1 ICR Supporting Statement Information Collection Request for EPA Application Materials for the Water

Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act

OMB Control No. 2040

- NEW, EPA ICR No. 2549.01

A. Justification

.

1. E xplain the circumstances that make the collect ion of information necessary.

I dentify any legal or administrative requirements that necessitate the collection.

The collection of information is necessary in order to receive applications for credit assistance pursuant to section 5024 of the Water Infr astructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) of 2014

, 33 USC 3903

. The purpose of the WIFIA program is to provide

Federal credit assista nce in the form of direct loans and loan guarant ees to eligible clean water and drinking water projects.

WIFIA requi res that an eligible entity shall submit to the Administrator an application at such time, in such manner, and containing such information, as the Secretary or the Administrator may require to receive assistance under WIFIA. In order to satisfy these requi rements, EPA must collect a letter of interest and an application from entities seeking funding. The relevant section of WIFIA is attached hereto as Exhibit A

. EPA is publishing this notice to give entities an opportunity to submit applications upon author ization of funding . This collection is necessary to determine whether each proposed project meets

creditworthiness and other F ederal requirements to receive W IFIA credit assistance.

2. Indicate how, by whom, and for what purpose the information is to be used. Except for a new collection, indicate the actual use the agency has made of the information

received from the current collection.

The letter of interest and the application (attached as Exhibits B and C) collected from loan applicants through this solicitation will be used to evaluate applications for credit assistance under the WIFIA eligibility requirements and selection criteria.

3. Describe whether, and to what extent, the collection of information involves the use of automated, electronic, me chanical, or other technological collection techniques or other forms of information technology, e.g. permitting electronic submission of responses, and the basis for the decision for adopting this means of collection. Also describe any consideration of us ing information technology to reduce burden.

The letter of interest form is available electronically . The letter of interest and supporting

narrative are submitted entirely via e

- mail only. The application is available electronically . It is submitted i n part electronically and in part via conventional mail, due to the size of the application package. To reduce burden and to minimize the number of2

copies required from the applicant , electronic versions of the application are required via

CD.

4. Descr ibe efforts to identify duplication. Show specifically why any similar information already available cannot be used or modified for use for the purpose(s)

described in item 2 above.

The letters of interest and applications will generally be project specif ic and the

information is not available elsewhere.

5. If the collection of information impacts small businesses or other small entities (item

5 of the OMB form 83

- 1), describe the methods used to minimize burden.

Eligible applicants under WIFIA includ e corporations, partnerships, joint ventures, trusts, Federal, State, or local governmental entities, agencies, or instrumentalities, tribal governments or consortium of tribal governments, and state infrastructure financing authorities, which could includ e small entities. Letters of interest and applications are voluntary. EPA cannot minimize the burden to small entities, be cause WRRDA require s all eligible entities to submit an application in order to receive credit assistance. The

relevant section of WRR DA is attached hereto as Exhibit A

.

6. Describe the consequence to federal program or policy activities if the collection is not conducted or is conducted less frequently, as well as any technical or legal obstacles to reducing burden.

I f the collection is not conducted

, EPA will be unable to satisfy the statutory mandate to require the submission of applications . Therefore, W IFIA credit assistance will not be

available

. In order to provide credit assistance to eligible projects, which is the purpose of the program, EPA must collect letters of interest and applications that respond to the eligibility requirements and selection criteria.

7. Explain any special circumstances that would cause an information collection to be

conducted in a manner inconsiste nt with 5 CFR 1320.6 :

There are no special circumstances. The collection of information is conducted in a

manner consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.6

.

8. Efforts to consult with persons outside the agency to obtain their views

On DATE OF PUBLICATION (Month, day, a nd year), Vol. No. _____, pages __________ to __________, the A gency published the notice of information collection and request for comments in the Federal Register. The solicitation is attached as Exhibit

D.

________ comments we re received.3

EPA will consul t with persons outside the A gency to obtain their views on the availability of data, frequency of recordkeeping, disclosure, or reporting format, and on the data elements to be recorded, disclosed, or reported.

9. Explain a ny decision to provide any payment or gift to respondents, other than remuneration of contractors or grantees.

No payments or gifts are provided to respondents.

10. Describe any assurance of confidentiality provided to respondents and the basis for

th e assurance in statute, regulation, or agency policy.

EPA cannot offer an assurance of confidentiality to any applicant. The applicant is

directed to state if any information submitted in its letter of interest

, application

, or any supplementary material may not be released by the Agency upon request from a member of the public or otherwise made publicly available . The applicant must identify the

confidential business information and provide reasons why such information is

confidential business information and should not be released, including particulars as to any competitive harm which would potentially result from the release of such

information. The Agency will handle requests from the public for release of information

under its standard Freedom of Info rmation Act procedures.

11. Provide additional justification for any q uestions of a sensitive nature.

Questions of a sensitive nature are not found in this information collection.

