Office of the Secretary December 2006 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

Current law requires that U.S. citizens actually control each U.S. air carrier, that U.S. citizens own or control at least 75 percent of the shareholders' voting interest, and that the president and two- thirds of the directors and the managing officers must be U.S. citizens. The Department interprets this law in conducting initial and continuing fitness reviews of U.S. air carriers. We are withdrawing a proposal to modify by regulation the standards we apply in those cases where ``actual control'' by U.S. citizens is at issue. The proposal being withdrawn would have narrowed the scope of our inquiry in such cases to those core matters affecting compliance with U.S. requirements affecting safety, security, national defense and corporate governance. These rationalized standards for deciding whether U.S. citizens maintained ``actual control'' of a carrier would have applied only to proposed transactions involving investors whose countries have an open-skies air services agreement with the United States and offer reciprocal investment opportunities to U.S. citizens. Our interpretation of other aspects of the statutory citizenship requirement would have been unchanged. Although we are withdrawing the current proposal, we will continue to consider other ways to rationalize and simplify our domestic investment regime. The need for greater certainty and transparency in our requirements and administrative process has become very apparent. Indeed, public comment in this docket has only served to confirm the Department's growing concern that the current regime is so unduly complex and burdensome that it needlessly inhibits the movement of capital that otherwise would flow into the U.S. airline industry and thus interferes with the legitimate needs of U.S. carriers to attract strategic investors from overseas markets. The Department notes that most of the American economy has progressed well beyond the antiquated notions that continue to apply to the airline industry because of our administrative interpretations of the current statute. In a modern, global industry such as aviation, we believe that the United States should not shut its doors to foreign investment by perpetuating archaic and time-consuming administrative practices that serve neither a statutory purpose nor an identifiable policy interest of the United States. The Department had also proposed amendments to 14 CFR Part 204, the rules governing the data used in fitness determinations, and invited comment on the procedures used in fitness cases. The Department will publish a separate decision on those matters.

Notice is hereby given that the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) and the Assistant Secretary for Health have taken final action in the following case: Jennifer Blaisdell, University of Pennsylvania and Retinal Consultants of Arizona, Ltd.: Based on the report of an investigation conducted by the University of Pennsylvania (UP) and additional analysis conducted by ORI in its oversight review, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) found that Ms. Jennifer Blaisdell, former Clinical Coordinator for Retinal Consultants of Arizona, Ltd. (RCA), committed research misconduct in a study sponsored by two cooperative agreements funded by the National Eye Institute (NEI), National Institutes of Health (NIH): U10 EY012261, ``Age-related Macular Degeneration Prevention Trial,'' Dr. Stuart Fine, Principal Investigator (P.I.), and U10 EY012279, ``Coordinating Center for AMD, Complications of Age- Related Macular Degeneration Prevention Trial'' (CAPT), Dr. Maureen McGuire, P.I. Specifically, PHS found that Ms. Blaisdell knowingly and intentionally committed research misconduct by: 1. Fabricating a CAPT data form dated 5/29/02 reporting a 30-month telephone follow-up visit with patient 01-026; this patient died on 5/ 3/02; 2. Fabricating a CAPT data form dated 2/20/03 reporting a 43-month telephone follow-up visit with patient 01-019; this patient died on 2/ 10/03; 3. Falsifying a CAPT data form dated 2/13/01 reporting a visit to the clinic on that date for patient 01-049; this patient's visit was 2/ 20/01; 4. Falsifying the CAPT form for patient 01-055 dated 4/11/01, when no clinic visit took place, by substituting information purportedly obtained at a non-study visit on 2/28/01. Ms. Blaisdell has entered into a Voluntary Exclusion Agreement in which she has voluntarily agreed, for a period of two (2) years, beginning on November 14, 2006: (1) To exclude herself from serving in any advisory capacity to PHS, including but not limited to service on any PHS advisory committee, board, and/or peer review committee, or as a consultant; and (2) That any institution that submits an application for PHS support for a research project on which Ms. Blaisdell's participation is proposed or which uses her in any capacity on PHS supported research, or that submits a report of PHS-funded research in which she is involved, must concurrently submit a plan for supervision of Ms. Blaisdell's duties to the funding agency for approval. The supervisory plan must be designed to ensure the scientific integrity of her research contribution. Ms. Blaisdell also agrees to ensure that the institution submits a copy of the supervisory plan to ORI. She further agrees that she will not participate in any PHS- supported research until such a supervisory plan is submitted to ORI.

The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act provides for a three-person National Indian Gaming Commission. One member, the chairman, is appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. Two associate members are appointed by the Secretary of the Interior. Before appointing members, the Secretary is required to provide public notice of a proposed appointment and allow a comment period. Notice is hereby given of the proposed appointment of Norman H. DesRosiers as an associate member of the National Indian Gaming Commission for a term of 3 years.

Pursuant to the Privacy Act of 1974, the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, proposes to add a new system of records to the Department's inventory, entitled Background Check Service. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Office of Field Operations operates the Background Check Service. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services conducts background checks on petitioners and applicants who are seeking immigration related benefits. To facilitate the background check process and to improve efficiency, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services developed the Background Check Service as a centralized repository that contains the consolidated data on all background check requests and results. The Background Check Service allows authorized U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services representatives to request background checks and access the data stored in the Background Check Service during the adjudication process in order to facilitate informed decision-making.