1634 Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 9 / Friday, January 12, 2018 / Notices 

The information collection 

requirements specified in the Cotton 

Dust Standard protect workers from the 

adverse health effects that may result 

from their exposure to cotton dust. The 

major information collection 

requirements of the Cotton Dust 

Standard include: Performing exposure 

monitoring, including initial, periodic, 

and additional monitoring; notifying 

each worker of their exposure 

monitoring results either in writing or 

by posting; implementing a written 

compliance program; and establishing a 

respiratory protection program in accord 

with OSHA’s Respiratory Protection 

Standard (29 CFR 1910.134). 

II. Special Issues for Comment 

OSHA has a particular interest in 

comments on the following issues: 

• Whether the proposed information 

collection requirements are necessary 

for the proper performance of the 

Agency’s functions, including whether 

the information is useful; 

• The accuracy of OSHA’s estimate of 

the burden (time and costs) of the 

information collection requirements, 

including the validity of the 

methodology and assumptions used; 

• The quality, utility, and clarity of 

the information collected; and 

• Ways to minimize the burden on 

employers who must comply. For 

example, by using automated or other 

technological information collection 

and transmission techniques. 

III. Proposed Actions 

OSHA is requesting to decrease its 

current burden hours from 21,549 to 

9,532 hours, a total decrease of 12,017 

hours. The decrease was due to a 

decrease in the number of exposed 

employees from 11,786 to 4,957. In 

addition, there was a $1,555,336 

decrease in the overall cost of medical 

exams (from $2,896,328 to $1,340,992), 

as a result of a decrease in the number 

of medical exams. 

Type of Review: Extension of a 

currently approved collection. 

Title: Cotton Dust Standard (29 CFR 

1910.1043). 

OMB Control Number: 1218–0061. 

Affected Public: Business or other forprofits. 

Number of Respondents: 5,474. 

Frequency of Responses: On occasion. 

Total Responses: 25,712. 

Average Time per Response: Various. 

Estimated Total Burden Hours: 9,532 

hours. 

Estimated Cost (Operation and 

Maintenance): $0. 

IV. Public Participation—Submission of 

Comments on This Notice and Internet 

Access to Comments and Submissions 

You may submit comments in 

response to this document as follows: 

(1) Electronically at http://

www.regulations.gov, which is the 

Federal eRulemaking Portal; (2) by 

facsimile (fax); or (3) by hard copy. All 

comments, attachments, and other 

material must identify the Agency name 

and the OSHA docket number for the 

ICR (Docket No. OSHA–2011–0194). 

You may supplement electronic 

submissions by uploading document 

files electronically. If you wish to mail 

additional materials in reference to an 

electronic or facsimile submission, you 

must submit them to the OSHA Docket 

Office (see the section of this notice 

titled ADDRESSES). The additional 

materials must clearly identify your 

electronic comments by your name, 

date, and the docket number so the 

Agency can attach them to your 

comments. 

Because of security procedures, the 

use of regular mail may cause a 

significant delay in the receipt of 

comments. For information about 

security procedures concerning the 

delivery of materials by hand, express 

delivery, messenger, or courier service, 

please contact the OSHA Docket Office 

at (202) 693–2350, (TTY (877) 889– 

5627). 

Comments and submissions are 

posted without change at http://

www.regulations.gov. Therefore, OSHA 

cautions commenters about submitting 

personal information such as social 

security numbers and dates of birth. 

Although all submissions are listed in 

the http://www.regulations.gov index, 

some information (e.g., copyrighted 

material) is not publicly available to 

read or download from this website. 

All submissions, including 

copyrighted material, are available for 

inspection and copying at the OSHA 

Docket Office. Information on using the 

http://www.regulations.gov website to 

submit comments and access the docket 

is available at the website’s ‘‘User Tips’’ 

link. Contact the OSHA Docket Office 

for information about materials not 

available from the website and for 

assistance in using the internet to locate 

docket submissions. 

V. Authority and Signature 

Loren Sweatt, Deputy Assistant 

Secretary of Labor for Occupational 

Safety and Health, directed the 

preparation of this notice. The authority 

for this notice is the Paperwork 

Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. 3506 

et seq.) and Secretary of Labor’s Order 

No. 1–2012 (77 FR 3912). 

Signed at Washington, DC, on January 8, 

2018. 

Loren Sweatt, 

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor for 

Occupational Safety and Health. 

[FR Doc. 2018–00393 Filed 1–11–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4510–26–P 

OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND 

BUDGET 

Request for Information 

AGENCY: Office of Information and 

Regulatory Affairs, U.S. Office of 

Management and Budget. 

ACTION: Request for information. 

SUMMARY: The Chief Statistician of the 

United States and the Statistical and 

Science Policy Branch (SSP) in the U.S. 

Office of Management and Budget 

(OMB) seek to establish priorities and 

coordinate research efforts across the 

Federal Statistical System to focus on 

improving federal statistics. In 

particular, a priority has been placed on 

using new techniques and 

methodologies based on combining data 

from multiple sources. To support this 

effort, information is requested on: (1) 

Current and emerging techniques for 

linking and analyzing combined data; 

(2) on-going research on methods to 

describe the quality of statistical 

products that result from these 

techniques; (3) computational 

frameworks and systems for conducting 

such work; (4) privacy or confidentiality 

issues that may arise from combining 

such data; and (5) suggestions for 

additional research in those or related 

areas. While there are regulatory and 

statutory constraints on combining data 

within the federal government, the 

information sought concerns how best 

to combine data once they are accessed 

appropriately and successfully. The 

intent is for the research to inform the 

adoption of revised statistical standards 

regarding the use of such combined data 

for federal purposes, including but not 

limited to the production of principal 

key economic indicators and 

demographic statistical products. 

DATES: Submit written comments within 

60 days of publication date. 

ADDRESSES: All responses must be 

submitted electronically to the 

following email address: FN-OMBCombined-Data-RFI@omb.eop.gov. 

You will receive an electronic 

confirmation acknowledging receipt of 

your response, but will not receive 

individualized feedback. 


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Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 9 / Friday, January 12, 2018 / Notices 1635 

Response to this Request for 

Information (RFI) is voluntary. Any 

personal identifiers (e.g., names, 

addresses, email addresses, etc.) will be 

available to the public when responses 

are compiled. Proprietary, classified, 

confidential, or sensitive information 

should not be included in your 

response. 

This RFI is for information and 

planning purposes only. It should not be 

construed as a solicitation or as an 

obligation on the part of the Federal 

Government, the Office of Management 

and Budget, the Chief Statistician of the 

United States or SSP. OMB does not 

intend to make any awards based on 

responses to this RFI or to otherwise pay 

for the preparation of any information 

submitted or for the Government’s use 

of such information. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Bob 

Sivinski, Statistician, Office of 

Information and Regulatory Affairs, U.S. 

Office of Management and Budget, New 

Executive Office Building Room 9257, 

725 17th St. NW, Washington, DC 

20006; telephone: (202) 395–1205 (this 

is not a toll-free number). 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The 

federal government produces a wide 

array of statistical data that are a critical 

national resource. The use of these data 

are central to our democracy and 

include: Supporting constitutional 

duties, such as reapportionment of the 

House of Representatives; allocating 

resources to states, localities, tribes, 

businesses and individuals; supporting 

good planning at all levels of federal, 

state, local and tribal governments; 

describing our economic wellbeing; 

providing evidence to address critical 

problems facing our nation, such as 

opioid addiction; supporting informed 

public and private decision making that 

will create jobs and improve our 

infrastructure; and creating 

opportunities for local communities. 

These statistics use well-tested and 

documented processes that rely on 

censuses, sample surveys or 

administrative records. However, the 

federal government is facing a number 

of challenges for these traditional 

methods supporting informational 

needs of the future. It is well 

documented 1 that survey response rates 

are declining, and costs are rising. At 

the same time, data users increasingly 

demand much more timely and granular 

information, such as local rather than 

national data. To meet the needs of the 

many stakeholders and policy-makers 

who depend on high quality, reliable 

federal statistical data, the statistical 

agencies must take advantage of new 

technologies and data sources to both 

reduce costs and make improvements. 

We believe there are many opportunities 

to increase the efficiency of the 

statistical system and reduce the 

response burden on people and 

businesses. 

The Chief Statistician of the United 

States and SSP are well aware of these 

issues and are seeking to change the 

paradigm underlying the production of 

these statistics. The Federal Statistical 

System must adopt new methods and 

standards to provide statistics that 

continue to meet the data needs of our 

nation for the 21st century. Given the 

existing environment, an important 

component of this transformation will 

be based on combining data from 

multiple sources to produce statistical 

products and information. 

Important work in the area of 

combining data from multiple sources 

has been conducted; see, e.g. National 

Research Council (2017; www.nap.edu/ 

catalog/24652/innovations-in-federalstatistics-combining-data-sources-whileprotecting-privacy); the related 

information provided through: http://

sites.nationalacademies.org/DBASSE/ 

CNSTAT/DBASSE_170268; and 

references cited therein. However, much 

more research must be carried out 

before the Federal Statistical System can 

adopt these techniques for the 

production of its key statistics. The 

Chief Statistician is therefore seeking to 

set priorities and coordinate Federal 

Statistical System resources to focus on 

such a program of continued research 

and therefore is requesting relevant 

information. 

Request for Public Comment 

This RFI seeks to identify published 

works, current and planned research, 

and descriptions of best practices taking 

place in private sector firms and 

academic institutions related to 

combining data from multiple sources to 

produce statistical data and products. 

The RFI is also seeking suggestions for 

new areas of research that the federal 

government should pursue in order to 

adopt new methods for combining data 

from multiple sources to produce 

statistics. These include but are not 

limited to: Computational environments 

for accessing and processing multiple 

data sources; measurement and 

documentation of the quality of 

statistical data derived from combining 

multiple data sources; new techniques 

for harmonizing and linking multiple 

data sources; issues regarding privacy 

and disclosure avoidance, standards for 

describing the fitness for use of key 

statistics based on combined data 

sources; and principles for curating and 

disseminating these new data and 

associated products. In addition, 

descriptions of and citations to papers 

or projects where data have been 

combined to do analyses that highlight 

sources of data that may be useful for 

government data integration, or how 

new data sources can be helpful in 

assessing how federal statistics can be 

better structured and presented to 

increase their value to the nation, are 

welcome. Finally, the RFI is seeking 

information on tested best practices 

related to securing partnerships across 

data holders and providing access to 

secondary users. 

The Chief Statistician of the United 

States and SSP plan to consider this 

input in focusing Federal Statistical 

System research efforts, including the 

Federal Committee on Statistical 

Methodology, on a program that informs 

policy and provides guidance on the 

Federal use of data combined from 

multiple sources. 

Footnotes 

1. National Research Council. 2013. 

Nonresponse in Social Science 

Surveys: A Research Agenda. 

Washington, DC: The National 

Academies Press. https://doi.org/ 

10.17226/18293. 

Nancy Potok, 

Chief, Statistical and Science Policy, Office 

of Information and Regulatory Affairs. 

[FR Doc. 2018–00400 Filed 1–11–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3110–01–P 

NUCLEAR REGULATORY 

COMMISSION 

[NRC–2018–0001] 

Sunshine Act Meeting Notice 

DATES: Weeks of January 15, 22, 29, 

February 5, 12, 19, 2018. 

PLACE: Commissioners’ Conference 

Room, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, 

Maryland. 

STATUS: Public and Closed. 

Week of January 15, 2018 

Thursday, January 18, 2018 

9:00 a.m. Strategic Programmatic 

Overview of the Decommissioning 

and Low-Level Waste and Spent 

Fuel Storage and Transportation 

Business Lines (Public Meeting); 

(Contact: Damaris Marcano: 301– 

415–7328) 

This meeting will be webcast live at 

the Web address—http://www.nrc.gov/. 


sradovich on DSK3GMQ082PROD with NOTICES