This report provides background information on PUHCA, including its history and impact. It also discusses how PUHCA reform fits into the current electric utility industry restructuring debate. This report will be updated as events warrant. For related information on electricity restructuring, see the CRS Electronic Briefing Book.

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Legislation provides Caribbean countries similar tariff benefits as Mexico under the Caribbean and Central American Relief and Economic Stabilization Act. A senate bill provides relief to the hurricane affected countries of Central America. The senate bill is more restrictive than the House bill in the scope of tariff benefits offered.

“Secret” or “closed door” sessions of the House of Representatives and Senate are held periodically to discuss business, including impeachment deliberations, deemed to require confidentiality and secrecy. Authority for the two chambers to hold these sessions is implied by Article I, section 5, of the Constitution. Both the House and the Senate have supplemented this clause through rules and precedents.

This is a funding level summary of each of the 13 annual appropriation acts for FY1999 appears in the summaries of annual appropriations spending section of this report.

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Appropriations are one part of a complex federal budget process that includes budget resolutions, appropriations (regular, supplemental, and continuing) bills, rescissions, and budget reconciliation bills. This report is a guide to CRS reports that provide analytical perspectives on the 13 annual appropriations bills, and other related appropriation measures. It does not include a detailed explanation or description of the budget or appropriations processes.

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This report discusses aspects of the process by which House committees mark up and report legislation. Among the subjects discussed are: selecting the text to be marked up, offering and debating amendments, and making motions to conclude debates during markups. The report also discusses relevant rules and practices concerning motions, quorums, votes, points of order, and parliamentary inquiries.

This report provides general guidance to committees for conducting meetings to mark up legislation.

This report describes the process of reaching the final agreement between house and senate over the final version of a bill that the two houses have passes in different forms.

This report identifies and summarizes these and other rules and directives affecting committee powers, authority, activities, and operations.

House Rules, especially Rules X-XIII, govern the authority and operations of its committees and subcommittees. This report identifies and summarizes these and other rules and directives affecting committee powers, authority, activities, and operations.

On October 13, 1999, President Clinton announced a new approach to the management of the roadless areas in the National Forest System that may prohibit new road construction and certain other activities in inventoried readless areas and extend some protections to non-inventoried roadless areas as well.

On June 14th, 1999, the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) called for public comment on its current procedures for designating critical habitat. In addition, a proposal is before the Senate (S.1100) to move the time at which critical habitat must be designated for a species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) from being (basically) concurrent with the listing of the species to the time a recovery plan is finalized for that species. This report is written as background for considering the current legislative proposal and the FWS notice and may be updated as circumstances warrant.

This report describes the SNS's management, project costs, schedule, site selection, and funding, and discusses issues raised by some congressional critics of the project, such as management problems, potential cost overruns, and schedule delays.

This report is a compilation of evidentiary issues and rulings from the Senate impeachment trials of Judges Nixon, Hastings, Claiborne, Ritter, Louderback, and Swayne. A discourse on what evidentiary rules and principles are applicable in impeachment trials is appended.

The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act authorizes the President to declare that an emergency or major disaster exists that overwhelms state and local resources. Legislation before the 106th Congress (H.R. 707 and S. 1691) would, among other matters, amend the Act to: (1) fund hazard mitigation projects designed to reduce future disaster losses; (2) add conditions to assistance; and (3) consolidate provisions governing the distribution of aid to disaster victims. This report compares provisions of the two bills, and will be updated as legislative action occurs.

The extent to which emissions from motor vehicles and the amount of sulfur in commercial gasoline should be regulated has become a controversial issue. The EPA is proposing national limits on gasoline sulfur levels which would become effective in 2004. This report provides background information on the regulation of vehicle emissions in the United States, analyzes key elements of the National Low Emission Vehicle (LEV) program and the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Tier 2 proposal, summarizes major views on the proposal that have been expressed by the automobile industry, the oil refining industry, and some environmental organizations, and discusses relevant legislative activity in the 106th Congress.

This report provides background information on federal emission standards for motor vehicles under the Clean Air Act and stricter standards originally developed to address the severity of air quality problems in California, explains the low emission standards and flexible compliance mechanisms to which states and manufacturers have voluntarily agreed under the National Low Emission Vehicle (LEV) Program, discusses the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) estimates of the program's air quality benefits and costs, and examines regulatory issues related to its implementation including sulfur levels in gasoline and the relative stringency of emission standards for light trucks.

Although Congress authorizes most federal programs for multiple years, it annually authorizes programs for national defense as well as appropriating funding for them each fiscal year. Of the activities traditionally authorized and funded, the Department of Defense (DOD) administers the following six environmental programs: environmental restoration, compliance, cleanup at base closure sites, pollution prevention, environmental technology, and natural resource conservation.

The Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 established "Tier 1" standards to limit tailpipe emissions from new motor vehicles, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is required to determine if more stringent requirements are needed to attain or maintain National Ambient Air Quality Standards. EPA also must assess the availability and cost-effectiveness of technologies necessary to control emissions. In a report submitted to Congress in August 1998, EPA concluded that tougher standards are necessary and that essential technologies are available and cost-effective

This report discusses a variety of animal agriculture issues that generated debate during the 106th Congress, including low livestock prices, especially for hogs. Economic difficulties have revived questions such as the impacts of consolidation in the livestock industry, and the price effects of animal imports from Canada and Mexico. This report also discusses a number of legislative proposals to assist livestock producers and enforce sanitary and phytosanitary standards, as well as continuing trade disputes and negotiations with China, the European Union, New Zealand, and Australia.

This report discusses "Section 32", which is a permanent appropriation that since 1935 has earmarked the equivalent of 30% of annual customs receipts to support the farm sector through a variety of activities. Today, most of this sizeable appropriation (now about $5.7 billion per year) is simply transferred directly into the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) child nutrition account to fund school feeding and other programs.