[Federal Register Volume 88, Number 179 (Monday, September 18, 2023)]
[Notices]
[Pages 63953-63956]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2023-20067]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry

[30Day-23-0057]


Agency Forms Undergoing Paperwork Reduction Act Review

    In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Agency 
for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) has submitted the 
information collection request titled ``APPLETREE Performance 
Measures'' to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and 
approval. ATSDR previously published a ``Proposed Data Collection 
Submitted for Public Comment and

[[Page 63954]]

Recommendations'' notice on June 27, 2023, to obtain comments from the 
public and affected agencies. ATSDR did not receive comments related to 
the previous notice. This notice serves to allow an additional 30 days 
for public and affected agency comments.
    ATSDR will accept all comments for this proposed information 
collection project. The Office of Management and Budget is particularly 
interested in comments that:
    (a) Evaluate whether the proposed collection of information is 
necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, 
including whether the information will have practical utility;
    (b) Evaluate the accuracy of the agencies estimate of the burden of 
the proposed collection of information, including the validity of the 
methodology and assumptions used;
    (c) Enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to 
be collected;
    (d) Minimize the burden of the collection of information on those 
who are to respond, including, through the use of appropriate 
automated, electronic, mechanical, or other technological collection 
techniques or other forms of information technology, e.g., permitting 
electronic submission of responses; and
    (e) Assess information collection costs.
    To request additional information on the proposed project or to 
obtain a copy of the information collection plan and instruments, call 
(404) 639-7570. Comments and recommendations for the proposed 
information collection should be sent within 30 days of publication of 
this notice to www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain. Find this particular 
information collection by selecting ``Currently under 30-day Review--
Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search function. Direct 
written comments and/or suggestions regarding the items contained in 
this notice to the Attention: CDC Desk Officer, Office of Management 
and Budget, 725 17th Street NW, Washington, DC 20503 or by fax to (202) 
395-5806. Provide written comments within 30 days of notice 
publication.

Proposed Project

    APPLETREE Performance Measures (OMB Control No. 0923-0057, Exp. 09/
30/2023)--Revision--Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry 
(ATSDR).

