Rural Utilities Service March 14, 2016 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Rural Utilities Service (RUS, Agency), an agency of the United States Department of Agriculture, issued a Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) for the development of a more efficient and effective environmental review process for the RUS Telecommunications Program on March 1, 2016. The Notice of Availability of a Programmatic Environmental Assessment was published on March 2, 2016, in the Federal Register at 81 FR 10575. The PEA provides a broad environmental analysis of the Agency's preliminary decisions and includes a tiered, site-specific analysis at the project level that would be completed before Agency dispersal of funds and/or applicant construction. Since publication of the Agency's Environmental Policies and Procedures (7 CFR part 1970) in the Federal Register (81 FR 11000) on March 2, 2016, RUS has updated the PEA with citations to the Agency's new environmental rule. These changes are administrative and not substantive, therefore supplementation of the PEA is not required.