A briefing report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the personnel management policies and practices of the District of Columbia Courts, focusing on whether: (1) D.C. Courts' applicable policies for six basic personnel activities or functions--performance evaluation, competitive and noncompetitive promotions, corrective actions, training, classification, and equal employment opportunity (EEO) policies--were consistent with commonly accepted personnel management principles; and (2) D.C. Courts generally adhered to its policies when implementing the six personnel activities or functions."

This report addresses the compensation issues related to Chinese Embassy bombing in Belgrade.

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A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the financial statements of the Senate Restaurants Revolving Fund for the period ended September 30, 1999 and 1998. GAO contracted with the independent public accounting firm of KPMG Peat Marwick LLP to conduct the audit."

The attached Geothermal (Ground-Source) Heat Pump (GHP) Guide Specifications have been developed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) with the intent to assist federal agency sites and engineers in the preparation of construction specifications for GHP projects. These specifications have been developed in the industry-standard Construction Specification Institute (CSI) format and cover several of the most popular members of the family of GHP systems. These guide specifications are applicable to projects whether the financing is with conventional appropriations, arranged by GHP specialty ESCOs under the U.S. Department of Energy's Technology-Specific GHP Super ESPCs, arranged by utilities under Utility Energy Service Contracts (UESCs) or arranged by generalist ESCOs under the various regional ESPCs. These specifications can provide several benefits to the end user that will help ensure successful GHP system installations. GHP guide specifications will help to streamline the specification development, review, and approval process because the architecture and engineering (AE) firm will be working from the familiar CSI format instead of developing the specifications from other sources. The guide specifications help to provide uniformity, standardization, and consistency in both the construction specifications and system installations across multiple federal sites. This standardization can provide future benefits to the federal sites in …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Brady Act's phase I (interim Brady) and phase II (permanent Brady) provisions in preventing the sale of firearms to prohibited individuals, focusing on: (1) how the permanent Brady compares with the interim Brady; (2) under permanent Brady, the advantages and disadvantages of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System's (NICS) background checks conducted by a designated state agency versus by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); (3) under permanent Brady, the extent to which default proceeds resulted in firearms being sold to prohibited individuals; and (4) the options policymakers have in preventing or minimizing such transfers."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Energy's (DOE) management and disposal of its low-level radioactive wastes, focusing on: (1) the factors that influence DOE's decisions about the treatment, storage, and disposal of the wastes; and (2) DOE's costs to treat, store, and dispose of these wastes and the cost-effectiveness of DOE's disposal decisions."

This report discusses estimates of food stamp program eligibility and participation in the U.S. armed services. Related legislation and policy considerations are also addressed.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the: (1) dental health status of Medicaid beneficiaries and other vulnerable populations; and (2) extent to which these groups have dental coverage and use dental services."

PFP's Standby Power System consists of the diesel generators, the generator control system, Rm 308 UPS, switchgear batteries, and the electrical equipment used to distribute this power. Due to the nature of the equipment and its use throughout general industry, the majority of the system falls within the CGI definition HNF-PRO-268, ''Control of Purchased Items and Services'' and HNF-PRO-1819, ''PHMC Engineering Requirements'' require that the critical characteristics of CGI-procured equipment be established in an engineering document prior to placing the order. HNF-5043 established these critical characteristics for the Standby Power System. This modification adds several items to the document.

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In this note, the authors present the recipe recommended by the Search Limits Committee for the construction of confidence intervals for the use of D0 collaboration. In another note, currently in preparation, they present the rationale for this recipe, a critique of the current literature on this topic, and several examples of the use of the method. This note is intended to fill the need of the collaboration to have a reference available until the more complete note is finished. Section 2 introduces the notation used in this note, and Section 3 contains the suggested recipe.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) changes in medical residency slots, focusing on: (1) VA's goals in realigning its residency program and the goals accomplished so far; (2) the reasons for changes in the number of graduate medical education residency slots; and (3) the views of VA facility and medical school officials on the effect of the changes on resident training and on the potential to train residents at VA community-based outpatient clinics."

The World Trade Organization (WTO) went into effect in 1995, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) which had been in existence since 1948. Under the WTO, the governments of the 136 member countries agree on a set of rules and principles for trade, negotiate periodically to reduce trade barriers, and participate in the dispute settlement procedure. Economists believe that, over the past 50 years, the more predictable environment for trade as well as the reduction in trade barriers has contributed to unprecedented economic prosperity for the majority of countries. On the other hand, trade liberalization under the WTO has resulted in economic costs to those whose jobs have been adversely affected, although they are relatively few compared to total employment in the United States.

Various strategies were developed for the purpose of mitigating respirable dust experienced at facilities in the southwest corner of the 200 West Area. These strategies focused on treatment of that portion of the dust source located within the 200 West Expansion Area. Strategies included direct shielding of the facilities via establishment of a poplar windbreak and installation of an artificial windscreen; soil stabilization via seeding of herbaceous plants, soil fixatives, straw crimping, straw blankets, gravel mulches, drift fences, baled straw, and living fences; and various irrigation systems that would function both to water seeded herbs and to suppress dust.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Department of Defense's (DOD) management practices for demilitarizing excess ammunition. Specifically, GAO evaluates (1) the extent to which the excess ammunition stockpile has been reduced and whether the liability associated with excess ammunition has been fully identified, (2) the Army's reliance on contracted demilitarization and the impact of doing so on government facilities that use similar environmentally friendly processes, and (3) the feasibility of using excess ammunition for U.S. training needs. GAO found that DOD's reported stockpile of excess ammunition has grown rather than decreased, rising from 354,000 tons in 1993 to 493,000 tons at the end of 2000. In addition, the reported stockpile does not include all excess ammunition, which understates DOD's ultimate liability for demilitarizing ammunition. In recent years, the Army has devoted 50 percent of its excess ammunition demilitarization budget to contractors that use environmentally friendly demilitarization processes. Although a congressional directive resulted in greater emphasis on contractor demilitarization, the Army began and later expanded this effort without considering the effect it would have on government facilities. With increased contractor demilitarization, the Army has retained and underutilized environmentally friendly …