Background and Brief Description

    The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) seeks 
to build and sustain the capacity to evaluate exposures to hazardous 
waste across the country. Releases from hazardous waste sites are a 
major source of harmful exposures in homes, schools, workplaces, and 
communities. These exposures are often complex and may be difficult to 
identify and control. Hazardous waste sites may involve various toxic 
substances, exposure pathways, and health impacts. ATSDR's primary goal 
is to keep communities safe from harmful exposures and related 
diseases. To accomplish this goal, the agency works closely with 
partnering agencies to evaluate exposures at hazardous waste sites, 
educate communities, and seek new ways to better protect public health.
    ATSDR's Partnership to Promote Local Efforts to Reduce 
Environmental Exposure (APPLETREE) Program is critical to ATSDR's 
success in accomplishing its mission in communities nationwide. ATSDR's 
recipients will use APPLETREE funding to advance ATSDR's primary goal 
of keeping communities safe from harmful environmental exposures and 
related diseases. APPLETREE gives recipients the resources to build 
their capacity to assess and respond to site-specific issues involving 
human exposure to hazardous substances in the environment. APPLETREE 
helps recipients identify exposure pathways at specific sites; educate 
affected communities about site contamination and potential health 
effects; make recommendations to prevent exposure; review health 
outcome data to evaluate potential links between site contaminants and 
community health outcomes. APPLETREE also facilitates the 
implementation of State-level programs to ensure that potential early 
care and education facilities are in areas free from harmful 
environmental exposures. Additionally, it motivates the recipients to 
innovate and implement progressive public health interventions that can 
prevent exposure to environmental contamination. Due to the local 
connections and partnerships of APPLETREE recipients, there is an 
enhancement in community engagement and implementation of 
recommendations. This program is authorized under sections 104(i)(15) 
of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and 
Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980, as amended by the Superfund Amendments 
and Reauthorization Act (SARA) of 1986 [42 U.S.C. 9604(i)(15)].
    Under the next five-year APPLETREE cooperative agreement NOFO (No. 
CDC-RFA-TS-23-0001), eligible applicants include federally recognized 
American Indian/Alaska Native Tribal governments; American Indian/
Alaska native tribally designated organizations; political subdivisions 
of States (in consultation with States); and State and local 
governments or their bona fide agents. ATSDR technical project officers 
(TPOs) will assist approximately 30 APPLETREE recipients to address 
site-specific issues involving human exposure to hazardous substances. 
Key capacities include identification of human exposure pathways at 
ATSDR sites, education of affected communities and local health 
professionals about site contamination and potential health effects; 
making appropriate recommendations to prevent exposure; reviewing 
health outcome data to evaluate potential links between site 
contaminants and community health; and documenting the effects of 
environmental remediation on health.
    Under this Revision, ATSDR will continue to collect information 
related to recipient activities, and the process and outcome 
performance measures outlined by the cooperative agreement program. 
Information will be used to monitor progress toward program goals and 
objectives, and for program quality improvement. The first nine forms 
were previously approved by OMB (APPLETREE Performance Measures, OMB 
Control No. 0923-0057, Expiration Date 09/30/2023). The first of these 
three forms were migrated to the new information technology (IT) system 
called ATSDR's Request Management Service System (ARMSS).
    1. ATSDR Health Education Activity (HE) Form: For each 
environmental health assessment and health education activity conducted 
at ATSDR sites, APPLETREE Recipients shall quantitatively assess and 
report efforts to educate community members about site recommendations 
and health risks using indicators to assess community understanding of 
site findings about health risks and community understanding of agency 
recommendations to reduce health risks. This information will be 
entered into ARMSS for each health education activity at ATSDR sites.
    2. ATSDR Technical Assistance Activity (TA) Form: Throughout the 
budget year, this form will be used to record the routine requests made 
by the recipients and their program responses. These responses do not 
evaluate environmental data and do not make health calls but are 
monitored by ATSDR as part of the recipients' performance.
    3. ATSDR Site Impact Assessment (SIA) Form: For each environmental 
health assessment and health education

[[Page 63955]]

activity conducted at ATSDR sites, recipients shall estimate and report 
the number of people protected from exposure to toxic substances at 
each site where implementation of agency recommendations has taken 
place and at each childcare center where safe siting guidelines have 
been implemented. To the extent possible, recipients shall estimate and 
report the disease burden prevented due to the implementation of site 
recommendations and safe siting guidelines.
    The fourth form is currently being migrated from SharePoint to 
ARMSS. This transition is currently taking place.
    4. ATSDR Success Story Form: Recipients will provide one success 
story per quarter (four success stories total per year) that highlights 
the impact of any of their programs. Recipients will report a summary, 
background, intervention/action taken, and accomplishment/impact for 
each story. Optionally, they may include a photo or quote.
    Recipients will continue to submit the following five forms to 
ATSDR via email. In the future, these forms will be moved to an 
electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) to simplify data collection.
    5. APPLETREE Annual Performance Report (APR) Template: Recipients 
will continue to provide an APR each year and at the end of the funding 
cycle, which summarizes their annual and funding cycle performances, 
respectively. APRs will be due in December of each year to coincide 
with the CDC Grants Management annual reports to reduce the overall 
reporting burden, and the final report will be due at the end of the 
funding cycle. The purpose of the performance reports will be to assess 
Partners based on performance measures and evaluation projects. The 
reports should include a summary of performance measures, results of 
any evaluation projects, an accompanying narrative of progress and 
interpretation of results, optional successes, challenges, and an 
updated work plan. These reports will be entered into a Microsoft Word 
form.
    6. Choose Safe Places for Early Care and Education (CSPECE) 
Qualitative Narrative Form: Recipients will continue to provide a 
narrative report of their CSPECE Programs to document descriptive 
details of their State's landscape, program plan, program 
implementation, and results that cannot be captured through numbers. 
Recipients will complete and submit the narrative once a year as a 
supplement with their APRs in a Microsoft Word form.
    7. CSPECE Quantitative Form: Recipients will continue to provide 
data on their CSPECE Programs to quantify aspects of their program such 
as children reached, target audiences educated, early care and 
education programs referred and screened, and recommendations 
implemented. To supplement their APRs, recipients will complete and 
submit a Microsoft Excel form once a year as a supplement with their 
APRs.
    In addition to the required annual reporting, at the end of the 
five-year program, each recipient will report cumulative five-year 
performance measures for three forms: the APR, the CSPECE Qualitative 
Narrative Form, and the CSPECE Quantitative Form. This will result in 
six total responses in a five-year period for each form. The estimated 
annualized number of required responses is thus rounded to once per 
year for these three forms (six hours divided by three years equals 1.2 
hours per year).
    8. ATSDR SoilSHOP Form: SoilSHOPs are not a required activity; 
however, if conducted, a recipient will need to complete the ATSDR 
SoilSHOP Form. This form gathers data on the inputs, activities, 
outputs, and outcomes of the event, such as the number of soil samples 
screened, the number of elevated soil samples, the number of 
individuals receiving health consultations, and the number of 
individuals receiving referrals. The form will be submitted to ATSDR 
via email within three weeks of the SoilSHOP completion.
    9. ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up Form: For each environmental 
health assessment, recipients will provide an update on the status of 
acceptance and implementation of all recommendations to understand 
whether and how recommendations have been implemented, and the 
subsequent impact on communities. Recipients will complete a Microsoft 
Excel reporting form annually on the anniversary date of the release of 
each health assessment.
    As part of this Revision request, the last form is new.
    10. ATSDR Requests for Certified and Non-certified Public Health 
Assessments and Health Consultations Form: For each environmental 
health assessment, recipients will provide the request, dates, and 
triage information and can associate the request with a hazardous waste 
site. Site scoping and clearance information are completed for about 
15% of environmental health assessments that complete ATSDR's clearance 
process (i.e., certified). This information will be entered into ARMSS.
    ATSDR is seeking a three-year Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) 
clearance for this Revision. The total annual time burden requested is 
269 hours. This reflects an increase of two hours from the previously 
267 approved in 2020. ATSDR will fund 30 recipients. Recipient 
reporting is required to receive funding under the APPLETREE 
cooperative agreement.

                                        Estimated Annualized Burden Hours
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                      Average
                                                                     Number of       Number of      burden per
        Type of respondents                   Form name             respondents    responses per   response (in
                                                                                    respondent         hrs.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
APPLETREE Recipients...............  ATSDR Health Education (HE)              30              17            4/60
                                      Activity Form.
                                     ATSDR Technical Assistance               30              17            4/60
                                      (TA) Activity Form.
                                     ATSDR Site Impact                        30               3            7/60
                                      Assessment (SIA) Form.
                                     ATSDR Success Story Form...              30               4           30/60
                                     APPLETREE Annual                         30               1               2
                                      Performance Report (APR)
                                      Template.
                                     Choose Safe Places for                   30               1               1
                                      Early Care and Education
                                      (CSPECE) Qualitative
                                      Narrative Form.
                                     CSPECE Quantitative Form...              30               1           15/60
                                     ATSDR SoilSHOP Form........              10               1            7/60
                                     ATSDR Recommendation Follow-             30               4           10/60
                                      up.
                                     ATSDR Requests.............              30               3            7/60
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[[Page 63956]]

Jeffrey M. Zirger,
Lead, Information Collection Review Office, Office of Public Health 
Ethics and Regulations, Office of Science, Centers for Disease Control 
and Prevention.
[FR Doc. 2023-20067 Filed 9-15-23; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4163-70-P