch, California as well as the Corral Late Successional Reserve (LSR). The proposed project would provide the Burnt Ranch community and the LSR with enhanced protection from catastrophic wildfire and increased fire fighter and public safety. The proposal includes thinning trees from below in overcrowded stands, plantations and along roadsides. Some thinning would be accomplished through commercial timber harvest of sawtimber and/or biomass as well as from prescribed burning. The Burnt Ranch Fire Resilient Community Project is located in sections 5, 4, 3, 2, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 33, 34, and 35 in T. 5 N., R. 6 E.; sections 19 and 30 in T. 5 N., R. 7 E., sections 1, 2, 3, 11 and 12 in T. 4 N., R. 6 E. Humboldt Meridian.