This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER

contains documents other than rules or

proposed rules that are applicable to the

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Notices Federal Register

71561 

Vol. 78, No. 230 

Friday, November 29, 2013 

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 

Commodity Credit Corporation 

Farm Service Agency 

Notice of Intent To Prepare a 

Supplemental Programmatic 

Environmental Impact Statement for 

the Conservation Reserve Program 

AGENCY: Commodity Credit Corporation 

and Farm Service Agency, USDA. 

ACTION: Notice of Intent (NOI); request 

for comments. 

SUMMARY: This notice announces that 

the Farm Service Agency (FSA), on 

behalf of the Commodity Credit 

Corporation (CCC), intends to complete 

a Supplemental Programmatic 

Environmental Impact Statement 

(SPEIS) assessing the environmental 

impacts of potential changes to the 

Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), as 

required by the National Environmental 

Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). The intent 

of this notice is to provide an initial 

summary introduction to the 

alternatives being considered for 

potential changes to CRP, and to request 

comments on these proposed 

alternatives. The input we receive as a 

result of this notice will enable us to 

refine the alternatives, begin to evaluate 

their impacts, and document results in 

the scoping report as required by NEPA. 

DATES: We will consider comments that 

we receive by January 13, 2014. 

Comments received after this date will 

be considered to the extent possible. 

ADDRESSES: We invite you to submit 

comments on this NOI. In your 

comments, include the volume, date, 

and page number of this issue of the 

Federal Register. You may submit 

comments by any of the following 

methods: 

• Federal eRulemaking Portal: Go to 

http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the 

online instructions for submitting 

comments; 

• Online: Go to www.CRPSPEIS.com. 

Follow the online instructions for 

submitting comments; 

• Email: CRPcomments@

cardnotec.com. 

• Fax: (757) 594–1469. 

• Mail, Hand Delivery, or Courier: 

CRP SPEIS, c/o Cardno TEC, Inc., 11817 

Canon Blvd., Suite 300, Newport News, 

VA 23606. 

All written comments will be 

available for inspection online at 

www.regulations.gov and in the Office 

of the Director, Conservation and 

Environmental Programs Division, FSA, 

USDA, 1400 Independence Ave. SW., 

Room 4709 South Building, 

Washington, DC 20250, during business 

hours between 8:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., 

Monday through Friday, except 

holidays. A copy of this notice is 

available through the FSA home page at 

http://www.fsa.usda.gov/. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For 

questions, contact Nell Fuller, National 

Environmental Compliance Manager, 

telephone: (202) 720–6303. For the 

documents discussed in this notice, go 

to www.CRPSPEIS.com.Persons with 

disabilities who require alternative 

means for communication (Braille, large 

print, audio tape, etc.) should contact 

the USDA Target Center at (202) 720– 

2600 (voice and TDD). 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: As 

required by NEPA regulations (40 CFR 

1500–1508), FSA is assessing potential 

changes to CRP in 2014 by preparing a 

SPEIS (2014 CRP SPEIS), to provide 

FSA decisionmakers, other agencies, 

Tribes, and the public with an analysis 

that evaluates program effects in 

appropriate contexts, describes the 

intensity of adverse as well as beneficial 

impacts, and addresses cumulative 

environmental impacts associated with 

proposed programmatic changes to CRP. 

CRP was first authorized in the Food 

Security Act of 1985, Public Law 99– 

198, 99 Stat. 1509–1514 (16 U.S.C. 

3831–3836), and is governed by 

regulations in 7 CFR part 1410. CRP is 

a voluntary program that supports the 

implementation of long-term 

conservation measures designed to 

improve the quality of ground and 

surface waters, control soil erosion, and 

enhance wildlife habitat on 

environmentally sensitive agricultural 

land. In return, CCC provides 

participants with rental payments and 

cost share assistance under contracts 

that extend from 10 to 15 years. CRP is 

a CCC program administered by FSA 

with the support of other Federal, State, 

and local agencies and organizations. 

More information on CRP is available at 

http://www.fsa.usda.gov/

FSAwebapp?area=home&/

subject=copr&/topic=crp. 

