Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 173 / Thursday, September 6, 2012 / Notices 54905 

Submission Requirements: 

(a) In preparing your application, you 

must comply with the requirements in 

§ 462.11. 

(b) In accordance with § 462.10, the 

deadline for transmittal of applications 

is October 1. 

(c) Whether you submit your 

application by mail (through the U.S. 

Postal Service or a commercial carrier) 

or deliver your application by hand or 

by courier service, you must mail or 

deliver three copies of your application, 

on or before the deadline date, to the 

following address: NRS Assessment 

Review, c/o American Institutes for 

Research, 1000 Thomas Jefferson Street 

NW., Washington, DC 20007. 

(d) If you submit your application by 

mail or commercial carrier, you must 

show proof of mailing consisting of one 

of the following: 

(1) A legibly dated U.S. Postal Service 

postmark. 

(2) A legible mail receipt with the 

date of mailing stamped by the U.S. 

Postal Service. 

(3) A dated shipping label, invoice, or 

receipt from a commercial carrier. 

(4) Any other proof of mailing 

acceptable to the Secretary of the 

Department of Education. 

(e) If you mail your application 

through the U.S. Postal Service, we do 

not accept either of the following as 

proof of mailing: 

(1) A private metered postmark. 

(2) A mail receipt that is not dated by 

the U.S. Postal Service. 

(f) If your application is postmarked 

after the application deadline date, we 

will not consider your 

Note: The U.S. Postal Service does not 

uniformly provide a dated postmark. Before 

relying on this method, you should check 

with your local post office. 

(g) If you submit your application by 

hand delivery, you (or a courier service) 

must deliver three copies of the 

application by hand, on or before 

4:30:00 p.m., Washington, DC time, on 

the application deadline date. 

Accessible Format: Individuals with 

disabilities can obtain this document in 

an accessible format (e.g., braille, large 

print, audiotape, or compact disc) on 

request to the contact person listed in 

this notice. 

Electronic Access to This Document: 

The official version of this document is 

the document published in the Federal 

Register. Free Internet access to the 

official edition of the Federal Register 

and the Code of Federal Regulations is 

available via the Federal Digital System 

at: www.gpo.gov/fdsys. At this site you 

can view this document, as well as all 

other documents of this Department 

published in the Federal Register, in 

text or Adobe Portable Document 

Format (PDF). To use PDF you must 

have Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is 

available free at the site. 

You may also access documents of the 

Department published in the Federal 

Register by using the article search 

feature at: www.federalregister.gov. 

Specifically, through the advanced 

search feature at this site, you can limit 

your search to documents published by 

the Department. 

Authority: 20 U.S.C. 9212 

Dated: August 30, 2012. 

Brenda Dann-Messier, 

Assistant Secretary for Vocational and Adult 

Education. 

[FR Doc. 2012–21866 Filed 9–5–12; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4000–01–P 

ELECTION ASSISTANCE COMMISSION 

Request for Substantive Comments on 

the EAC’s Proposed Requirements for 

Version 1.1 of the Voluntary Voting 

System Guidelines (VVSG) 

AGENCY: United States Election 

Assistance Commission. 

ACTION: Request for public comment on 

proposed requirements for Version 1.1 

of the Voluntary Voting System 

Guidelines (VVSG). 

SUMMARY: The Help America Vote Act of 

2002 (HAVA) (Pub. L. 107–252; 42 

U.S.C. 15301 et seq. (October 29, 2002)) 

established the U.S. Election Assistance 

Commission (EAC). Section 202 of 

HAVA directs the EAC to adopt 

voluntary voting system guidelines 

(VVSG) and to provide for the testing, 

certification, decertification, and 

recertification of voting system 

hardware and software. The VVSG 

provides specifications and standards 

against which voting systems can be 

tested to determine if they provide basic 

functionality, accessibility, and security 

capabilities. As required by Section 222 

(d) of HAVA, the EAC is publishing a 

set of proposed requirements (Voluntary 

Voting System Guidelines, 1.1) for the 

testing of voting systems for a 90 day 

public comment period. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Background 

The EAC made the decision to update 

and revise the 2005 VVSG (also known 

as VVSG 1.0) as a result of feedback 

received through its Voting System 

Testing and Certification Program. As 

the EAC has worked to test and certify 

voting systems it observed and received 

feedback from various sources that the 

standards being tested to were at times 

ambiguous and difficult to apply in 

testing. This ambiguity led to challenges 

in making testing consistent both within 

a test laboratory and across test 

campaigns at different laboratories. The 

EAC also received feedback from the 

National Institute of Standards and 

Technology (NIST) that the creation of 

formalized test suites for the 2005 VVSG 

would be aided by a clarification of 

certain portions of document. This 

information, combined with the EAC’s 

issuance of thirty five interpretations of 

the VVSG to clarify various standards, 

led the EAC to propose improvements to 

the 2005 VVSG. In addition, the EAC 

determined to implement a number of 

recommendations submitted by the 

EAC’s Technical Guidelines 

Development Committee (TGDC). 

