I 

116TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 5536 

To require the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to make 

certain operational models available to the public, and for other purposes. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

DECEMBER 23, 2019 

Mrs. FLETCHER introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 

Committee on Science, Space, and Technology 

A BILL 

To require the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to make certain operational models available to 

the public, and for other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Learning Excellence 

5 and Good Examples from New Developers Act of 2019’’ 

6 or the ‘‘LEGEND Act of 2019’’. 

7 SEC. 2. DEFINITIONS. 

8 In this Act: 


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1 (1) ADMINISTRATION.—The term ‘‘Administra2 tion’’ means the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

3 Administration. 

4 (2) ADMINISTRATOR.—The term ‘‘Adminis5 trator’’ means the Under Secretary of Commerce for 

6 Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the 

7 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

8 (3) MODEL.—The term ‘‘model’’ means any nu9 merical model of the Earth’s system or its compo10 nents produced by scientists employed by the Ad11 ministration. 

12 (4) OPERATIONAL MODEL.—The term ‘‘oper13 ational model’’ means any model that has an output 

14 used by the Administration for operational or public 

15 service functions. 

16 (5) OPEN SOURCE CODE.—The term ‘‘open 

17 source code’’ means computer code or programming 

18 language that is available for public use or modifica19 tion. 

20 SEC. 3. PURPOSES. 

21 The purposes of this Act are— 

22 (1) to support innovation in modeling by allow23 ing interested stakeholders to have easy and com24 plete access to the models used by the Administra25 tion; and 


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1 (2) to use vetted innovations arising from ac2 cess provided under paragraph (1) to improve mod3 eling by the Administration. 

4 SEC. 4. REQUIREMENT TO MAKE CERTAIN OPERATIONAL 

5 MODELS AVAILABLE TO THE PUBLIC. 

6 (a) IN GENERAL.—The Administrator shall make 

7 available to the public the following: 

8 (1) Current and future operational models de9 veloped by the Administration, in the form of open 

10 source code for a period consistent with applicable 

11 records retention requirements. 

12 (2) All Government-owned data, subject to re13 distribution rights, associated with such models and 

14 used in operational forecasting by the Administra15 tion, including— 

16 (A) relevant metadata; 

17 (B) data used for current operational fore18 casts; and 

19 (C) a description of intended model out20 puts. 

21 (b) DISCRETION TO MAKE EXPERIMENTAL OR DE22 VELOPMENT MODELS AVAILABLE.—The Administrator 

23 may make experimental or developmental models associ24 ated with development projects funded by the Administra25 tion available to the public as open source code. 


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1 (c) PLATFORM.—In carrying out subsections (a) and 

2 (b), the Administrator may use government servers, con3 tracts or agreements with a private vendor, or any other 

4 platform consistent with the purpose of this Act. 

5 (d) TECHNICAL CORRECTION.—Section 102(b) of the 

6 Weather Research Forecasting and Innovation Act of 

7 2017 (15 U.S.C. 8512(b)) is amended by redesignating 

8 the second paragraph (4) (as added by section 4(a) of the 

9 National Integrated Drought Information System Reau10 thorization Act of 2018 (Public Law 115–423)) as para11 graph (5). 

12 (e) PHASED IMPLEMENTATION.— 

13 (1) IMMEDIATE EFFECT FOR CERTAIN MOD14 ELS.—For operational models that, as of the date of 

15 the enactment of this Act, meet the requirements de16 scribed in paragraph (5)(E)(ii) of section 102(b) of 

17 the Weather Research Forecasting and Innovation 

18 Act of 2017 (15 U.S.C. 8512(b)), as redesignated by 

19 subsection (d), the Administrator shall implement 

20 the requirements of subsection (a) as soon as prac21 ticable after such date of enactment. 

22 (2) NEW MODELS.—For operational models 

23 that meet the requirements described in paragraph 

24 (1) and are created or substantially updated after 

25 the date of the enactment of this Act, the AdminisVerDate Sep 11 2014 18:41 Dec 29, 2019 Jkt 099200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\H5536.IH H5536

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1 trator shall implement the requirements of sub2 section (a) not later than 1 year after such date of 

3 enactment. 

4 SEC. 5. REQUIREMENT TO REVIEW MODELS AND LEVER5 AGE INNOVATIONS. 

6 The Administrator shall— 

7 (1) consistent with the mission of the Earth 

8 Prediction Innovation Center, periodically review in9 novations and improvements made by persons out10 side the Administration to the operational models 

11 made available to the public under section 4 in order 

12 to improve the accuracy and timeliness of forecasts 

13 of the Administration; and 

14 (2) if the Administrator identifies an innovation 

15 for such a model the Administrator considers suit16 able, develop and implement a plan to use the inno17 vation to improve the model. 

18 SEC. 6. REPORT ON IMPLEMENTATION. 

19 (a) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 1 year after the 

20 date of the enactment of this Act, the Administrator shall 

21 submit to the appropriate congressional committees a re22 port on the implementation of this Act that includes a de23 scription of— 

24 (1) how operational models have been made 

25 publicly available as required by section 4(a); and 


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1 (2) the process of the Administration under sec2 tion 5— 

3 (A) for engaging with interested stake4 holders to learn what innovations those stake5 holders have found; 

6 (B) for reviewing those innovations; and 

7 (C) for operationalizing innovations the 

8 Administrator considers suitable. 

9 (b) APPROPRIATE CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEES

10 DEFINED.—In this section, the term ‘‘appropriate con11 gressional committees’’ means— 

12 (1) the Committee on Commerce, Science, and 

13 Transportation and the Committee on Appropria14 tions of the Senate; and 

15 (2) the Committee on Science, Space, and 

16 Technology and the Committee on Appropriations of 

17 the House of Representatives. 

18 SEC. 7. PROTECTION OF NATIONAL SECURITY INTERESTS. 

19 (a) IN GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other provi20 sion of this Act, the Administrator may withhold models 

21 or data used in operational weather forecasting if the Ad22 ministrator determines doing so to be necessary to protect 

23 the national security interests of the United States. 

24 (b) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this Act 

25 shall be construed to supersede any other provision of law 


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1 governing the protection of the national security interests 

2 of the United States. 

3 SEC. 8. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 

4 There are authorized to be appropriated to the Ad5 ministration for each of fiscal years 2021 through 2026 

6 such sums as may be necessary to carry out this Act. 

Æ 


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