The Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 directs the Department of the Interior to allow incidental taking of marine mammals upon request by U.S. citizens engaged in certain activities. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will use the information to verify the finding required to issue incidental take regulations, to decide if we should issue a Letter of Authorization (LOA), and, if issued, what conditions should be contained in the LOA. In addition, we will analyze the information to determine impacts to the marine mammals and the availability of those marine mammals for subsistence purposes of Alaska Natives.
This information collection has 352 responses and 1,500 annual burden hours, which is an increase of 255 responses and 708 burden hours.
We are reporting as a program change an increase of 97 responses and 592 burden hours previously approved under OMB Control No. 1018-0139.
We are reporting as an adjustment a net increase of 158 responses and 116 burden hours as follows:
 -200 hours for the burden associated with the applications for regulations. Our previous submissions for both Beaufort and Chukchi Seas erroneously listed the total burden hours rather than annualizing over the 3-year period of approval. Therefore, we have made an adjustment to correct this mistake.
 +1 response and 24 burden hours for LOA requests, based on our experience in administering these collections over the last 3 years.
 +156 responses and the associated 234 burden hours for monitoring and reporting, based on information from our outreach.
 +1 response and 58 annual burden hours for final reports, based on information from our outreach. Ten hours are associated with the additional response and the remaining 48 hours are the result of increasing the completion time from 8 to 10 hours for both the Beaufort and Chukchi collection.
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that the collection of information encompassed by this request complies with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR 1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding the proposed collection of information, that the certification covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.