The TGDC held numerous public 

meetings and subcommittee conference 

calls to create a set of draft guidelines 

for recommendation to the EAC (all 

TGDC meeting materials can be found at 

http://www.nist.gov/itl/vote/). On 

August 17, 2007, the TGDC voted to 

complete final edits of their 

recommendations and submitted them 

to the Executive Director of the EAC. 

The EAC received the draft guidelines 

from the TGDC on August 31, 2007. 

After receipt of the TGDC’s 

recommendations for the next iteration 

(VVSG 2.0) of the VVSG the EAC 

opened a one hundred and eighty day 

public comment period. During this 

comment period, which ran from 

September 2007 to May 2008, the EAC 

received comments praising many of the 

proposed standards as being more 

testable and less ambiguous than 

previous versions of the standard. This 

public comment period produced over 

3000 comments on the 

recommendations. In addition, during 

the comment period the EAC conducted 

a series of seven roundtable discussions 

regarding the TGDC’s recommendations. 

After the close of the public comment 

period for the TGDC’s VVSG 2.0 

recommendations and considering a 

variety of relevant factors, the EAC 

made the decision to first update and 

revise the 2005 VVSG with portions of 

the TGDC’s recommendations. This 

serves as the basis for the creation of 

VVSG 1.1. 

As noted during the previous public 

comment period for version VVSG 1.1, 

by revising the guidelines now, the EAC 

expects to improve the test process over 

the short term for existing voting 

systems while allowing additional time 

to develop more complex revisions for 

the requirements in VVSG 2.0 written 

for the next generation of voting 

systems. Topics currently undergoing 


TKELLEY on DSK3SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
54906 Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 173 / Thursday, September 6, 2012 / Notices 

continued research at NIST include 

open ended vulnerability testing/ 

penetration testing, volume testing, 

further development of the concept of 

software independence and the 

development (with IEEE Working Group 

P1622 of a common data format for 

voting systems. 

Changes to VVSG 1.1 Since the Initial 

Public Comment Period 

The initial proposed revision to VVSG 

1.1, was offered during a 120-day public 

comment period in the summer of 2009. 

Since that time, the EAC’s Testing & 

Certification Program has discovered 

additional best practices, experienced 

anomalies and deficiencies with voting 

systems entering the Testing and 

Certification Program, and clarified 

many ambiguities with the standard. 

Changes were made after the 120-day 

public comment period to address these 

issues. Since the initial public 

comment, changes were made to the 

following areas: 

Heading Comment 

Telecommunications ..................................................................................................................... Treated all results as official. 

NSRL ............................................................................................................................................ Removed all references. 

Software Validation ....................................................................................................................... Provided a secondary method of software validation not available in the 2005 VVSG. 

Access Control ............................................................................................................................. Enhanced access control requirements based on 

the two-tier access control model present in 

today’s election equipment. 

Quality Assurance and Configuration Management .................................................................... Combined sections 8 and 9 into a single section. 

Coding Convention 

Required Languages .................................................................................................................... Required all systems to officially support at least 

one ideographic language. 

Audit and Election Logging .......................................................................................................... Enhanced and strengthen logging requirements 

by providing greater clarity and specific, especially for election logs. 

Additionally, the EAC included all 

relevant Requests for Interpretations 

(located at the EAC’s Web site) within 

the latest draft of VVSG 1.1. Please be 

aware that those sections added since 

the close of the initial public comment 

period for VVSG 1,1 are the only 

sections that the EAC is accepting 

comments on for this 90-day public 

comment period. 

