Published 30 Day FRN

Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 4 / Thursday, January 7, 2021 / Notices

Federal Emergency Management
Agency
[Docket ID: FEMA–2020–0035; OMB No.
1660–0072]

Agency Information Collection
Activities: Submission for OMB
Review; Comment Request; Flood
Mitigation Assistance (FMA); Building
Resilient Infrastructure and
Communities (BRIC); Pre-Disaster
Mitigation (PDM)
Federal Emergency
Management Agency, Department of
Homeland Security (DHS).
ACTION: 30-Day notice and request for
comments.
AGENCY:

The Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) will
submit the information collection
described below to the Office of
Management and Budget for review and
clearance in accordance with the
requirements of the Paperwork
Reduction Act of 1995. While this
information collection continues to
include the Flood Mitigation Assistance
(FMA) and Pre-Disaster Mitigation
(PDM) programs, it introduces the
Building Resilient Infrastructure and
Communities (BRIC) program, and
addresses the process for using a BRIC
fiscal year (FY) 20 National Competition
Panel Review Expression of Interest
Form to solicit panel members to review
competitive BRIC grant applications.
After reviewing all the comments
submitted, FEMA has decided to use the
BRIC FY20 National Competition Panel
Review Expression of Interest Form to
solicit interest from potential panelists.
DATES: Written comments must be
received on or before February 8, 2021.
ADDRESSES: Written comments and
recommendations for the proposed
information collection should be sent
within 30 days of publication of this
notice to www.reginfo.gov/public/do/
PRAMain. Find this particular
information collection by selecting
‘‘Currently under 30-day Review—Open
for Public Comments’’ or by using the
search function.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Jennie Orenstein, Grants Policy Branch
Chief, Federal Insurance and Mitigation
Administration, FEMA,
[email protected], (202)
212–4071. You may contact the Records
Management Division for copies of the
proposed collection of information at
email address: [email protected].

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SUMMARY:

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This
collection of information is necessary to
implement grants for the Flood
Mitigation Assistance (FMA) program,
Pre-Disaster Mitigation (PDM), and
Building Resilient Infrastructure and
Communities (BRIC) program.
The FMA program is authorized
pursuant to Section 1366 of the National
Flood Insurance Act of 1968, as
amended (42 U.S.C. 4104c). FMA was
created as part of the National Flood
Insurance Reform Act (NFIRA) of 1994,
Public Law 103–325. The Biggert-Waters
Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012
(BW–12), Public Law 112–141,
consolidated the Repetitive Flood
Claims (RFC) and Severe Repetitive Loss
grant (SRL) programs into FMA. Under
FMA, cost-share requirements were
changed to allow more Federal funds for
properties with repetitive flood claims.
The FMA program, under 44 CFR part
79, provides funding for measures taken
to reduce or eliminate the long-term risk
of flood damage to buildings,
manufactured homes, and other
structures insured under the National
Flood Insurance Program (NFIP).
PDM was authorized under Section
203 of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster
Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
(Stafford Act), Public Law 93–288, as
amended by Section 102 of the Disaster
Mitigation Act of 2000, Public Law 106–
390 (42 U.S.C. 5133). As a result of
amendments by the Disaster Recovery
Reform Act of 2018 (DRRA), the PDM
program is being replaced with the BRIC
program. Therefore, PDM is established
as a legacy program. The PDM program
provided grants for cost-effective
mitigation actions prior to a disaster
event to reduce overall risks to the
population and structures while also
reducing reliance on funding from
actual disaster declarations. While the
last cycle of the PDM program awards
were made in Fiscal Year (FY) 2019,
information collection will continue
through FY 2020–2021 for grant
monitoring and closeout.
The Disaster Recovery Reform Act of
2018, Section 1234, National Public
Infrastructure Pre-Disaster Hazard
Mitigation, amended Section 203 of the
Stafford Act (42 U.S.C. 5133) to
authorize BRIC. The BRIC program is
designed to promote a national culture
of preparedness and public safety
through encouraging investments to
protect our communities and
infrastructure and through
strengthening national mitigation
capabilities to foster resilience. The
BRIC program seeks to fund effective
and innovative projects that will reduce
risk, increase resilience, and serve as a
catalyst to encourage the whole

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND
SECURITY

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community to invest in and adopt
policies related to mitigation.
The guiding principles of the BRIC
program are to (1) support state and
local governments, tribes, and territories
through capability and capacitybuilding to enable them to identify
mitigation actions and implement
projects that reduce risks posed by
natural hazards; (2) encourage and
enable innovation while allowing
flexibility, consistency, and
effectiveness; (3) promote partnerships
and enable high-impact investments to
reduce risk from natural hazards with a
focus on critical services and facilities,
public infrastructure, public safety,
public health, and communities; (4)
provide a significant opportunity to
reduce future losses and minimize
impacts on the Disaster Relief Fund; and
(5) support the adoption and
enforcement of building codes,
standards, and policies that will protect
the health, safety, and general welfare of
the public, take into account future
conditions, and have long-lasting
impacts on community risk reduction,
including for critical services and
facilities and for future disaster costs.
The BRIC program will distribute funds
annually and apply a federal/nonfederal cost share.
In accordance with OMB Circular A–
102, FEMA requires that all parties
interested in receiving FEMA mitigation
grants to submit an application package
for grant assistance. Applications and
sub-applications for the BRIC and FMA
programs are submitted via the FEMA
Grants Outcome (GO) system.
Information necessary for the ongoing
monitoring and closeout of the PDM
program for FY 2019 and prior will be
collected via the e-Grants system. The
FEMA GO and e-Grants systems have
been developed to meet the intent of the
e-Government initiative, authorized by
Public Law 106–107. This initiative
requires that all government agencies
both streamline grant application
processes and provide for the means to
electronically create, review, and submit
a grant application via the internet.
To increase transparency in decisionmaking while building capability and
partnerships, FEMA will convene a
National Review Panel to score
applications and sub-applications based
on qualitative evaluation criteria. The
qualitative criteria are narrative
submissions to allow applicants and
sub-applicants the flexibility to fully
explain the strengths of the proposed
project. Qualitative evaluation criteria
have graded scales of point scoring.
The BRIC program will need to solicit
volunteers from State, local, Tribal, and
territorial governments (SLTTs) and

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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 4 / Thursday, January 7, 2021 / Notices

Other Federal Agencies (OFAs) to
review applications that are routed to
the qualitative panel reviews. The
volunteers will review and score
applications based on a pre-determined
scoring criterion.
This proposed information collection
previously published in the Federal
Register on October 27, 2020, with a 60day public comment period. The
comment period closed on December
28, 2020. FEMA received one comment
with two parts via www.regulations.gov
in response to Information Collection
1660–0072. A summary of the comment
and FEMA’s response is provided
below.
The first part of the comment stated
that because ‘‘community’’ is used in
program descriptions, applications and
sub-applications submitted by SLTTs
for BRIC and FMA grants should
include additional information such as
evidence of public outreach and
education on proposed mitigation
activities and public comment on the
proposed mitigation activities. In
response, while FEMA appreciates this
comment, the Federal Register notice
for this information collection was
published to solicit feedback about the
expression of interest form created to
solicit potential panelists for the BRIC
application review process. Adding
additional requirements to BRIC
applications and sub-applications is
outside the scope of this matter.
The second part of the comment seeks
additional information about the
makeup of the qualitative panel, the
review process, and whether panelists
will be compensated for their
participation in the review process. In
response, FEMA provides the following
information.
BRIC applications and subapplications will be reviewed for
Eligibility and Completeness (E&C) by
FEMA’s respective regional offices.
During the E&C review, projects that are
submitted to the national competition
will also be provided a technical score.
Technical scores are made up of 100
points, which are binary points. After
applications have gone through the E&C
review, they will be forwarded to the
National Technical Review (NTR).
Projects that are marked as standard or
decentralized during the E&C review
will be reviewed and issued an NTR
memo. After NTR has concluded, the
projects that are submitted to the
national competition will be sent to the
qualitative panels. During the
qualitative panels, applications will be
reviewed by representatives from the
SLTTs and OFAs that comprise the
panel and scored based on a gradient
scale. Qualitative scoring has a total of

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100 possible points. The scoring is made
up of six (6) criteria, all ranging in
different point value. The panelists will
leverage their mitigation experience and
expertise during the review to assess the
degree to which subapplications meet
the six BRIC qualitative evaluation
criteria. The subapplication’s final
qualitative score will be calculated by
averaging the qualitative scores from
each panelist. The six criteria include
the following: (1) Risk Reduction/
Resiliency Effectiveness possible 35
points, (2) Future Conditions possible
15 points, (3) Implementation Measures
possible 15 points, (4) Population
Impacted possible 15 points, (5)
Outreach Activities possible 5 points,
and (6) Leveraging Partners possible 15
points. More information on the
background, evaluation process and
scoring, and criteria can be found here:
https://www.fema.gov/sites/default/
files/2020-08/fema_bric-qualitativecriteria_support_document_08-2020.pdf
. For the qualitative panels, each
application will be reviewed and scored
by three (3) volunteer panel members.
The panelists will not be compensated
for their participation.
Collection of Information
Title: Mitigation Grant Programs.
Type of Information Collection:
Revision of a currently approved
collection.
OMB Number: 1660–0072.
FEMA Forms: Building Resilient
Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC)
FY20 National Competition Panel
Review Expression of Interest Form.
Abstract: FEMA’s FMA and BRIC
programs use an automated grant
application and management system
called FEMA GO. The Pre-Disaster
Mitigation program uses an automated
grant application and management
system called e-Grants. These grant
programs provide funding for the
purpose of reducing or eliminating the
risks to life and property from hazards.
The FEMA GO and e-Grants systems
include all the application information
needed to apply for funding under these
grant programs. FEMA and SLTTs will
use the information submitted via the
FY20 National Competition Panel
Review Expression of Interest Form to
solicit volunteers from SLTTs and OFAs
to review applications that are routed to
the BRIC qualitative panel reviews. The
volunteers will review, and score
applications based on a pre-determined
scoring criterion.
Affected Public: Federal Government;
State, local, Tribal, and territorial
governments; Individuals or
Households.

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Estimated Number of Respondents:
436.
Estimated Number of Responses:
5,364.
Estimated Total Annual Burden
Hours: 58,248.
Estimated Total Annual Respondent
Cost: $3,324,211.
Estimated Respondents’ Operation
and Maintenance Costs: None.
Estimated Respondents’ Capital and
Start-Up Costs: None.
Estimated Total Annual Cost to the
Federal Government: $7,586,635.
Comments
Comments may be submitted as
indicated in the ADDRESSES caption
above. Comments are solicited to (a)
evaluate whether the proposed data
collection is necessary for the proper
performance of the agency, including
whether the information shall have
practical utility; (b) evaluate the
accuracy of the agency’s estimate of the
burden of the proposed collection of
information, including the validity of
the methodology and assumptions used;
(c) enhance the quality, utility, and
clarity of the information to be
collected; and (d) minimize the burden
of the collection of information on those
who are to respond, including through
the use of appropriate automated,
electronic, mechanical, or other
technological collection techniques or
other forms of information technology,
e.g., permitting electronic submission of
responses.
Millicent L Brown,
Acting Records Management Branch Chief,
Office of the Chief Administrative Officer,
Mission Support, Federal Emergency
Management Agency, Department of
Homeland Security.
[FR Doc. 2021–00027 Filed 1–6–21; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 9111–BW–P

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Bureau of Indian Affairs
[212A2100DD/AAKC001030/
A0A501010.999900 253G]

Advisory Board for Exceptional
Children
Bureau of Indian Affairs,
Interior.
ACTION: Notice of meeting.
AGENCY:

The Bureau of Indian
Education (BIE) is announcing that the
Advisory Board for Exceptional
Children will hold an online meeting.
The purpose of the meeting is to meet
the mandates of the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act of 2004

SUMMARY:

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