Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report discusses (1) whether the goals of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Restructuring Act's goals are realistic and (2) disagreements between the IRS Oversight Board, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), and GAO on the act's funding issues. GAO found that the act's goals of meeting taxpayers' needs while ensuring compliance with the tax laws require a massive modernization of IRS. These changes involve major management challenges and will require considerable time to implement. Although IRS officials believe that they have complied with the act's requirements, they are still learning how to effectively manage in the new environment. GAO believes that it is premature to consider significant changes to the act. Differences exist among the Oversight Board, TIGTA, and GAO with respect to specific IRS funding issues."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) administration of grants for environmental programs and projects. GAO focuses on the (1) total dollar amounts by type of grants awarded, (2) type of entities receiving these grants, (3) EPA offices awarding grants, and (4) congressional and other concerns raised by EPA grant activities. GAO found that EPA awarded about $16.7 billion in grants for fiscal years 1996 through 2000. States were the major recipients of continuing environmental program funds, while nonprofit organizations were the major recipients of project grants. EPA's Office of Water awarded half of all continuing environmental program grants, while the Offices of Solid Waste and Emergency Response, Research and Development, and Water awarded most project grants. Congressional committees and EPA's Inspector General conducted several inquiries into EPA's management of grants."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "As the electricity industry restructures, California and the west have witnessed extraordinarily high wholesale prices and sharp limitations on the availability of electricity. In California, high prices have led to financial problems for the state's utilities, power outages, and rate increases. In other Western states, the high prices have also led to rate increases for consumers. This report assesses the outlook for California's electricity supplies this summer. Because of a lack of timely direct access to key information and limitation in other data, GAO was unable to assess likely conditions in California. To make an independent, reliable assessment, GAO would need access to data underlying key supply and demand factors, such as power plant outages and electricity supplies that could be imported into California. Furthermore, forecasts of California's electricity market show stark differences in the expected conditions this summer."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) fiscal year 2000 performance report and fiscal year 2002 performance plan required by the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 to assess its progress in achieving selected key outcomes that are important mission areas for the agency. NRC reports mixed progress in achieving the three outcomes GAO reviewed. To measure performance for the three outcomes, NRC established the same four goals: one relates to safety and three relate to such nonsafety issues as public confidence, regulatory burden, and organizational enhancements. Although NRC's strategies for the safety-related performance goal outcomes seem clear and reasonable, GAO could not assess NRC's performance for the three nonsafety performance goals because NRC only recently developed and reported strategies for them in its fiscal year 2002 performance plan. Because NRC has had little experience in applying the strategies and measures for the three nonsafety goals, it may need to revise them after it completes various planned evaluations during the next three years."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The attorneys general of 46 states signed a settlement agreement in 1998 with the nation's largest tobacco companies. The agreement requires the tobacco companies to make annual payments to the states in perpetuity as reimbursement for past tobacco-related costs. Florida, Minnesota, Mississippi, and Texas reached earlier individual settlements with the tobacco companies. States are free to use the money for any purpose. This report examines (1) the amount of payments received by the states and the states' decision-making processes on the allocation of payments in fiscal years 2000 and 2001 and (2) the types of programs that states funded with their payments in those two fiscal years. As of April 2001, GAO found that 45 of the 46 states received nearly $13.5 billion of the $206 billion estimated to be paid by the tobacco companies during the first 25 years of the agreement. Many states established dedicated funds to receive at least part of the payments. Other states passed legislation to ensure that payments are used to supplement existing state funds, enacted laws governing the future use of the payments, established voter approved initiatives to decide …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Wholesale electricity prices in California rose sharply in May 2000 and have remained high. In addition, there were disruptions in service--blackouts--this winter and spring. The California Independent System Operator, the state agency in charge of balancing electricity supply with demand, expects high prices and service disruptions to continue and perhaps worsen this summer. In response to concerns about high prices and generator outages in California, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) undertook a study, released in February 2001, to determine whether outages were being used to withhold power and drive up prices of electricity in California. Other studies of the electricity market in California have been conducted by economists and industry experts. One study, conducted by three economists from Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of California Energy Institute examined whether market prices of electricity in California in 1998 and 1999 were higher than competitive levels. A second, similar study by two economists--one from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one from a private consulting firm--examined the California market during 2000. This report reviews the FERC study, as well as the …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) considers the contaminants in storm water runoff as a significant threat to water quality across the nation. Prompted by Congress, EPA has responded with various initiatives, including the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Storm Water Program, which requires more than 1,000 local governments to undertake storm water management programs. Those municipalities in Phase I of the program have been trying to reduce pollutants in storm water runoff for several years, and it is time to begin evaluating their efforts. EPA however, has not established measurable goals for this program, nor has it attempted to evaluate the program's effectiveness in reducing storm water pollution or to determine its cost. EPA attributes its inaction to inconsistent data reporting from municipalities, insufficient staff resources, and other competing priorities within the Office of Wastewater Management. Although municipalities report monitoring and cost data to EPA or state regulatory agencies annually, these agencies have not reviewed this information to determine whether it can be useful in determining the program's overall effectiveness or cost. GAO found that the reported cost information will be difficult to analyze unless EPA …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) efforts to combat violent crime and drug trafficking in public housing through Operation Safe Home. GAO found that Operation Safe Home lacks the necessary information systems and management controls to ensure that HUD's Office of Inspector General (OIG) can readily monitor the obligation and expenditure of funds and track the numbers of arrests and convictions. As a result, the OIG cannot reliably allocate program resources or accurately estimate its funding needs. Furthermore, in the absence of complete, consistent, or accurate information, the OIG cannot Congress with reliable and supportable information on Operation Safe Home's accomplishments. The OIG recognizes the need for more effective management controls within Operation Safe Home and has begun to address the problem. These actions, once implemented, should help the OIG to allocate resources more effectively, better estimate future funding needs, and more accurately measure and report the program's accomplishments. However, GAO remains concerned about OIG's long-term involvement in Operation Safe Home. The OIG cannot independently and impartially audit or investigate Operation Safe Home, and may not be perceived as impartial when …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) submitted its fourth expenditure plan to Congress in March 2001. In the plan, IRS requested $128 million from its systems modernization appropriations account. This report (1) determines whether the plan satisfied the conditions specified in the acts, (2) determines IRS' progress in implementing modernization management controls and capabilities, and (3) provides other observations about the plan and IRS' Business Systems Modernization program. GAO found that IRS' March 2001 expenditure plan satisfies the conditions specified in the appropriations acts. IRS continues to make important progress in implementing modernization management controls and capabilities but has yet to implement a sufficiently defined version of the enterprise architecture to guide and constrain projects or employ rigorous configuration management practices. Acquiring modernized systems before having the requisite management capacity in place increases the risk of cost, schedule, and performance shortfalls."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Improper payments are a long-standing problem throughout the government. The Department of Defense (DOD) has been overpaying contractors by hundreds of millions of dollars each year. For fiscal years 1994 through 1999, DOD contractors returned nearly $1.2 billion that the Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) had mistakenly paid them as a result of errors, such as paying the same invoice twice or misreading invoice amounts. Sometimes, however, the contractors do not promptly respond to government demands that the overpayments be returned. The Debt Management Office was created at the DFAS Columbus Center to deal with contractors that are unresponsive to the government's demands that overpayments be returned. GAO found that the Debt Management Office at DFAS Columbus is not effectively and proactively pursuing collections of debts assigned to it. Specifically, the Office is not (1) taking appropriate action to establish the validity of the debts that it receives for collection, (2) promptly issuing letters demanding payment, (3) actively communicating with contractors or resolving issues related to the debts, and (4) effectively using the Department of the Treasury's centralized debt collection programs to maximize collections and …

Laser-based experiments are being developed to study the response of solids under high pressure loading. Diagnostic techniques that have been applied include dynamic x-ray diffraction, VISAR wave profile measurements, and post-shock recovery and analysis. These techniques are presented with some results from shocked Si, Al, and Cu experiments.

Expert workshops were held in Richland in May 2001 to review the Hanford Double-Shell Tank Integrity Project and make recommendations to extend the life of Hanford's double-shell waste tanks. The workshop scope was limited to corrosion of the primary tank liner, and the main areas for review were waste chemistry control, tank inspection, and corrosion monitoring. Participants were corrosion experts from Hanford, Savannah River Site, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, and several consultants. This report describes the current state of the three areas of the program, the final recommendations of the workshop, and the rationale for their selection.

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

The Environmental Sciences Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) was awarded the first Naturaland Accelerated Bioremediation Research (NABIR) Program, Field Research Center (FRC) based upon the recommendation of a review panel following a competitive peer-reviewed proposal process. The contaminated FRC site at ORNL is centered on groundwater plumes that originate from the former S-3 Waste Disposal Ponds located at the Y-12 Plant and the Y-12 Bone Yard/Bum Yard. Proposals for individual science research projects at the FRC were submitted in the spring of 2000 in response to a solicitation issued by the Department of Energy (DOE). Proposals selected for funding began work in Fiscal Year 2001 (October 1, 2000). The FRC staff have initiated several characterization efforts intended to support, inform, and educate individual FRC investigators, NABIR principal investigators (PIs), and the broader community of the specific conditions, opportunities, and challenges of this site. These efforts include both physical site characterization as well as numerical simulation (modeling) studies. Geochemical modeling has been conducted with the goal of: (1) providing a baseline understanding of the geochemical behavior of uranium (U); (2) examining the interaction of geochemistry and uranium transport in the subsurface; (3) elucidating some potential pitfalls for researchers with …

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A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Department of Education's performance report for fiscal year 2000. Specifically, GAO examines Education's progress in achieving selected key outcomes that are important to its mission. Given the lack of performance data, explanations, and strategies to meet unmet goals in the future, it was difficult for GAO to assess progress. The lack of a performance plan also hindered GAO's efforts. Specifically, GAO found that it was difficult to assess Education's progress in achieving the six selected outcomes because of the lack of fiscal year 2000 data for many of its indicators. Consistent with its findings in reviewing Education's performance report from last year, GAO found that Education had no goals or measures for preventing fraud, waste, mismanagement, and error in the student financial assistance programs. Although the Office of Student Financial Assistance has established a target of being removed from GAO's high-risk list, there were no corresponding goals or measures in the department's interim report. However, Education has revised its strategic plan to incorporate an objective of ensuring financial integrity within the department. Like last year's report, GAO found that there was no …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report reviews the Department of Energy's (DOE) fiscal year 2002 performance report and fiscal 2002 performance plan as required by the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 to assess DOE's progress in achieving five key outcomes identified as important mission areas for the agency. GAO found that DOE's performance report did not always effectively demonstrate the agency's progress in achieving its outcomes because it included (1) unclear, jargon-laden measures that did not always support superceeding objectives, (2) performance assessments that were inconsistent with actual performance, (3) objectives with insufficient performance measures, and (4) a lack of explanation for shortfalls in performance. In its fiscal year 2002 performance plan, DOE generally outlined broad, clear strategies for achieving the objectives under the selected outcomes. However, DOE did not consistently provide detailed, specific actions required to achieve some of the outcomes. DOE's fiscal year 2000 performance and accountability report and fiscal year 2002 performance plan present an overall improvement over previous reports and plans. Specifically, the fiscal year 2000 report organizes information by departmental decision unit to better track with the budget, and it better links objectives …

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

Daily newspaper from Baytown, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Funeral program for Calvin Lewis Calhoun, Sr., born July 27, 1937 and died June 21, 2001. The funeral was held June 29, 2001 at Calvary Baptist Church, officiated by Rev. Willie J. Harper, Sr. The funeral arrangements were made through Lewis Funeral Home and he was buried in Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery near San Antonio, Texas.

The Mayak Production Association (PA Mayak), an industrial site in Russia, will be assigned multiple new plutonium disposition missions in order to implement the ''Agreement Between The Government Of The United States Of America And The Government Of Russian Federation Concerning The Management And Disposition Of Plutonium Designated As No Longer Required For Defense Purposes And Related Cooperation'' signed September 1, 2000, by Gore and Kasyanov, In addition, the mission of industrial-scale mixed-oxide (MOX) fabrication will be assigned to either the Mining Chemical Combine (MCC) industrial site at Krasnoyarsk-26 (K-26) or PA Mayak. Over the next decades, these new missions will generate radioactive wastes containing weapons-grade plutonium. The existing Mayak and K-26 onsite facilities and infrastructures cannot currently treat and immobilize these Pu-containing wastes for storage and disposal. However, the wastes generated under the Agreement must be properly immobilized, treated, and managed. New waste treatment and immobilization missions at Mayak may include operating facilities for plutonium metal-to-oxide conversion processes, industrial-scale MOX fuel fabrication, BN-600 PAKET hybrid core MOX fuel fabrication, and a plutonium conversion demonstration process. The MCC K-26 site, if assigned the industrial-scale MOX fuel fabrication mission, would also need to add facilities to treat and immobilize the Pu-containing …

Semiweekly newspaper from Boerne, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with Harry Depoy. He was born in Pulaski County, Indiana on April 1, 1920. He recalls joining the Army in the spring 1944 and being assigned to the 670th Field Artillery Battalion. He describes how he had two brothers and both were assigned to different batteries in the 670th. He recalls shipping out from Boston to Le Havre, France. His unit trained in the mountains of France and then joined up with the 1st Army under General Bradley. Next he describes his unit fighting with the 3rd Army under General Patton. He describes some near encounters with V-1 Bombs. He describes getting caught behind enemy lines near Dusseldorf for ten days. Near Berlin, he describes how the Russians fired upon both the surrendering German troops and the Americans. He recalls hearing Patton ordering the Americans to return the fire and the Russians finally ceasing fire. He got to know General Patton very well and describes several instances of direct contact. He describes taking German prisoners, many of whom were SS, and very difficult to deal with. He recalls that he was in Yugoslavia when Germany surrendered. He says he …