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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 one of the 13 regular appropriations bills that Congress passes each year. It is designed to supplement the information provided by the House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Legislative Branch Appropriations.

The Economic Development Administration (EDA), targeted for elimination or major “reinvention” early in the 104th Congress, gained a new lease on life in the waning days of the 105th. Having been kept alive via appropriations bills since its last authorizing legislation expired in 1982, P.L. 105-393 reauthorized the EDA and its programs for 5 years. On October 27, Congress approved a conference agreement recommending $286.7 million for EDAP and $28 million for S&E, for a totalFY2001 appropriation of$411.9 million for EDA. It became part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 4942, P.L. 106-553) signed into law on December 21, 2000.

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On March 27, 2002 the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published its proposed changes to the medical privacy regulations issued by the Clinton Administration under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”). HHS is accepting comments on the proposed changes until April 26, 2002. This report provides an overview of the final rule for “Standards for the Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information” ( “privacy rule”) that went into effect on April 14, 2001, and an overview of the Bush Administration’s proposed changes to the privacy regulation.

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This report provides background on the purpose, structure, and other aspects of the new Institute for Security Cooperation.

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Tri-weekly student newspaper from Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas that includes local, state and campus news along with advertising.

Weekly student newspaper from McMurry University in Abilene, Texas that includes local, state and campus news along with advertising.

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

Weekly student newspaper from the University of Dallas in Irving, Texas that includes campus news and commentaries along with advertising.

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant makes $16.5 billion available to states each year, regardless of changes in the number of people receiving benefits. To qualify for their full TANF allotments, states must spend a certain amount of state money, referred to as maintenance-of-effort funds. As states implemented work-focused reforms during the strong economy of the 1990s, welfare caseloads dropped by more than 50 percent. GAO found that most former welfare recipients were employed at some point after leaving welfare, typically with earnings that did not raise them above the poverty level. Under welfare reform, spending shifted from monthly cash payments to services, such as child care and transportation. This shift reflects two key features of reform. First, many states have increased spending to engage more welfare families in work-related activities and to provide more intensive services. Second, many states have increased their efforts to provide services to low-income families not receiving welfare. Services for these families include child care, case management, and job retention and advancement services for families who have recently left welfare for employment as well as other low-income working families. Although …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Education has a history of financial management problems, including serious internal control weaknesses, that have affected the Department's ability to provide reliable financial information on its operations. GAO found that significant internal control weaknesses in payment processes and poor physical control over its computer assets led to fraud, improper payments, and lost assets. GAO also identified instances of grant and loan fraud and pervasive control breakdowns and improper payments in other areas, particularly involving purchasing cards."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO discussed the condition of culverts on fish-bearing streams in Oregon and Washington and the federal efforts to identify and restore culverts that are impeding fish passage on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Forest Service lands. This testimony is based on a November 2001 report (GAO-02-136), which described (1) the number of culverts that may impede fish passage on BLM and Forest Service lands in Oregon and Washington, (2) the factors affecting the agencies' ability to restore passage through culverts acting as barrier culverts, and (3) the results of the agencies' efforts to restore fish passage."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Preventive medicine, including immunizations for many diseases and screening for some types of cancer, holds the promise to extend and improve the quality of life for millions of Americans. Medicare now covers three preventive services for immunizations and three for screenings, and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) sponsors "interventions" to increase the use of preventive services. GAO found that the use of preventive services varies widely by service, state, ethnic group, income, and education. The greatest differences among ethnic groups were for immunization rates. Cancer screening rates tended to differ according to income and education level. CMS pays for interventions that promote breast cancer screenings and pneumonia and flu shots. Most of the techniques being used, such as reminder systems that medical offices can use to alert doctors and patients to needed cancer screenings, have been effective. CMS is evaluating what its current efforts have accomplished and expects the results later this year."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) authorization act for fiscal year 2000 limits expenditures for space station development to $25 billion and for shuttle launches to $17.7 billion. The act also requires NASA to (1) account for and report amounts obligated to date against the cost limits, (2) identify the amounts needed for future development and completion of the space station, and (3) arrange for GAO to verify the accounting within 60 days after submission of the budget request. Last year, GAO reported that NASA, as part of its fiscal year 2002 budget request, did not comply with the act's requirement to use obligations as its basis for reporting against the cost limits but instead used budget authority. The agency was also unable to provide detailed support for the amounts obligated against the limits for evaluation within the 60 days, but said that it could have provided the information if given more time. After a protracted effort, NASA has acknowledged that its systems cannot provide the data needed to support amounts obligated against the limits. NASA's inability to provide detailed data is due to its lack of …

Semiweekly newspaper from Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas that includes local, national, and campus news along with advertising.

Weekly Czech and English language newspaper from Temple, Texas published as the official organ of the Slavonic Benevolent Order of the State of Texas that includes news of interest to members along with advertising.

This paper addresses the modeling problem of the linear accelerator RF system in SNS. Klystrons are modeled as linear parameter varying systems. The effect of the high voltage power supply ripple on the klystron output voltage and the output phase is modeled as an additive disturbance. The cavity is modeled as a linear system and the beam current is modeled as the exogenous disturbance. The output uncertainty of the low level RF system which results from the uncertainties in the RF components and cabling is modeled as multiplicative uncertainty. Also, the feedback loop uncertainty and digital signal processing signal conditioning subsystem uncertainties are lumped together and are modeled as multiplicative uncertainty. Finally, the time delays in the loop are modeled as a lumped time delay. For the perturbed open loop system, the closed loop system performance, and stability are analyzed with the PI feedback controller.

The solution of hydrogen and hydride formation in FCC substitutional solid solution Pd0.9Rh0.1-xAlx alloys have been examined. In contrast to some other Pd ternary alloys, a linear relation does not obtain between the H capacity and x for the Pd0.9Rh0.1-xAlx alloys investigated here where the H capacity of the alloys is estimated from the H content of the steeply rising part of the isotherms in the hydride phase regions. A linear increase of the dilute phase H solubility with x for these Pd0.9Rh0.1-xAlx alloys does, however, obtain for these alloys. Although Pd-Rh binary alloys have broader plateaux than does Pd itself, small amounts of Al substituted into Pd0.85Rh0.15 or Pd0.80Rh0.20 alloys can reduce or eliminate the two phase regions, the plateaux; there is, however, not much effect on the dilute phase solubilities. For example, small amounts of Al substituted into the Pd0.85Rh0.15 or Pd0.80Rh0.20 alloys eliminate the plateaux. On the other hand, alloying Pd with Al to form binary alloys with Xal equals 0.015 or 0.030 does not eliminate the plateaux which are present in these binary alloys up to Xal equals 0.075 (298 K). Small amounts of Al substitution do not have such a dramatic effect on the plateau …

The objective of this project is to design, construct and field demonstrate a 3-MMscfd membrane system to recover natural gas liquids (NGL) and remove water from raw natural gas. The gas processed by the membrane system will meet pipeline specifications for dew point and Btu value, and the process is likely to be significantly less expensive than glycol dehydration followed by propane refrigeration, the principal competitive technology. The BP-Amoco gas processing plant in Pascagoula, MS was finalized as the location for the field demonstration. Detailed drawings of the MTR membrane skid (already constructed) were submitted to the plant in February, 2000. However, problems in reaching an agreement on the specifications of the system compressor delayed the project significantly, so MTR requested (and was subsequently granted) a no-cost extension to the project. Following resolution of the compressor issues, the goal is to order the compressor during the first quarter of 2002, and to start field tests in mid-2002. Information from potential users of the membrane separation process in the natural gas processing industry suggests that applications such as fuel gas conditioning and wellhead gas processing are the most promising initial targets. Therefore, most of our commercialization effort is focused on promoting …