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 provides background information regarding the bill and joint resolution, which must be passed by both houses in identical form, then presented to the President for his approval or disapproval.

Because the minimum wage is not indexed to the price level, it has been legislatively increased from time to time to make up for the loss in its real value due to inflation. In nominal terms, the minimum wage has risen steadily since 1938 from 25 cents an hour to $5.15 where it now stands. But the legislated adjustments to the minimum wage have occurred at irregular intervals. As a result, there has been significant variation in the purchasing power of the minimum wage.

Reauthorizing the Superfund hazardous waste cleanup law is a top environmental priority in the 105th Congress, according to congressional leaders and the subcommittees with jurisdiction. The program has been accused of being slow, ineffective, and too expensive. Many feel its liability system is unfair. And the taxes that feed the Superfund trust fund expired on December 31, 1995.

The European Community (EC) and Japan reached an agreement on trade in automobiles in July 1991. The agreement restricts exports of automobiles from Japan to the EC to 1.23 million cars per year until the end of 1999. The Commission of the European Communities estimates that Japanese transplant production in the EC will amount to 1.2 million cars per year in 1999. The Japanese appear to concur with this estimate but do not agree that it constitutes a cap on transplant investment or production. Whether the agreement covers the export of U.S.-built Japanese transplants to the EC is unclear. If the agreement covers, or has the effect of discouraging, such exports, it would be a cause for concern for U.S. policymakers. U.S. trade officials have reportedly discussed the issue with Japanese counterparts. It is unknown whether U.S. concerns have been addressed to European Community (EC) officials.

Debate continues over the benefits of U.S. trade with Mexico, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and particularly maquiladoras, or cross-border production sharing plants. Maquiladoras generate a large portion of U.S.-Mexico trade, yet the economic effects are not widely understood. Many believe there is no benefit to such trade because it leads to the loss of U.S. jobs, production, and wages. Maquiladora products, however, have a high U.S. content that in addition to fostering productivity gains in both countries, may actually minimize the loss of U.S. jobs by allowing the higher paying jobs to stay at home rather than be shipped entirely abroad, for example, to Asia. Still, adjustment to globalized production creates challenges, particularly in addressing the plight of low-skilled workers who become unemployed. Research, however, continues to point to domestic rather than trade policy for the likely solutions, particularly the emphasis on education and training programs.

This document is a program from the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) Forum on Technology and Governance in the 1990s, held on January 27, 1993. The program includes a schedule of events and biographical information on each of the forum speakers.

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.

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Authority of a state licensing agency to require the disclosure of social security numbers (RQ-614)

Letter opinion 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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether a county treasurer must provide access to the actual returned and unpaid checks issued by the county, in lieu of a computer printout listing such checks, when the actual checks are requested under the Open Records Act, Government Code chapter 252, and related questions (ID# 21832)

Letter opinion 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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Reconsideration of Attorney General Opinion WW-1246(1962) (RQ-604)

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Defense's (DOD) efforts to reduce the costs associated with civilian personnel management, focusing on: (1) how DOD determines the number and locations for civilian personnel regional service centers and why is there a wide disparity in the number of regional centers among the services; (2) whether DOD is applying the investment principles of the Clinger-Cohen Act in overseeing, managing, and developing the Defense Civilian Personnel Data System (DCPDS); (3) whether DCPDS duplicates the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) Employee Express System: (4) whether DOD leadership is aware of the extent and cost of the needed modifications to the commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software applications; and (5) whether DOD identified and mitigated the risks associated with the major COTS modifications."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO assessed how well the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) is managing its year 2000 program, focusing on: (1) the status of the BOP's year 2000 program; and (2) recent actions it has taken to strengthen its management of the program and improve year 2000 assistance to state and local government institutions."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the use of the disaster recovery funds provided for Yosemite National Park, following the January 1997 flood, focusing on whether: (1) planned and actual expenditures are consistent with the park's planning documents; (2) the costs of the disaster recovery projects appear reasonable; and (3) there is any merit to the allegations about the misuse of some of the disaster recovery funds."

This paper summarizes our experience in bench-scale packaging of Fernald Silo I waste in chemically bonded phosphate ceramics. The waste was received from the Fernald Environmental Management Project (FEMP), and its treatability was studied in our laboratory. This waste contained As{sup 5+}, Ba, Cr{sup 6+}, Ni, Pb, Se{sup 4+}, and Zn as the hazardous contaminants. In addition, the total specific activity of all the radioactive isotopes in the waste was 3.85 {micro}Ci/g, of which that of radium alone was 0.477 {micro}Ci/g. This indicated that radon (a daughter product of the radium) in the waste could present a serious handling problem during this study. For this reason, the waste was handled and stored in a flowing-air glovebox. We made waste form samples with an actual waste loading of 66.05 wt.% and subjected them to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP). The results showed excellent stabilization of all contaminants. Actual levels detected in the leachate were well below the EPA's most stringent Universal Treatment Standards and in almost all cases were one order of magnitude below this limit. Radioactivity in the leachate was also very low. Alpha activity was 25 {+-} 2.5 pCi/mL, while beta activity was 9.81 …

The main focus of the Ames Laboratory`s Technology Integration Program, TIP, from May 1991 through December 1994 was the development, fabrication, and demonstration of a mobile instrumentation laboratory incorporating rapid in situ sampling systems for safe, rapid, and cost effective soil screening/characterization. The Mobile Demonstration Laboratory for Environmental Screening Technologies, MDLEST, containing the analysis instrumentation, along with surface and subsurface sampling probe prototypes employing the laser ablation sampling technique were chosen to satisfy the particular surface and subsurface soil characterization needs of the various Department of Energy facilities for determining the extent of heavy metal and radionuclide contamination. The MDLEST, a 44 foot long 5th wheel trailer, is easily configured for the analysis instrumentation and sampling system required for the particular site work. This mobile laboratory contains all of the utilities needed to satisfy the operating requirements of the various instrumentation installed. These utilities include, an electric generator, a chilled water system, process gases, a heating/air conditioning system, and computer monitoring and automatic operating systems. Once the MDLEST arrives at the job site, the instrumentation is aligned and calibration is completed, sampling and analysis operations begin. The sample is acquired, analyzed and the results reported in as little as 10 …

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The release of materials containing residual radioactivity from a controlled environment in decontamination and decommissioning (D&D) activities has been problematic. The primary impediment to such a release is the lack of a suitable framework within which release standards can be developed. The concept of clearance for radioactive materials was recently introduced by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) (l). This concept is being evaluated by the international regulatory communities as a basis for setting standards for releasing from control solid materials containing residual radioactivity. Accordingly, both the IAEA (2) and the European Commission (EC) (3) have recently proposed clearance standards. In the US, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC) has just begun its rule-making process on clearance. The term ''clearance'' was introduced as a regulatory process for releasing radioactive materials posing negligible risks. A trivial risk level has been determined to be a 10{sup {minus}6} to 10{sup {minus}7} annual risk to an exposed individual, and a population risk of no more than 0.1 for an annual practice. Under these strict constraints, exposure scenarios would be developed to estimate potential doses to affected individuals. Such scenarios may account for processing, disposal, and product end-use of materials. This paper discusses these scenarios and …

Salt caverns can be formed through solution mining in the bedded or domal salt formations that are found in many states. Salt caverns have traditionally been used for hydrocarbon storage, but caverns have also been used to dispose of some types of wastes. This paper provides an overview of several years of research by Argonne National Laboratory on the feasibility and legality of using salt caverns for disposing of nonhazardous oil field wastes (NOW) and naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM), the risk to human populations from this disposal method, and the cost of cavern disposal. Costs are compared between the four operating US disposal caverns and other commercial disposal options located in the same geographic area as the caverns. Argonne's research indicates that disposal of NOW into salt caverns is feasible and, in most cases, would not be prohibited by state agencies (although those agencies may need to revise their wastes management regulations). A risk analysis of several cavern leakage scenarios suggests that the risk from cavern disposal of NOW and NORM wastes is below accepted safe risk thresholds. Disposal caverns are economically competitive with other disposal options.

Development of useful high-T{sub c} superconductors requires synthesis of superconducting compounds; fabrication of wires, tapes, and films from these compounds; production of composite structures that incorporate stabilizers or insulators; and design and testing of efficient components. This report describes FY 1998 technical progress of research and development efforts aimed at producing superconducting components in the Bi-(Pb)-Sr-Ca-Cu and Y-Ba-Cu oxide systems. Topics discussed are synthesis and heat treatment of high-T{sub c} superconductors, formation of monolithic and composite conductors, characterization of structures and superconducting and mechanical properties, and fabrication and testing of prototype components. Collaborations with industry and academia are documented.

Oxidation of an aluminum nanocluster (252,158 atoms) of radius 100{angstrom} placed in gaseous oxygen (530,727 atoms) is investigated by performing molecular-dynamics simulations on parallel computers. The simulation takes into account the effect of charge transfer between Al and O based on the electronegativity equalization principles. We find that the oxidation starts at the surface of the cluster and the oxide layer grows to a thickness of {approximately}28{angstrom}. Evolutions of local temperature and densities of Al and O are investigated. The surface oxide melts because of the high temperature resulting from the release of energy associated with Al-O bondings. Amorphous surface-oxides are obtained by quenching the cluster. Vibrational density-of-states for the surface oxide is analyzed through comparisons with those for crystalline Al, Al nanocluster, and {alpha}-Al{sub 2}O{sub 3}.

Many applications require the derivatives of functions defined by computer programs. Automatic differentiation (AD) is a means of developing code to compute the derivatives of complicated functions accurately and efficiently, without the difficulties associated with developing correct code by hand. We discuss some of the issues involved in developing automatic differentiation tools for parallel programming environments.

The current status of understanding of the equation of motion of an electron is summarized. Classically, a consistent, linearized theory exists for an electron of finite extent, as long as the size of the electron is larger than the classical electron radius. Nonrelativistic quantum mechanics seems to offer a tine theory even in the point-particle limit.