Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) filing season performance affects tens of millions of taxpayers who expect timely refunds and accurate answers to their tax questions. IRS's budget request is a planning tool showing how it intends to provide taxpayer service and enforce the tax laws in 2007. It is also the first in a series of annual steps that will determine whether IRS meets its new long-term goals of increasing tax compliance and reducing taxpayers' acceptance of cheating on their taxes. Tax law enforcement remains on GAO's list of high-risk federal programs, in part, because of the persistence of a large tax gap. IRS recently estimated the gross tax gap, the difference between what taxpayers owe and what they voluntarily pay, to be $345 billion for 2001. GAO assessed (1) IRS's interim 2006 filing season performance; (2) the budget request; and (3) how the budget helps IRS achieve its longterm goals. GAO compared performance and the requested budget to previous years."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "About a dozen people are killed or injured in natural gas transmission pipeline incidents each year. In an effort to improve upon this safety record, the Pipeline Safety Improvement Act of 2002 requires that operators assess pipeline segments in about 20,000 miles of highly populated or frequented areas for safety risks, such as corrosion, welding defects, or incorrect operation. Half of these baseline assessments must be done by December 2007, and the remainder by December 2012. Operators must then repair or replace any defective pipelines, and reassess these pipeline segments for corrosion damage at least every 7 years. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) administers this program, called gas integrity management. This testimony is based on ongoing work for this Subcommittee and for other committees, as required by the 2002 act. The testimony provides preliminary results on the safety effects of (1) PHMSA's gas integrity management program and (2) the requirement that operators reassess their natural gas pipelines at least every 7 years. It also discusses how PHMSA has acted to strengthen its enforcement program in response to recommendations GAO made in 2004. GAO expects to …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Over the past several years, we have reported on significant pay problems experienced by mobilized Army National Guard and Army Reserve (Army Guard and Reserve) soldiers in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack. These reports included examples of hundreds of soldiers receiving inaccurate and untimely payroll payments due to a paper-intensive, error-prone pay process and the lack of integrated pay and personnel systems. In response to our reports, the Department of Defense (DOD) has taken some action to improve controls designed to pay Army Guard and Reserve soldiers accurately and on time, especially those who had become sick or injured in the line of duty. This report responds to a Congressional request that we investigate the allegation that 37 Army Guard and Reserve soldiers assigned to the Medical Retention Processing Unit (MRPU) at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, were overpaid for hostile fire and hardship duty pay while in an outpatient status. Our objectives were to determine (1) whether the allegations were true, and if so, whether the pay issues were more widespread at Fort Bragg and (2) the key causes of the overpayments and the …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "As part of the Committee on Government Reform's continuing focus on pay and financial issues affecting Army soldiers deployed in the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), the requesters were concerned that battle-injured soldiers were not only battling the broken military pay system, but faced blemishes on their credit reports and pursuit by collection agencies from referrals of their Army debts. GAO was asked to determine (1) the extent of debt of separated battle-injured soldiers and deceased Army soldiers who served in the GWOT, (2) the impact of DOD debt collection action on separated battle-injured and deceased soldiers and their families, and (3) ways that Congress could make the process for collecting these debts more soldier friendly."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Alaska Native corporations (ANC) were created to settle land claims with Alaska Natives and foster economic development. In 1986, legislation passed that allowed ANCs to participate in the Small Business Administration's (SBA) 8(a) program. Since then, Congress has extended special procurement advantages to 8(a) ANC firms, such as the ability to win sole-source contracts for any dollar amount. This report identifies (1) trends in the government's 8(a) contracting with ANC firms, (2) the reasons agencies have awarded 8(a) sole-source contracts to ANC firms and the facts and circumstances behind some of these contracts, and (3) how ANCs are using the 8(a) program. GAO also evaluated SBA's oversight of 8(a) ANC firms."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The CARE Act, a federal effort to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic, is administered by HHS. The Act uses formulas based upon a grantee's number of AIDS cases to distribute funds to eligible metropolitan areas (EMA), states, and territories. The use of AIDS cases was prescribed because most jurisdictions tracked and reported only AIDS cases when the grant programs were established. HIV cases must be incorporated with AIDS cases in CARE Act formulas no later than fiscal year 2007. GAO was asked to discuss factors that affect the distribution of CARE Act funding. This testimony is based on HIV/AIDS: Changes Needed to Improve the Distribution of Ryan White CARE Act and Housing Funds, GAO-06-332 (Feb. 28, 2006). GAO discusses how specific funding-formula provisions contribute to funding differences among CARE Act grantees and what distribution differences could result from using HIV cases in CARE Act funding formulas."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In light of GAO's past four reports and testimonies on Army military pay and travel pay for soldiers who have served in the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), GAO was asked to determine if weaknesses in Army processes for initiating and terminating active duty pay might result in erroneous payments and debt, including (1) overpayments to soldiers in the Fort Brag Medical Retention Processing Unit (MRPU)--1 of 23 MRPUs--and (2) overpayments and other errors that resulted in debt collection action against battle-injured soldiers who were released from active duty. GAO also was asked to develop case studies to illustrate the effects of these problems on soldiers and their families and to determine ways that Congress could make the debt collection process more soldier friendly."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The United States has strongly advocated that the United Nations (UN) reform its management practices to mitigate various program and financial risks. The findings of the Independent Inquiry Committee into the Oil for Food Program have renewed concerns about UN oversight, and the 2005 UN World Summit proposed actions to improve the UN's Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS). Furthermore, over the past decade, as UN procurement more than tripled to $1.6 billion in response to expanding UN peacekeeping operations, experts have called on the UN to correct procurement process deficiencies. We examined (1) whether UN funding arrangements for OIOS ensure independent oversight; (2) the consistency of OIOS's practices with key auditing standards; and (3) the control environment and processes for procurement."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "This testimony focuses on the Architect of the Capitol's progress in achieving selected project milestones and in managing the project's schedule since Congress's March 15, 2006, hearing on the project. As part of this discussion, we will address a number of key challenges and risks that continue to face the project, as well as actions AOC has taken or plans to take to address these risks. In addition, we will discuss the status of the project's costs and funding."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The President's Vision for Space Exploration calls for human and robotic missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. In response, over the next two decades, NASA may spend $100 billion on new technologies and facilities that will require reliable ground communications to achieve those missions. Presently, that communications capability is provided by NASA's Deep Space Network--a system of antennas located at three sites around the world. However, the Network faces challenges that may hinder its provision of current and future mission support. This report discusses (1) the significant operational challenges faced by the Deep Space Network and (2) the extent to which NASA is integrating the Network into its future communications plans."

Article discussing two different approaches, referred to as renewal and modulation, to generate time series with a nonexponential distribution of waiting times.

Free weekly newspaper that includes business and classified advertising.

Free weekly newspaper that includes business and classified advertising.

Weekly newspaper from Port Aransas, Texas on Mustang Island that includes local, state and national news along with extensive advertising.

Daily student newspaper from the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas that includes local, state and campus news along with advertising.

Weekly Jewish newspaper from Fort Worth, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with extensive advertising.

Video footage from the KXAS-TV/NBC station in Fort Worth, Texas, to accompany a news story.

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Free weekly newspaper that includes business and classified advertising.

Excavation of the 618-2 Burial Ground has produced many items of anomalous waste. Prior to temporary packaging and/or storage, these items have been characterized in the field to identify radiological and industrial safety conditions.

Atmospheric general circulation models (GCMs) used to project climate responses to increased CO{sub 2} generally omit irrigation of agricultural land. Using the NCAR CAM3 GCM coupled to a slab-ocean model, we find that inclusion of an extreme irrigation scenario has a small effect on the simulated temperature and precipitation response to doubled CO{sub 2} in most regions, but reduced warming by as much as 1 C in some agricultural regions, such as Europe and India. This interaction between CO{sub 2} and irrigation occurs in cases where agriculture is a major fraction of the land surface and where, in the absence of irrigation, soil moisture declines are projected to provide a positive feedback to temperature change. The reduction of warming is less than 25% of the temperature increase modeled for doubled CO{sub 2} in most regions; thus greenhouse warming will still be dominant. However, the results indicate that land use interactions may be an important component of climate change uncertainty in some agricultural regions. While irrigated lands comprise only {approx}2% of the land surface, they contribute over 40% of global food production. Climate changes in these regions are therefore particularly important to society despite their relatively small contribution to average global …

Clouds of stray electrons are ubiquitous in particle accelerators and frequently limit the performance of storage rings. Earlier measurements of electron energy distribution and flux to the walls provided only a relative electron cloud density. We have measured electron accumulation using ions expelled by the beam. The ion energy distribution maps the depressed beam potential and gives the dynamic cloud density. Clearing electrode current reveals the static background cloud density, allowing the first absolute measurement of the time-dependent electron cloud density during the beam pulse.

iSHIELD11 performs a line-source numerical integration of radiation source terms that are defined by the iSHIELD11 computer code[1] . An example is provided to demonstrate how one can use iSHIELD11 to perform a shielding analysis for a 250 GeV electron linear accelerator.

The goals of this study are: (1) to configure a thermal-hydrological, natural-ventilation model for simulating temperature, humidity, and condensate distributions in the coupled domains of in-drift airspace and near-field rockmass. Rokmass model: TOUGH2, in-drift model: MULTIFLUX (MF); (2) obtain meaningful results from the model for a practical application in which the beneficial effects of unheated drift sections are analyzed; and (3) study the sensitivity to the axial dispersion coefficient with the model.