Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This document reviews the Department of Veterans Affairs' oversight of laundry services at its Medical Center in Albany, New York. GAO found inadequate management and oversight of the contract for operating the laundry facility. There was no separation of duties between the quality assurance evaluator and the contracting officer's technical representative. This individual allowed the contractor to deviate from the contract's terms. As a result, it appears that the contractor was overpaid for the services provided."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit resulted in the Forest Service's suspending or maintaining the suspension of 49 projects within Georgia's Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forests--11 for contracted timber sales and 27 for vegetative management actions. The decision did not result in the suspension of projects in other national forests in Alabama and Florida. According to Forest Service officials and other stakeholders, the decision has had various consequences for timber sales and vegetative management projects in the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forests. In some cases, such as the suspended timber sale projects, the consequences could be quantified in terms of monetary claims against the Forest Service and reduced receipts to local communities. In other cases, such as the suspended vegetative management projects, the consequences are more qualitative. According to Forest Service officials, the suspensions affected the Forest Service's ability to control for wildfires, sedimentation, and southern pine beetle infestations; to protect endangered species; and to ensure habitat diversity. Although the environmental group that filed the lawsuit against the Forest Service could not provide any data on the consequences of the suspended timber sales and vegetative …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Eight federal agencies now have teams that can respond to a terrorist attack involving chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapons. Each team varies in size, structure, geographical scope, and task. The teams do not duplicate one another. They have unique capabilities and functions, and many have experience dealing with different types of agents and weapons. The type of terrorist incident would determine which team would be most appropriate to respond. GAO found that federal agencies lack a coherent framework to develop and evaluate budget requirements for their response teams because there is no national strategy with clearly defined outcomes. To improve interagency cooperation, federal agencies have participated in several group activities. For example, the Weapons of Mass Destruction Interagency Steering Group, led by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is identifying federal response teams that could respond to different terrorist scenarios. Federal, state, and local agencies have also participated in major field exercises that simulated urban terrorist acts. These efforts could go a long way toward improving the operational coordination of federal response teams."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) runs 67 laundries that serve patients in its hospitals, nursing homes, and domiciliaries. Most of the operating costs for these laundries are for labor. VA could reduce these costs by closing 13 of its 67 facilities and moving those workloads to its underused laundries. VA could make more efficient use of its existing facilities and save money by closing costly laundries that require expensive renovations and new equipment. In addition, VA could make greater use of competitive sourcing to keep costs down. GAO's review of current VA laundry contracts showed that labor costs were significantly reduced. Furthermore, competing VA in-house services with the private sector would ensure that VA would receive the most efficient and lowest-cost laundry service."

In March 2000, DOE-Headquarters (HQ) requested the Tanks Focus Area (TFA) to assume management responsibility for the Salt Processing Project technology development program at Savannah River Site. The TFA was requested to conduct several activities, including review and revision of the technology development roadmaps, development of down-selection criteria, and preparation of a comprehensive Research and Development (R&D) Program Plan for three candidate cesium removal technologies, as well as the Alpha and strontium removal processes that must also be carried out. The three cesium removal candidate technologies are Crystalline Silicotitanate (CST) Non-Elutable Ion Exchange, Caustic Side Solvent Extraction (CSSX), and Small Tank Tetraphenylborate Precipitation (STTP). This plan describes the technology development needs for each process that must be satisfied in order to reach a down-selection decision, as well as continuing technology development required to support conceptual design activities.

Weekly newspaper from Bogata, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

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

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a building owned by the Karnes County Hospital District, but leased to physicians for their private medical practice is tax-exempt.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Responsibility of a sheriff for taking custody of a person hospitalized for injuries sustained while being arrested by law enforcement officers of a different jurisdiction.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a component committee of the Edwards Aquifer Authority is subject to the Open Meetings Act when a majority of the member of the Authority's Board attends a meeting of the committee.

The purpose of this report is to lay the groundwork for an emerging process to assess U.S. geothermal resources that might be suitable for development as Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS). Interviews of leading geothermists indicate that doing that will be intertwined with updating assessments of U.S. higher-quality hydrothermal resources and reviewing methods for discovering ''hidden'' hydrothermal and EGS resources. The report reviews the history and status of assessment of high-temperature geothermal resources in the United States. Hydrothermal, Enhanced, and Hot Dry Rock resources are addressed. Geopressured geothermal resources are not. There are three main uses of geothermal resource assessments: (1) They inform industry and other interest parties of reasonable estimates of the amounts and likely locations of known and prospective geothermal resources. This provides a basis for private-sector decisions whether or not to enter the geothermal energy business at all, and for where to look for useful resources. (2) They inform government agencies (Federal, State, local) of the same kinds of information. This can inform strategic decisions, such as whether to continue to invest in creating and stimulating a geothermal industry--e.g., through research or financial incentives. And it informs certain agencies, e.g., Department of Interior, about what kinds of tactical …

The unqualified data addressed in this qualification report have been cited in an Analysis Model Report (AMR) to support the Site Recommendation in determining the suitability of Yucca Mountain as a repository for high-level radioactive waste. The unqualified data include precipitation volumes and surface geology maps The precipitation data consist of daily precipitation volumes measured at Yucca Mountain. The surface geology data include identification of the types and surface expressions of geologic units and associated structural features such as faults. These data were directly used in AMR U0010, Simulation of Net Infiltration for Modern and Potential Future Climates, ANL-NBS-HS-000032 (Hevesi et al. 2000), to estimate net infiltration into Yucca Mountain. This report evaluates the unqualified data within the context of supporting studies of this type for the Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project (YMP). The purpose of this report is to identify data that can be cited as qualified for use in technical products to support the YMP Site Recommendation and that may also be used to support the License Application. The qualified data may either be retained in the original Data Tracking Number (DTN) or placed in new DTNs generated as a result of the evaluation. The appropriateness and limitations …

Weekly newspaper from San Antonio, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

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

Weekly newspaper from Comanche, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Semi-weekly newspaper from Livingston, Texas that includes local, state and national news along with advertising.

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

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

Weekly newspaper from Archer City, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Approximately 700,000 MT of DUF{sub 6} is stored, or will be produced under a current agreement with the USEC, at the Paducah site in Kentucky, Portsmouth site in Ohio, and ETTP site in Tennessee. On July 21, 1998, the 105th Congress approved Public Law 105-204 (Ref; 1), which directed that facilities be built at the Kentucky and Ohio sites to convert DUF{sub 6} to a stable form for disposition. On July 6, 1999, the Department of Energy (DOE) issued the ''Final Plan for the Conversion of Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride as Required by Public Law 105-204 (Ref. 2), in which DOE committed to develop a Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Materials Use Roadmap''. On September 1, 2000, DOE issued the Draft Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Materials Use Roadmap (Ref. 3) (Roadmap), which provides alternate paths for the long-term storage, beneficial use, and eventual disposition of each product form and material that will result from the DUF{sub 6} conversion activity. One of the paths being considered for DUF{sub 6} cylinders is to reuse the empty cylinders as containers to transport and dispose of LLW, including the converted DU. The Roadmap provides results of the many alternate uses and disposal paths for conversion products and the …

This document communicates the planned implementation of the Systems Engineering processes and products for the SST retrieval projects as defined in the Systems Engineering Management Plan for the Tank Farm Contractor.

The current Tank Farm Contractor (TFC) for the U. S. Department of Energy, Office of River Protection (ORP), River Protection Project (RPP), CH2M Hill Hanford Group, Inc. (CHG), will use a computer based requirements management system. The system will serve as a tool to assist in identifying, capturing, and maintaining the Standards/Requirements Identification Document (S/RID) requirements and links to implementing procedures and other documents. By managing requirements as one integrated set, CHG will be able to carry out its mission more efficiently and effectively. CHG has chosen the Dynamic Object Oriented Requirements System (DOORS{trademark}) as the preferred computer based requirements management system. Accordingly, the S/RID program will use DOORS{trademark}. DOORS{trademark} will replace the Environmental Requirements Management Interface (ERMI) system as the tool for S/RID data management. The DOORS{trademark} S/RID test project currently resides on the DOORSTM test server. The S/RID project will be migrated to the DOORS{trademark} production server. After the migration the S/RID project will be considered a production project and will no longer reside on the test server.

Research using the Advanced Light Source Spectro-microscopy facility is described. Three closely related techniques, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, x-ray absorption spectroscopy, and x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, have become widely accepted as important tools for the study of the chemical composition and electronic properties of surfaces, overlayers, and interfaces. There is now a major effort to push these spectroscopic techniques into a new realm of applications with very high spatial resolution, at and below 1 micron. This results in a new set of probes which can create images of chemical composition with great subtlety. The field is growing rapidly as high brightness sources of x-rays become available. This 6 month project was used to initiate research applications of soft x-ray spectro-microscopes at the Advanced Light Source. Due to its short duration, only preliminary results were obtained. The term ''spectromicroscopy'' is an ugly and unwieldy word to impose on an experimental endeavor, but it has been adopted by a number of disciplines and is likely to remain in use for some time. The word is obviously a contraction of the phrase ''spectroscopic microscopy,'' but there is also a distinction sometimes made between this, and the reverse combination, ''microscopic spectroscopy'', or ''microspectroscopy''. Microspectroscopy is a …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) could save millions of dollars by systematically consolidating food production, employing Veterans Canteen Service workers to provide inpatient food services, and using competitive sourcing. VA already has experience in implementing these options at several locations, although VA's experience with food service contractors is limited. Using a systematic approach to assess available options at each location would allow VA to provide food service at the lowest cost while maintaining quality."