302 Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 2 / Wednesday, January 3, 2018 / Proposed Rules 

§ 200.80f [Removed] 

■ 8. Remove § 200.80f. 

By the Commission. 

Dated: December 21, 2017. 

Brent J. Fields, 

Secretary. 

[FR Doc. 2017–27967 Filed 1–2–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 8011–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 

Forest Service 

36 CFR Part 220 

[Docket No. 

RIN 0596–AD31 

National Environmental Policy Act 

Compliance 

AGENCY: Forest Service, USDA. 

ACTION: Advance notice of proposed 

rulemaking; request for comment. 

SUMMARY: The Forest Service is 

proposing to revise its National 

Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) 

procedures with the goal of increasing 

efficiency of environmental analysis. 

This will help the Forest Service 

implement its core mission by 

increasing the health and productivity 

of our Nation’s forests for the benefit of 

all Americans, and in turn foster 

productive and sustainable use of 

National Forest System lands. The 

Agency’s NEPA procedures are a key 

component of its overall environmental 

analysis and decision-making process. 

The Agency is seeking comments from 

the public on ways it can achieve the 

goals of increased efficiency of 

environmental analysis. 

DATES: Comments must be received in 

writing by February 2, 2018. 

ADDRESSES: Please submit comments via 

one of the following methods: 

1. Public participation portal 

(preferred): https://cara.ecosystemmanagement.org/Public/ 

CommentInput?project=ORMS-1797. 

2. Mail: NEPA Services Group, c/o 

Amy Barker; USDA Forest Service, 

Geospatial Technology and 

Applications Center, 2222 West 2300 

South, Salt Lake City, UT 84119. 

3. Email: nepa-procedures- revision@

fs.fed.us. 

All comments, including names and 

addresses when provided, are placed in 

the record and are available for public 

inspection and copying. The public may 

inspect comments received online via 

the public reading room at https://cara.

ecosystem-management.org/Public/

ReadingRoom?project=ORMS-1797, or 

at U.S. Forest Service, Ecosystem 

Management Coordination, 201 14th St. 

SW, 2 Central, Washington, DC 20024. 

Visitors are encouraged to call ahead to 

(202) 205–1475 to facilitate entry to the 

building. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Jim 

Smalls; Assistant Director, Ecosystem 

Management Coordination; 202–205– 

1475. Individuals who use 

telecommunication devices for the deaf 

(TDD) may call the Federal Information 

Relay Service (FIRS) at 1–800–877–8339 

between 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m., 

Eastern Standard Time, Monday 

through Friday. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Background 

The Forest Service is proposing to 

revise its NEPA procedures (including 

its regulations at 36 CFR part 220, Forest 

Service Manual 1950, and Forest 

Service Handbook 1909.15) with the 

goal of increasing efficiency of 

environmental analysis. The Agency 

will continue to hold true to its 

commitment to deliver scientifically 

based, high-quality analysis to decision 

makers that honors its environmental 

stewardship responsibilities while 

maintaining robust public particiption. 

These values are at the core of the Forest 

Service mission. 

Reforming the Forest Service’s NEPA 

procedures is needed for a variety of 

reasons. An increasing percentage of the 

Agency’s resources are spent each year 

to provide the necessary resources for 

wildfire suppression, resulting in fewer 

resources available for other 

management activities such as 

restoration. In 1995, fire made up 16 

percent of the Forest Service’s annual 

appropriated budget. In 2017, more than 

50 percent of the Forest Service’s annual 

budget will be dedicated to wildfire. 

Along with this shift in resources, there 

has also been a corresponding shift in 

staff, with a 39 percent reduction in all 

non-fire personnel since 1995. 

Additionally, the Agency has a backlog 

of more than 6,000 special use permits 

awaiting completion, and over 80 

million acres of National Forest System 

land are in need of restoration to reduce 

the risk of wildfire, insect epidemics, 

and forest diseases. 

Increasing efficiency of environmental 

analysis will enable the Agency to 

complete more projects needed to 

increase the health and productivity of 

our national forests and grasslands. The 

Agency’s goal is to complete project 

decision making in a timelier manner, to 

improve or eliminate inefficient 

processes and steps, and where 

appropriate increase the scale of 

analysis and the amount of activities 

authorized in a single analysis and 

decision. Improving the efficiency of 

environmental analysis and decision 

making will enable the agency to ensure 

lands and watersheds are sustainable, 

healthy, and productive; mitigate 

wildfire risk; and contribute to the 

economic health of rural communities 

through use and access opportunities. 