The objective of this experimental program was to evaluate the effectiveness of gas-disengaging equipment (GDE) to separate gas from the liquid effluent of CST ion-exchange columns. The GDE designed for this evaluation supports four fundamental separation methods: (1) passive settling, (2) gas sparging to strip entrained gas or gas bubbles, (3) subatmospheric pressure separation, and (4) injection of ultrasonic waves to induce coalescence of bubbles with attendant settling. These methods may be used separately or in combination, provided that the selections are not mutually exclusive (e.g., passive settling and gas sparging are mutually exclusive by definition). The method using ultrasonic waves is limited because the acoustic actuator cannot be used on a continuous basis; only intermittent bursts are recommended to prevent overheating and subsequent failure. Each separation method was evaluated to determine which, if any, would be suitable for application to CST ion-exchange columns. The GDE supports two general modes of column operation. In one mode, the GDE operates at an elevated pressure and the feed pump must push fluid through the series of columns. In the other mode, operation proceeds in a vented condition and an interstage pump is required to reelevate the liquid pressure to feed the downstream …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The General Services Administration (GSA), the federal government's real property manager, it is responsible for identifying, funding, and completing needed repairs and alterations at federal buildings. This report examines (1) GSA's process for assessing and selecting prospectus-level major repair and alteration design projects for funding, (2) the obstacles that impede GSA from satisfying its repair and alteration requirements, and (3) the consequences associated with deferring needed repairs and alterations at selected buildings. GAO found that in fiscal year 2001, GSA assessed the merits of 27 prospectus-level repair and alteration design projects and recommended 12 for funding. These projects were selected by a multifaceted process that relied on empirical data and professional judgment coupled with specific selection criteria and computer analysis that compared competing projects. GSA explained its decisions when it recommended lower-ranked projects for repairs. However, because of insufficient funding, those projects were placed on GSA's growing repair and alteration inventory. GSA has faced long-standing obstacles, including inadequate program data, the lack of a multiyear repair and alteration plan, and limited funding, in reducing this multibillion-dollar inventory. In addition, funding limitations remain a major obstacle. Delaying …

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This document describes the calculations I have carried out to synthesize spectra for test cases Ar1, Ge1, Ba1 and Au1. First, a brief description of how HULLAC generates atomic data is presented. Next, the implementation of those data in a collisional-radiative (CR) model is described. Two approaches are taken: First, the HULLAC data are entered into the CR rate matrix, and the relative populations of each ion charge state as given by an off-line Monte Carlo calculation are used to constrain the resulting level populations. Alternatively, the HULLAC data-filled CR rate matrix is inverted with out constraining the relative ion populations; the resulting average ion charge < Z > is significantly different between the two calculations. My resulting b-b, b-f and f-f emission spectra are presented in figures.

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The purpose of this project is to conduct collaborative research to evaluate and maximize the effectiveness of permeable reactive barriers (PRBs) with a broad-based working group including representatives from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center (NFESC) and its project partner, Battelle, are leading the DoD effort with funding from DoD's Environmental Security Technology Certification Program (ESTCP) and Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (SERDP). Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is coordinating the DOE effort with support from Subsurface Contaminant Focus Area (SCFA), a research program under DOEs Office of Science and Technology. The National Risk Management Research Laboratory's Subsurface Protection and Remediation Division is leading EPA's effort. The combined effort of these three agencies allows the evaluation of a large number of sites. Documents generated by this joint project will be reviewed by the participating agencies' principal investigators, the Permeable Barriers Group of the Remediation Technologies Development Forum (RTDF), and the Interstate Technology and Regulatory Cooperation (ITRC). The technical objectives of this project are to collect and review existing field data at selected PRB sites, identify data gaps, conduct additional measurements, and …

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The Plutonium Conversion Task within the Plutonium Immobilization Program (PIP) transforms incoming plutonium (Pu) feed materials into an oxide acceptable for blending with ceramic precursors. One of the feed materials originally planned for PIP was unirradiated fuel, which consisted mainly of the Zero Power Plutonium Reactor (ZPPR) fuel. Approximately 3.5 metric tons of Pu is in ZPPR fuel. The ZPPR fuel is currently stored at the Argonne National Laboratory-West as stainless steel clad metal plates and oxide pellets, with the vast majority of the Pu in the metal plates. The metal plates consist of a Pu-U-Mo alloy (containing 90% of the ZPPR plutonium metal) and a Pu-Al alloy (containing 10% of the ZPPR plutonium metal). The Department of Energy (DOE) decided that ZPPR fuel is a national asset and, therefore, not subject to disposition. This report documents work done prior to that decision. The Hydnde-Oxidation (HYDOX) Process was selected as the method for Metal Conversion in PIP because it provides a universal means for preparing oxide from all feed materials. HYDOX incorporates both the hydride process, originally developed to separate Pu from other pit materials, as well as the oxide formation step. Plutonium hydride is very reactive and is readily …