12. Provide estimates of the hour burden of the collection of informati on. The Agency does not have any directly relevant prior experience on which to base these

estimates of the hour burden of the collection and the annualized cost to respondents

. Nevertheless, based on the number and type of interested stakeholders that h ave contacted the Agency about this program, the funding levels for the WIFIA program, and the EPA’s application procedures, the EPA estimates that the burden will be as follows , exclusive of the hours required for project development:

Letter of Interest :

Letter of Interest Burden per Application

Function Legal Manager Technical Clerical
Read application guidelines 1 1 1

Gather Information 10 5
Complete application form 1
Complete narrative 194 Review Application 5 5

Compile Appl ication 2

TOTAL 5 6 30 9

 Total number of unduplicated respondents: 20

 Frequency of response: one per respondent

 Annual hour burden per application: 50

 Total annual burden hours: 1,000

Application:

Application Burden per Application

Legal Manag er Technical Clerical
Read application guidelines 1 1 1

Gather Information 2 6 15
Complete application form 1
Complete narrative 30
Review Application 10 10

Compile Application 5

TOTAL 1 0 11 57 22

 Total number of unduplic ated respondents: 5

 Frequency of response: one per respondent

 Annual hour burden per application: 100

 Total annual burden hours: 5 00

13. Provide an estimate of th e total annual cost burden to respondents or recordkeepers resulting from the collection of information.

EPA estimates that the total annual cost burden to respondents will be $ 1

, 489

, 594 . This estimate includes the following:

1. For the l etter of i nterest , EPA estimates 1,000 annual burden hours and the annualized cost of those hours is $40,107

. 2. For the application , EPA estimates 5 00 annual burden hours and the annualized cost of

those hours is $19,487

. 3. In addition, applicants will be charged two fees:

a. An application fee will be due upon submission of the application. For applications for proje cts serving small communities (population of not more than 25,000 people )

, this application fee will be $25,000. For all other applicants, this application fee will be $100,000. EPA assumes that one applicant will be a small community. The annual applicati on fee will be $425,000.

b. A credit processing fee will be due upon loan closing, to reimburse costs incurred by5 the EPA due to legal, financial, and other expert contractor help. Due to the nature of this fee, the amount i s expected to vary between applican ts. However, EPA estimates these costs as approximately $200,000 per applicant, a portion of which may be

waived at the discretion of the EPA. The total credit processing fee for five applicants will be approximately $1,000,000.

4. The cost of general expense s for submitting an application, such as supplies, delivery charges, mailing, copying, and telecommunications, will be $1

, 000. The total general expenses will be $5,000.

Note: EPA used the following median hourly wages from the May 2015 National Occupatio nal Employment and Wage Estimates United States ( http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm ) from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to

calculate the cost of the estimated burden hours:

 Lawyers= $ 55.69

 Management= $47.38

 Engineer s = $ 43.3 0

 Office and Administrative Support= $ 15.96

14. Provide estimates of annualized cost to the federal government. The estimated cost to the Federal government of this request for letters of interest and applicatio ns is $ 325

, 15 0

. This cost reflects three components:

1. EPA will establish an evaluation process to review each of letter of interest and application and to determine which projects will receive WIFIA funding. This process includes technical, financial, and management review of the letters of interest. Then, additional technical, financial, and management review of the applications. EPA

estimates that this process will require the equivalent of five FTE per year.

The esti mated average annual cost for EPA pe rsonnel is $95,704 based on the General Schedule (GS) 13, Step 05 level from the 2016 GS salary table . The annual cost was then multiplied by the standard government benefits multiplication factor of 1.6 to calculate an

estimated annual pay including benef its per FTE of $1 5 3,126 . Therefore, t he estimated annualized cost for the evaluation team is $ 7 65,632 . EPA plan s to use the application fees

to offset these costs. Assuming one application from a small community and four other applications per year , the to tal fees collected will be $ 4 25,000. Consequently, the net

estimated annualized cost to the Federal Government for the evaluation team is $ 3 40,632

.

2. EPA will hire legal, financial, and other expert contractor support for credit processing.

These costs are estimated to be $200,000 per application and are expected to be

re imbursed in full by the applicants. The net estimated annualized cost to the Federal Government for credit processing is $0.6

3. EPA will print application materials

. EPA does not expect to nee d any special equipment

or support, other than printing. As noted above in item 12, EPA expects 20 letters of

interest and 5 applications. If each letter of interest is 2 5 pages and each application is 50 pages, as requested in the solicitation, EPA may ne ed to print as many as 7 50 pages for staff involved in the evaluation process. EPA estimates up to 10 staff may need materials which adds up to a total of 7 500 pages of printing. EPA ’s printing costs are approximately 2 cent s per page, which adds up to a t otal printing cost of $ 15 0

.

15. Explain the reason for any program changes or adjustments reported in items 13 or

14 of the OMB form 83

- 1.

This is a new information collection at EPA

.

16. For collections of information whose results will be published, out line plans for tabulation, and publication.

The letters of interest and applications collected for the WIFIA program will not be published. EPA will maintain a publicly available list of projects that have submitted letters of interest and applications to the WIFIA program.

17. If seeking approval to not display the expiration date for OMB approval of the information collection, explain the reasons that display would be inappropriate.

The A gency plans to display the expiration date for OMB approval of the information

collection on all instruments.

18. Explain each exception to the certification statement identified in item 19, "certification for paperwork reduction act submissions," of OMB form 83

- 1.

The A gency is able to certify compliance with all provisions under Item 19 of OMB Form

83

- I.”