Agency NEPA Procedures 

Each Federal agency is required to 

develop NEPA procedures that 

supplement the Council on 

Environmental Quality (CEQ) 

regulations and reflect the agency’s 

unique mandate and mission. The CEQ 

encourages agencies to periodically 

review their NEPA procedures. The 

Forest Service’s NEPA procedures were 

last reviewed in 2008 when the Agency 

moved a subset of its NEPA procedures 

from the Forest Service Manual and 

Handbook to the Code of Federal 

Regulations. However, the Agency’s 

NEPA procedures still reflect in part the 

policies and practices established by the 

Agency’s 1992 NEPA Manual and 

Handbook. The proposed revision of the 

Forest Service’s NEPA procedures will 

be developed in consultation with CEQ. 

Request for Comment 

The Agency is seeking public 

comment on the following: 

• Processes and analysis 

requirements that can be modified, 

reduced, or eliminated in order to 

reduce time and cost while maintaining 

science-based, high-quality analysis; 

public involvement; and honoring 

agency stewardship responsibilities. 

• Approaches to landscape-scale 

analysis and decision making under 

NEPA that facilitate restoration of 

National Forest System lands. 

• Classes of actions that are unlikely, 

either individually or cumulatively, to 

have significant impacts and therefore 

should be categorically excluded from 

NEPA’s environmental assessment and 

environmental impact statement 

requirements, such as integrated 

restoration projects; special use 

authorizations; and activities to 

maintain and manage Agency sites 

(including recreation sites), facilities, 

and associated infrastructure. 

• Ways the Agency might expand and 

enhance coordination of environmental 

review and authorization decisions with 

other Federal agencies, as well as State, 

Tribal, or local environmental reviews. 


jstallworth on DSKBBY8HB2PROD with PROPOSALS
Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 2 / Wednesday, January 3, 2018 / Proposed Rules 303 

Dated: December 20, 2017. 

Tony Tooke, 

Chief, USDA, Forest Service. 

[FR Doc. 2017–28298 Filed 1–2–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3411–15–P 

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS 

COMMISSION 

47 CFR Part 54 

[WC Docket No. 17–310; FCC 17–164] 

Promoting Telehealth in Rural America 

AGENCY: Federal Communications 

Commission. 

ACTION: Proposed rule. 

SUMMARY: In this document, the Federal 

Communications Commission 

(Commission) proposes measured steps 

as part of a Notice of Proposed 

Rulemaking and Order to ensure that 

rural healthcare providers get the 

support they need while guarding 

against waste, fraud, and abuse, 

considers a series of measures to ensure 

the Rural Health Care (RHC) Program 

operates efficiently and considers the 

appropriate size of the funding cap. The 

Commission takes targeted, immediate 

action in the Order section of the item 

to mitigate the impact of the existing 

RHC Program cap on rural healthcare 

providers in funding year (FY) 2017. 

Because the Order section does not 

establish any final rules, we do not 

incorporate the Order section in this 

document. 

DATES: Comments are due February 2, 

2018, and reply comments are due on or 

before February 20, 2018. If you 

anticipate that you will be submitting 

comments, but find it difficult to do so 

within the period of time allowed by 

this document, you should advise the 

contact listed below as soon as possible. 

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, 

identified by WC Docket No. 17–310, by 

any of the following methods: 

• Federal eRulemaking Portal: http:// 

www.regulations.gov. Follow the 

instructions for submitting comments. 

• Federal Communications 

Commission’s website: http://

apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/. Follow the 

instructions for submitting comments. 

• People with Disabilities: Contact the 

FCC to request reasonable 

accommodations (accessible format 

documents, sign language interpreters, 

CART, etc.) by email: FCC504@fcc.gov 

or phone: (202) 418–0530 or TTY: (202) 

418–0432. 

For detailed instructions for 

submitting comments and additional 

information on the rulemaking process, 

see the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

section of this document. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Radhika Karmarkar, Wireline 

Competition Bureau, (202) 418–7400 or 

TTY: (202) 418–0484. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This is a 

summary of the Commission’s Notice of 

Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) in WC 

Docket No. 17–310; FCC 17–164, 

adopted on December 14, 2017 and 

released on December 18, 2017. The full 

text of this document is available for 

public inspection during regular 

business hours in the FCC Reference 

Center, Room CY–A257, 445 12th Street 

SW, Washington, DC 20554 or at the 

following internet address: https://

apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/ 

FCC-17-164A1.pdf. 

I. Introduction 

1. In this Notice of Proposed 

Rulemaking (NPRM), the Commission 

proposes measured steps to ensure that 

rural healthcare providers get the 

support they need while guarding 

against waste, fraud, and abuse. The 

Commission considers a series of 

measures to ensure the Rural Health 

Care (RHC) Program operates efficiently 

and in the appropriate size of the 

funding cap. 

2. As technology and telemedicine 

assume an increasingly critical role in 

healthcare delivery, a well-designed 

RHC Program is more vital than ever. 

Trends suggest that rural communities 

across the country are falling behind 

when it comes to the availability of 

high-quality healthcare. Indeed, the 

American Hospital Association (AHA) 

reports that ‘‘obtaining access to care in 

rural America is a significant 

challenge.’’ Over the last seven years, 

over 80 rural hospitals have closed and 

hundreds more are at risk of closing. On 

a per capita basis, there are far fewer 

doctors in rural areas than in urban 

areas. In sum, ‘‘rural hospitals are facing 

one of the great slow-moving crises in 

American health care.’’ 

3. By improving rural healthcare 

provider access to modern 

communications services, the RHC 

Program can help in overcoming some 

of the obstacles to healthcare delivery 

faced in isolated communities. Through 

broadband-enabled technology, a rural 

clinic can transmit an x-ray in a matter 

of seconds to a radiologist located 

thousands of miles away. Via videoconferencing, a woman with a high-risk 

pregnancy has access to the type of prenatal care that enables her baby to be 

delivered much closer to term. This in 

turn leads to fewer days in the Neonatal 

Intensive Care Unit for the baby and 

potentially places the child and family 

on a more positive future trajectory. 

With a high-speed data connection, a 

surgeon can perform an emergency 

procedure remotely. In places where the 

nearest pharmacist is a plane ride away, 

vending machine-like devices can 

dispense prescription medications. 

4. The efforts by the Commission’s 

Connect2HealthFCC (Connect2Health) 

Task Force have illustrated the 

significant impact communications 

services can have on addressing the 

healthcare needs of persons living in 

rural and underserved areas, and how 

communities are leveraging broadbandenabled health technologies to improve 

access to health and care throughout the 

country. For example, in Mississippi, 

the Connect2Health Task Force 

highlighted the positive impact of 

public-private partnerships on health 

outcomes and how broadband-enabled 

health technologies have made a 

difference to diabetes patients in 

Mississippi. Additionally, in Texas, the 

Connect2Health Task Force emphasized 

how broadband-enabled health 

technologies can improve access to 

mental health care. 

5. It is therefore crucial that the 

benefits of the RHC Program are fully 

realized across the nation. But current 

RHC Program rules and procedures may 

be holding back the promise of the RHC 

Program for the rural healthcare 

providers that need it most. For the 

second funding year (FY) in a row, 

demand for RHC Program support is 

anticipated to exceed available program 

funding, leaving healthcare providers to 

potentially pay more for service than 

expected. Unfortunately, part of that 

growth is due to an increase in waste, 

fraud, and abuse in the RHC Program. 

Further, the Telecommunications 

(Telecom) Program, a component of the 

RHC Program, has not been significantly 

reviewed or revised since its inception 

in 1997. 

II. Notice of Proposed Rulemaking 

A. Addressing RHC Program Funding 

Levels 

1. Revisiting the RHC Program Funding 

Cap 

6. The current cap on the RHC 

Program has remained at $400 million 

since its inception in 1997. RHC 

Program demand, however, exceeded 

the cap in FY 2016 and is expected to 

exceed the cap in FY 2017 and in future 

years. The proration that comes with 

capped funding may be especially hard 

on small, rural healthcare providers 

with limited budgets, and so the 

Commission examines whether a cap of 

$400 million is an appropriate level of 


jstallworth on DSKBBY8HB2PROD with PROPOSALS