Project Summary 

Although both Volume 1 and Volume 

2 of the VVSG 1.1 draft have undergone 

revisions, and should be commented on, 

we believe most commenter’s should 

focus on the significant changes to 

Volume 1 of the draft document. Major 

sections of VVSG 1.1 Volume 1 revised 

for this comment period include but are 

not limited to: 

Volume 1 

2.12 Accuracy 

2.1.4 Integrity 

2.1.5.1 Operational Requirements 

2.3.1 Opening the Polls 

2.3.3.3 DRE and EBM System 

requirements 

2.4.1 Closing the Polls 

2.4.4.2 Tabulator electronic reports 

3.2.2.1 Editable electronic ballot 

interfaces 

3.2.5 Visual display characteristics 

3.3.2 Enhanced visual interfaces 

3.3.4 Enhanced input and control 

characteristics 

4.1.1 Accuracy requirements 

4.1.2 Environmental requirements 

4.1.2.4 Electrical supply 

4.1.5.2 Ballot reading accuracy 

4.3.3 Reliability 

5.2.1 Scope (Software requirements) 

5.2.2 Selection of programming 

languages 

5.2.4 Software modularity and 

programming 

5.2.5 Structured programming 

5.2.8 Error checking 

5.5 Vote secrecy on DRE and EBM 

systems 

6.2.2 Durability (Telecommunications) 

6.2.3 Reliability 

7.1 Scope (Security requirements) 

7.2 Access control 

7.3 Physical security measures 

7.4.4 Software distribution 

7.4.5 Software reference information 

7.4.6 Software setup validation 

7.5.1 Maintaining data integrity 

7.5.5 Election returns 

7.7.3 Protecting transmitted data 

7.8.2 Approve or void the paper record 

7.8.3 Electronic and paper record 

structure 

8 Quality Assurance and Configuration 

Management (all) 

All changes made since the last public 

comment period are highlighted in 

yellow in the version published on the 

EAC’s Web site and in the Federal 

Register. 

The U.S. Election Assistance 

Commission (EAC) lacks a quorum of 

commissioners since the resignation of 

Commissioner Gracia Hillman on 

December 10, 2010. The EAC lost its 

two remaining commissioners in 

December 2011, with the resignations of 

Commissioners Gineen Bresso and 

Donetta Davidson. Because HAVA 

requires an affirmative vote of the 

Commission (Section 222(d)), all 

comments received will be reviewed 

and published as noted below. The final 

VVSG 1.1 draft document will be 

prepared for a Commission vote at such 

time as the EAC once again has a 

quorum of Commissioners. 

DATES: Comments must be received on 

or before 4 p.m. EST on December 5, 

2012. 

Submission of Comments: The public 

may submit comments through one of 

the two different methods provided by 

the EAC: (1) Email submissions to 

votingsystemguidelines@eac.gov; (2) by 

mail to Voluntary Voting System 

Guidelines Comments, U.S. Election 

Assistance Commission, 1201 New York 

Ave. NW., Suite 300, Washington, DC 

20005. 

In order to allow efficient and 

effective review of comments the EAC 

requests that: 

(1) Comments refer to the specific 

section that is the subject of the 

comment. 

(2) General comments regarding the 

entire document or comments that refer 

to more than one section be made as 

specifically as possible so that EAC can 

clearly understand to which portion(s) 

of the documents the comment refers. 

(3) To the extent that a comment 

suggests a change in the wording of a 

requirement or section of the guidelines, 

please provide proposed language for 

the suggested change. 


TKELLEY on DSK3SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 173 / Thursday, September 6, 2012 / Notices 54907 

All comments submitted will be 

published at the end of the comment 

period on the EAC’s Web site at 

www.eac.gov. This publication and 

request for comment is not required 

under the rulemaking, adjudicative, or 

licensing provisions of the 

Administrative Procedures Act (APA). It 

is a voluntary effort by the EAC to 

gather input from the public on the 

EAC’s administrative procedures for 

certifying voting systems to be used in 

pilot projects. Furthermore, this request 

by the EAC for public comment is not 

intended to make any of the APA’s 

rulemaking provisions applicable to 

development of this or future EAC 

procedural programs. 

An electronic copy of the proposed 

guidance may be found on the EAC’s 

Web site at http://www.eac.gov/open/ 

comment.aspx. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Brian Hancock, Phone (202) 566–3100, 

email votingsystemguidelines@eac.gov. 

Alice P. Miller, 

Chief Operating Officer and Acting Executive 

Director, U.S. Election Assistance 

Commission. 

[FR Doc. 2012–21895 Filed 9–5–12; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE P 

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission 

Combined Notice of Filings #2 

Take notice that the Commission 

received the following electric rate 

filings: 

Docket Numbers: ER10–2601–001; 

ER10–2605–003. 