Over the last decade, FSA has 

completed extensive NEPA analysis 

pertaining to CRP and components of 

the program. The 2014 CRP SPEIS will 

tier to (that is, it will focus on analyzing 

the new changes and incorporate and 

augment the prior analyses) and 

incorporate by reference other 

applicable NEPA documentation, as 

appropriate, and supplement the 2010 

CRP SEIS. As such, only those proposed 

changes to CRP that have not been 

adequately addressed in other NEPA 

documentation will be addressed in the 

2014 CRP SPEIS. Other applicable 

NEPA documentation can be found at 

www.CRPSPEIS.com and includes: 

• The 2003 CRP Environmental 

Impact Statement (EIS) and resulting 

Record of Decision (ROD), which 

evaluated the environmental 

consequences of changes to CRP under 

the Farm Security and Rural Investment 

Act of 2002, Public Law 107–171 (which 

is commonly known as the 2002 Farm 

Bill). 

• The 2008 13 state-level CRP 

Environmental Assessments (EAs) and 

resulting Findings of No Significant 

Impacts (FONSI), which analyzed the 

environmental impacts of managed 

haying and grazing variations on CRP 

contracts. 

• The 2008 CRP Programmatic EA 

(PEA) and FONSI, which evaluated 

mandatory changes to CRP reauthorized 

by the Food, Conservation, and Energy 

Act of 2008, Public Law 10–246 (2008 

Farm Bill). 

• The 2010 CRP SEIS and ROD, 

which evaluated changes to CRP 

enacted by the 2008 Farm Bill and 

supplemented the 2003 CRP EIS. 

• The 2012 CRP PEA and FONSI, 

which evaluated the environmental 

consequences associated with 

authorizing emergency haying and 

grazing of CRP conservation practices 

(CPs) that had previously been 

ineligible, and helped alleviate local 

impacts to farmers and ranchers as a 

result of extreme drought and high 

temperatures during 2012. 

Building on that NEPA 

documentation, the 2014 CRP SPEIS 


sroberts on DSK5SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
71562 Federal Register / Vol. 78, No. 230 / Friday, November 29, 2013 / Notices 

will help FSA review potential 

alternatives to, and environmental 

impacts expected to result from, 

proposed changes to CRP. The results of 

the 2014 CRP SPEIS and subsequent 

ROD will be used in implementing and 

modifying CRP administration and will 

also serve as guidance to FSA decisionmakers when considering proposed CRP 

changes. 

The SPEIS process provides a means 

for the public, other agencies, and 

Tribes to provide input on program 

implementation alternatives and their 

impacts, and other environmental 

concerns. We encourage you to 

participate in helping to define the 

scope of the draft 2014 CRP SPEIS. 

Summary Description of Preliminary 

Alternatives 

To initiate the process, FSA has 

developed a set of preliminary 

alternatives to be studied and impacts to 

be analyzed in the draft 2014 CRP 

SPEIS. At this time, FSA is proposing 

three alternatives (the No Action 

alternative and two action alternatives). 

The No Action alternative (continuation 

of CRP as it is currently administered 

and analyzed in the 2010 CRP SEIS) will 

be evaluated as required by the Council 

on Environmental Quality (CEQ) 

regulations (40 CFR parts 1500–1508). 

FSA expects legislative changes to 

CRP in the next Farm Bill (or other 

relevant legislation). Although the 

timing of the next legislative change to 

CRP is uncertain, to be able to 

implement the changes expeditiously, 

FSA is getting a start on the analysis of 

potential changes by including potential 

legislative changes in the alternatives. 

As a starting point for the required 

NEPA analysis that will be required 

before FSA can implement regulatory 

changes when the Farm Bill is enacted, 

FSA determined that using the 

proposals most recently passed by the 

House and the Senate, respectively, was 

reasonable. Because those proposals 

may change, it did not seem prudent to 

detail those proposed changes in this 

notice; the alternatives will be revised 

as needed in response to legislation and 

public and other input. To see the 

details that FSA is working from, refer 

to www.CRPSPEIS.com for the text of 

the House and Senate proposals used as 

our starting point. At this point, the two 

separate CRP proposals, however they 

are eventually modified, will be the 

foundation for our proposed federal 

actions, and are therefore included as 

separate alternatives. They are similar, 

but have some differences, and as 

discussed below, are not the sole 

components of the action alternatives. 

When the next Farm Bill is enacted 

(or any other legislative change to CRP), 

the resulting legislative changes to CRP 

will be used along with the public and 

other input to this NOI to fully 

articulate the alternatives and their 

impacts, which will be fully described 

in the resulting scoping report. 

FSA has developed the two action 

alternatives that include the provisions 

from each of the respective proposed 

legislative changes to CRP, as well as 

the following discretionary 

considerations, to ensure that the 2014 

CRP SPEIS captures the full range of 

potential alternatives, impacts, and 

issues anticipated: Administrative, 

staffing, and budgetary considerations; 

efficiency and jurisdiction concerns; 

and other factors. The alternatives and 

impacts will be amended, as 

appropriate, based on input from the 

public, other agencies, and Tribes 

during the scoping process, as well as 

by any legislative changes to CRP. 

Both of the two action alternatives 

include a gradual reduction of the CRP 

enrollment cap by 20 to 25 percent over 

the next 5 years. In the 2014 CRP SPEIS, 

FSA will analyze discretionary 

measures to meet the proposed 

mandatory reduction in enrollment 

while maintaining the maximum 

environmental benefit realized from the 

program. 

Other discretionary provisions, which 

FSA identified separately from any 

pending legislative changes, to be 

addressed in the 2014 CRP SPEIS 

include: 

• Changing the enrollment cap on the 

Farmable Wetlands Program; 

• Reducing incentive and cost-share 

payments for tree thinning activities; 

• Evaluating other forms or processes 

for enrollment under continuous signup; 

• Adding flexibility for haying and 

grazing, including emergency haying 

and grazing on otherwise ineligible CRP 

CPs (as addressed in the 2012 CRP PEA 

and FONSI); and 

• Providing transition options for 

expiring contracts to enroll in other 

conservation programs. 

Signed on November 21, 2013. 

Candace Thompson, 

Acting Executive Vice President, Commodity 

Credit Corporation, and Acting 

Administrator, Farm Service Agency. 

[FR Doc. 2013–28520 Filed 11–27–13; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3410–05–P 

CIVIL RIGHTS COMMISSION 

Agenda and Notice of Public Meeting 

of the New York Advisory Committee 

Notice is hereby given, pursuant to 

the provisions of the rules and 

regulations of the U.S. Commission on 

Civil Rights (Commission), and the 

Federal Advisory Committee Act 

(FACA), that a planning meeting of the 

New York Advisory Committee to the 

Commission will convene at 12 p.m. 

(EST) on December 12, 2013. The 

purpose of the meeting is project 

planning to discuss the scope of the 

Advisory Committee’s project on 

disparate treatment of youth in the New 

York correctional system. 

These meetings will be conducted via 

conference call. Members of the public, 

including persons with hearing 

impairments, who wish to listen to the 

conference call should contact the 

Eastern Regional Office (ERO), ten days 

in advance of the scheduled meeting, so 

that a sufficient number of lines may be 

reserved. You may contact the Eastern 

Regional Office by phone at 202–376– 

7533—persons with hearing 

impairments would first call the Federal 

Relay Service at 1–800–977–8339 and 

give them the ERO number 202–376– 

7533—or by email at ero@usccr.gov. 

Those contacting ERO will be given 

instructions on how to listen to the 

conference call. 

Members of the public who call-in 

can expect to incur charges for calls 

they initiate over wireless lines, and the 

Commission will not refund any 

incurred charges. Callers will incur no 

charge for calls they initiate over landline connections to the toll-free 

telephone number. 

Members of the public are entitled to 

submit written comments. The 

comments must be received in the 

regional office by January 14, 2014. 

Comments may be mailed to the Eastern 

Regional Office, U.S. Commission on 

Civil Rights, 1331 Pennsylvania 

Avenue, Suite 1150, Washington, DC 

20425, faxed to (202) 376–7548, or 

emailed to ero@usccr.gov. Persons who 

desire additional information may 

contact the Eastern Regional Office at 

202–376–7533. 

Records generated from this meeting 

may be inspected and reproduced at the 

Eastern Regional Office, as they become 

available, both before and after the 

meeting. Persons interested in the work 

of this advisory committee are advised 

to go to the Commission’s Web site, 

www.usccr.gov, or to contact the Eastern 

Regional Office at the above phone 

number, email or street address. 


sroberts on DSK5SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES