2021June7 OM OFMS 30 SupportStatement A

SUPPORTING STATEMENT FOR PAPERWORK REDUCTION ACT SUBMISSIONS

 

A. Justification

A1. Need for Information Collection

The Corporation for National and Community Service dba AmeriCorps (AmeriCorps) awards grants to states, institutions of higher education, non-profit organizations, Indian tribes, and U.S. Territories to operate AmeriCorps State, AmeriCorps National, AmeriCorps NCCC, AmeriCorps VISTA, Social Innovation Fund and AmeriCorps Seniors programs. This information collection comprises questions applicants answer related operational and financial management when applying for grant funding.

A2. Indicate how, by whom, and for what purpose the information is to be used.

Applicants respond to the questions included in these instructions when applying for funding in certain grant competitions. AmeriCorps will use the information collection to support pre-award risk assessment of applicants for grant funding.

 

 A3. Minimize Burden: Use of Improved Technology to Reduce Burden

AmeriCorps will be eliciting and accepting applicants’ response to these questions electronically via eGrants AmeriCorps’ secure online grants management system. If applicants are unable to apply or report on-line, they can use the attached form and instructions to submit via email.

A4. Non-Duplication

There are no other sources of information by which AmeriCorps can meet the purposes described in A2 (above).

 

A5. Minimizing for economic burden for small businesses or other small entities.

This collection of information does not impact small businesses because they are not eligible to apply for grants. There is no economic burden to any other small entities beyond the cost of staff time to collect and report the data. This is minimized to the degree possible by only asking for the information absolutely necessary to assess an organization’s risk posed to AmeriCorps.

A6. Consequences of the collection if not conducted, conducted less frequently, as well as any technical or legal obstacles to reducing burden.

 

AmeriCorps will be unable to request the necessary information to assess posed risk of applicants for AmeriCorps grant funding.

A7. Special circumstances that would cause information collection to be collected in a manner requiring respondents to report more often than quarterly; report in fewer than 30 days after receipt of the request; submit more than an original and two copies; retain records for more than three years; and other ways specified in the Instructions focused on statistical methods, confidentially, and proprietary trade secrets.

There are no special circumstances that would require the collection of information in these ways.

A8. Provide copy and identify the date and page number of publication in the Federal Register of the Agency’s notice. Summarize comments received and actions taken in response to comments. Specifically address comments received on cost and hour burden.

The 60-day Notice soliciting comments was published on Thursday, April 1, 2021 on page 17140-17141. No comments were received. The 30-day Notice was published on Wednesday, June 10, 2021.

 

 A9. Payment to Respondents

There are no payments or gifts to respondents

  

A10. Assurance of Confidentiality and its basis in statute, regulation, or agency policy.

Your responses to this information collection will be disclosed as appropriate unless prohibited by law.

A11. Sensitive Questions

 

The information collection does not include questions of a sensitive nature.

 

A12. Hour burden of the collection

These are survey questions related to operational and financial management of AmeriCorps grant applicants.

We expect approximately 1,500 respondents to use this form when applying for consideration of grant funding and should not exceed 2 hours of effort per respondent. There is no estimated annual hour burden outside of the customary and usual business practices.

 

A13. Cost burden to the respondent

The estimated respondent burdens and labor costs are shown in the following table.

Estimation of Respondent Burden
Number of respondents	1,500
Responses per respondent	1
Number of responses	1,500
Hours per response	2
Estimated hours (number of responses multiplied by hours per response)	3,000
Cost per hour (hourly wage)	$57.52
Annual public burden (estimated hours multiplied by cost per hour)	$172,560

Notes: The cost per hour is based on the Office of Personnel Management(OPM) General Schedule (GS) hourly rate of $42.22 for a GS-12, step 5, employee (for calendar year 2021 for the rest of the U.S.) plus the 36.25% civilian personnel full fringe benefit rate from OMB memorandum M-08-13 ($42.22 + $15.30 = $57.52, rounded to the nearest dollar).

A13. Respondent Costs Other Than Burden Hour Costs

AmeriCorps does not estimate any annual cost burden apart from the hourly burden in Item 12 above.

 

A14. Cost to Government

There is an estimated annual cost to the Government of approximately $4,717. This includes the percent of effort (1.2%) of staff required to process the information collection. The information collection is processed in batches, up to 8 times annually. It is estimated that it will take the Government 2,080 hours to review and verify the information contained in each response. This estimate was developed by staff involved in the management of current activity.

Notes: The cost is based on the OPM GS hourly rate of $45.67 for three GS-12, step 8, employees and an hourly rate of $59.33 for one GS-14, step 5 (for calendar year 2021) times the percent of effort (1.2%) required to complete the information collection for each batch of responses totaling 1,500.

A15. Reasons for program changes or adjustments in burden or cost.

Not applicable.

 

 A16. Publication of results

Results of the responses will not be published. 

 

A17. Explain the reason for seeking approval to not display the expiration date for OMB approval of the information collection.

Not applicable.

 

 A18. Exceptions to the certification statement

There are no exceptions to the certification statement in the submitted ROCIS form.

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