Applicants: Power Resources, Ltd., 

Yuma Cogeneration Associates. 

Description: Notification of Changes 

in Status of Power Resources, Ltd., et al. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5072. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER11–4267–002; 

ER11–4270–002; ER11–4269–003; 

ER11–4268–002; ER11–113–003; ER10– 

2682–002. 

Applicants: Algonquin Northern 

Maine Gen Co., Algonquin Tinker Gen 

Co., Algonquin Power Windsor Locks 

LLC, Algonquin Energy Services Inc., 

Sandy Ridge Wind, LLC, Granite State 

Electric Company. 

Description: Notice of Change in 

Status of Algonquin Energy Services 

Inc., et al. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5071. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2430–001. 

Applicants: AP&G Holdings LLC. 

Description: Amendment to pending 

baseline filing 1 to be effective 8/10/ 

2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5001. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2529–000. 

Applicants: KODE Novus II, LLC. 

Description: KODE Novus II LLC MBR 

Application to be effective 10/27/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5040. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2530–000. 

Applicants: Southwest Power Pool, 

Inc. 

Description: 2028R3 Sunflower 

Electric Power Corporation NITSA NOA 

to be effective 8/1/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5053. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2531–000. 

Applicants: ISO New England Inc., 

Central Maine Power Company. 

Description: Kibby Wind Power Large 

Generator Interconnection Agreement to 

be effective 8/31/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5066. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2532–000. 

Applicants: ISO New England Inc., 

Central Maine Power Company. 

Description: Sisk Wind Power Large 

Generator Interconnection Agreement to 

be effective 8/31/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5068. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2533–000. 

Applicants: KODE Novus I, LLC. 

Description: Filing of Shared 

Facilities Agreement to be effective 

4/27/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5073. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

Docket Numbers: ER12–2534–000. 

Applicants: Southwestern Public 

Service Company. 

Description: 8–28–12_RS145 SPS– 

LCEC Gen Agreement to be effective 

9/1/2012. 

Filed Date: 8/28/12. 

Accession Number: 20120828–5079. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/18/12. 

The filings are accessible in the 

Commission’s eLibrary system by 

clicking on the links or querying the 

docket number. 

Any person desiring to intervene or 

protest in any of the above proceedings 

must file in accordance with Rules 211 

and 214 of the Commission’s 

Regulations (18 CFR 385.211 and 

385.214) on or before 5:00 p.m. Eastern 

time on the specified comment date. 

Protests may be considered, but 

intervention is necessary to become a 

party to the proceeding. 

eFiling is encouraged. More detailed 

information relating to filing 

requirements, interventions, protests, 

service, and qualifying facilities filings 

can be found at: http://www.ferc.gov/ 

docs-filing/efiling/filing-req.pdf. For 

other information, call (866) 208–3676 

(toll free). For TTY, call (202) 502–8659. 

Dated: August 28, 2012. 

Nathaniel J. Davis, Sr., 

Deputy Secretary. 

[FR Doc. 2012–21962 Filed 9–5–12; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 6717–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission 

Combined Notice of Filings 

Take notice that the Commission has 

received the following Natural Gas 

Pipeline Rate and Refund Report filings: 

Filings Instituting Proceedings 

Docket Numbers: RP12–961–000 

Applicants: East Tennessee Natural 

Gas, LLC 

Description: Imbalance Provision 

Cleanup to be effective 10/1/2012 

Filed Date: 8/28/12 

Accession Number: 20120828–5041 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/10/12 

Docket Numbers: RP12–962–000 

Applicants: Cheyenne Plains Gas 

Pipeline Company, L. 

Description: Table of Contents Update 

to be effective 9/28/2012 

Filed Date: 8/28/12 

Accession Number: 20120828–5101 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/10/12 

Docket Numbers: RP12–963–000 

Applicants: Equitrans, L.P. 

Description: Negotiated Rate Service 

Agreement—PDC Mountaineer, LLC to 

be effective 9/1/2012 

Filed Date: 8/28/12 

Accession Number: 20120828–5106 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/10/12 

Docket Numbers: RP12–964–000 

Applicants: Equitrans, L.P. 

Description: Neg Rate Service 

Agreement—PDCM Amended Exh A to 

be effective 9/1/2012 

Filed Date: 8/28/12 

Accession Number: 20120828–5107 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 9/10/12 

Any person desiring to intervene or 

protest in any of the above proceedings 

must file in accordance with Rules 211 


TKELLEY on DSK3SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES