1 - SSA APPLETREE PMs 2023 Rev 20230831_final

Goal of the study: Under cooperative agreement, ATSDR collects information related to recipient activities and the process and outcome performance measures outlined by the cooperative agreement program. Information will be used to monitor progress toward program goals and objectives, and for quality improvement.

Intended use of the resulting data: Performance measures and progress reports will continue to be used by the APPLETREE Program to inform continuous program quality improvement. ATSDR will use these measures for program monitoring and management.

Methods to be used to collect: At the end of each budget year, recipients will report prescribed performance measures, and an annual performance report (APR) of program accomplishments, including an updated annual plan of work (APOW). For this revision information collection request (ICR), ATSDR has added one new form (ATSDR Requests), and will migrate one existing form (ATSDR Success Story) from SharePoint to ATSDR’s Request Management Service System (ARMSS). Other forms will continue to be collected via email.

Subpopulation to be studied: 30 cooperative agreement recipients, an increase of 2 over the 28 previously approved recipients in 2020.

How data will be analyzed: Data will be analyzed using descriptive statistics for program reports.

Part A. Justification

Although the current expiration date for OMB Control No. 0923-0057 is 09/30/2023, ATSDR is requesting PRA clearance by 09/30/2023 to re-align PRA clearance with the APPLETREE Program budget cycle and recipient reporting requirements for the new program announcement, NOFO No. CDC-RFA-TS-23-0001. Several forms require year-round reporting. Awards were finalized in 04/2023.

A.1. Circumstances Making the Collection of Information Necessary

The purpose of the ATSDR’s Partnership to Promote Local Efforts to Reduce Environmental Exposure (APPLETREE) Program is to: 1) identify pathways of exposure to hazardous substances at hazardous waste sites and releases; 2) identify, implement, and coordinate public health interventions to reduce exposures to hazardous substances which occur at levels of health concern; and 3) provide training at the state level to promote and achieve the safe siting of child care facilities in the United States. The APPLETREE Program is also an effective mechanism which enhances ATSDR's communication with state, local, and federal health and environmental agencies.

The APPLETREE Program is authorized under Sections 104(i)(15) of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980, as amended by the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA) of 1986 [42 U.S.C. 9604(i)(15)] (Attachment 1).

This is a revision information collection request (ICR) titled “APPLETREE Performance Measures” (OMB Control No. 0923-0057, expiration date 09/30/2023), for which ATSDR is requesting a three-year Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) clearance. Although ATSDR is requesting PRA clearance by 10/01/2023 to re-align PRA clearance with the APPLETREE Program budget cycle and recipient reporting requirements for the new program. Awards were finalized on 04/01/2023. The 60-day Federal Register Notice was published on 06/27/2023 (Attachment 2) and is further discussed in Section A.8.

On October 3, 2022, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) published a new notice of funding opportunity announcement (NOFO No. CDC-RFA-TS-23-0001) for the APPLETREE Program (Attachment 3). Under the new five-year cooperative agreement, ATSDR will continue to collect information related to APPLETREE recipients’ activities, including process and outcome performance measures. ATSDR will continue to use this information to monitor progress toward program goals and objectives and for program quality improvement.

A.2. Purpose and Use of the Information Collection

The purpose of this ICR is to support program planning and management related to recipient progress reporting, financial reporting and grants management, and quality control. Over the next five-year APPLETREE Program period, ATSDR will receive this information to monitor recipient performance and to support the recipients in terms of technical capacity for environmental assessment, community involvement and education, and stakeholder communications at ATSDR sites. Recipients may participate in ATSDR’s safe siting program for childcare facilities. This participation will foster a systematic way to work with childcare licensing authorities to evaluate prospective childcare locations, train licensing authorities, and evaluate existing childcare locations. The APPLETREE short-term, intermediate-term, and long-term outcomes and performance measures are detailed in the NOFO (Attachment 3).

Short-term, Intermediate, and Long-term Outcomes

Timely dissemination of site-specific findings to partners, stakeholders, and community members. (Component 1, Strategy A)

1.2 Increased partner buy-in and acceptance of recommendations. (Component 1, Strategy A)

1.3 Increased buy in and support from broad array of partners. (Component 1, Strategy B)

1.4 Increased stakeholder/partners knowledge of ECE siting issues and recommendations to prevent exposure. (Component 1, Strategy B)

1.5 Increased understanding of barriers and facilitators for safe siting. (Component 1, Strategy B)

1.6 Enhanced and/or expanded CSPECE programs. (Component 1, Strategy B)

1.7 Enhanced infrastructure among partners to sustain CSPECE program. (Component 1, Strategy B)

1.8 Increased knowledge among target audience to identify, reduce, or prevent health effects from exposure to hazardous substances. (Component 2)

2.1 Increased implementation of recipient recommendations to reduce, eliminate, or prevent exposures by regulatory agencies, policy makers, and/or individuals. (Component 1, Strategy A)

2.2 Decreased or eliminated site-related exposures. (Component 1, Strategy A)

2.3 Increased stakeholder practices to reduce hazardous exposure among children. (Component 1, Strategy B)

2.4 Increased process, systems, and policy changes to support exposure prevention. (Strategy B)

2.5 Increased practices of partners to manage CSPECE program independently. (Component 1, Strategy B)

2.6 Increased actions among target audience to identify, reduce, or prevent health effects from exposure to hazardous substances. (Component 2)

3.1 Decreased, eliminated, or prevented exposures to hazardous chemicals. (all Strategies for Component 1 and 2)

3.2 Increased collection of evidence on effective practices, policies, and processes for preventing exposure (all Strategies for Component 1 and Component 2)

The following information collection forms collect process and outcome measures relevant to activities and outcomes for which the recipients are accountable for tracking (Attachment 4). The first nine forms were previously approved by OMB in 2017 or in 2020. The last form is new.

ATSDR Health Education (HE) Activity Form (Attachment 4a): For health education activities, APPLETREE recipients shall quantitatively assess and report efforts to educate community members about site recommendations and health risks using indicators to assess community understanding of site findings about health risks and community understanding of agency recommendations to reduce health risks. This information will be entered into the new information technology (IT) system called ATSDR’s Request Management Service System (ARMSS).

ATSDR Technical Assistance (TA) Activity Form (Attachment 4b): Throughout the budget year, this form will be used to record the routine requests made by the recipients and their program responses. These responses do not evaluate environmental data and do not make health calls. They are not reviewed and cleared through ATSDR clearance processes but are monitored by ATSDR as part of the recipients’ performance. This information will be entered into ARMSS.

ATSDR Site Impact Assessment (SIA) Form (Attachment 4c): For each environmental health assessment conducted at ATSDR sites, recipients shall estimate and report the number of people protected from exposure to toxic substances at each site where implementation of agency recommendations has taken place. To the extent possible, recipients shall estimate the disease burden prevented due to the implementation of site recommendations. This information will be entered into ARMSS.

ATSDR Success Story Form (Attachment 4d): Recipients will provide a minimum of one success story per quarter (four success stories total per year) that highlights an impact of any of their programs. Recipients will report a brief summary, background, intervention/action taken, and accomplishment/impact for each story. Optionally, they may include a photo or quote. This information is being migrated from SharePoint into ARMSS.

APPLETREE Annual Performance Report (APR) Template (Attachment 4e) and Guidance Document (Attachment 4e1): Recipients will continue to provide an APR each year and at the end of the funding cycle, which summarizes their annual and funding cycle performances, respectively. Annual APRs will be due in November of each year to coincide with the CDC Grants Management annual reports to reduce the overall reporting burden. The final report will be due at the end of the funding cycle. The purpose of the performance reports will be to assess recipients based on performance measures and evaluation projects. The reports should include a summary of performance measures, results of any evaluation projects, an accompanying narrative of progress and interpretation of results, optional successes, challenges, and updated work plan. These reports will continue to be entered into a Microsoft Word document and provided directly to ATSDR via email. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.

CSPECE Qualitative Narrative Form (Attachment 4f): Recipients will provide a narrative report of their Choose Safe Places for Early Care and Education (CSPECE) Programs to document descriptive details of their state’s landscape, program plan, program implementation, and results that cannot be captured through numbers. Recipients will complete and submit the narrative once a year and at the end of the grant cycle as a supplement with their Annual Performance Reports in a Microsoft Word document and provide directly to ATSDR via email. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.

CSPECE Quantitative Form (Attachment 4g): Recipients will provide data on their CSPECE Programs to quantify aspects of their program such as children reached, target audiences educated, early care and education programs referred and screened, and recommendations implemented. Recipients will complete and submit a Microsoft Excel form once a year and at the end of the grant cycle as a supplement with their Annual Performance Reports and provide directly to ATSDR via email. The form is cumulative and documents efforts from all five years. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.

ATSDR SoilSHOP Form (Attachment 4h): SoilSHOPs are not a required activity, however if a recipient completes a SoilSHOP, they need to complete a SoilSHOPs Form in Word. This form gathers data on the inputs, activities, outputs, and outcomes of the event, such as the number of soil samples screened, number of elevated soil samples, number of individuals receiving health consultations, and number of individuals receiving referrals. The form should be provided back to ATSDR via email within a month of a SoilSHOP completion. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.

ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up Form (Attachment 4i): For each environmental health assessment, recipients will provide an update on the status of acceptance and implementation of all recommendations to understand whether and how recommendations have been implemented, and the subsequent impact on communities. Recipients will complete an Excel reporting form annually on the anniversary date of the release of each health assessment. Recipients will provide to ATSDR via email. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.

ATSDR Requests Form (Attachment 4j): For each environmental health assessment, recipients will provide the request, dates, and triage information and can associate the request with a hazardous waste site. Site scoping and clearance information are completed for about 15% of environmental health assessments that complete ATSDR’s clearance process (i.e., certified). This information will be entered into ARMSS.

A.3. Use of Improved Information Technology and Burden Reduction

Only the minimum amount of necessary information will be collected for the “APPLETREE Performance Measures” ICR.

ATSDR will require recipients to electronically submit the HE, the TA, SIA Performance Measures, Requests, and Success Stories in ARMSS. The use of this electronic reporting system will reduce recipient burden because the information can be submitted directly and quickly into the ATSDR system. The estimated time for each entry is 4, 4, and 7 minutes for HE, TA, and SIA, respectively. Direct entry will also reduce transcription errors because recipients will not have to send the information in another reporting form requiring separate data entry at ATSDR. We estimate that 58% (157/269) of the requested burden hours will be spent reporting electronically in ARMSS.

All other forms, including the APR, the SoilSHOP Form, the Recommendation Follow-up Form, and both CSPECE forms, will be submitted in electronic format to ATSDR via email. We estimate that 42% (112/269) of the requested burden hours will be spent reporting by submitting reports via email to ATSDR.

A.4. Efforts to Identify Duplication and Use of Similar Information

There will be no duplication of program management information in the APPLETREE Program. The reported information from the recipient will be generated as site activities progress throughout the budget year. No similar information exists.

A.5. Impact on Small Businesses or Other Small Entities

Recipient reports or performance measures and annual reports will not involve small businesses.

A.6. Consequences of Collecting the Information Less Frequently

APPLETREE recipients will submit information about each site activity into the HE, TA, SIA, SoilSHOP, and Requests forms as they occur. Due to the high volume of ATSDR site activities anticipated per year, we estimate each recipient will submit information several times per year. This frequency is necessary for accurate tracking of site activities. To allow recipients to wait to submit activity summaries monthly, quarterly, biannually, or annually, would result in loss of detail in site activities and increased opportunity for recall bias. This high volume of entries is offset by the minimal time needed to enter each site activity.

The APPLETREE recipients will submit APRs and both CSPECE forms once per year for program management and monitoring. Reporting once per year is a minimum requirement. Additionally, each form will be submitted a 6^th time at the end of the period of performance.

There are no technical or legal obstacles to reducing burden.

A.7. Special Circumstances Relating to the Guidelines of 5 CFR 1320.5

The following special circumstance(s) apply to this information collection. We are requiring the APPLETREE recipients to report HE, TA, SIA, SoilSHOP, and Requests information to the agency more often than quarterly as described and justified in Section A.6.

A.8. Comments in Response to the Federal Register Notice and Efforts to Consult Outside the Agency

A 60-day Federal Register Notice was published in the Federal Register on 06/27/2023, Vol. 88, No. 122, pp. 41620 (Attachment 2). ATSDR did not receive public comments related to this notice.
The APPLETREE Program has been in existence since 1987. As a mature program, consultations outside of ATSDR did not occur during the preparation of this NOFO (Attachment 3).

A.9. Explanation of Any Payment or Gift to Respondents

No payment or gift to APPLETREE recipients will be offered. The recipients are required to submit reports and performance measures as part of the cooperative agreement.

A.10. Protection of the Privacy and Confidentiality of Information Provided by Respondents

Three APPLETREE forms collect information in identifiable form (IIF), specifically, the recipient Point of Contact (POC) name, phone number and email (Attachments 4d,4e,4g). On 09/14/2023, the CDC Chief Privacy Officer determined that the Privacy Act does not apply to the APPLETREE ICR (Attachment 5), as records will not be retrieved by POC identifiers.

The APPLETREE Program will collect recipient performance measures using a combination of two approved IT systems: ARMSS and email. See Section A.15 for a description of the modes of collection by form. Records collected under this ICR will be maintained according to the CDC/ATSDR Records Control Schedule.

A.11. Institutional Review Board (IRB) and Justification for Sensitive Questions

The APPLETREE Program is conducted under the non-research cooperative agreement (NOFO No. CDC-RFA-TS-23-0001) (Attachment 3). The ATSDR Human Subjects Contact has determined that the information collection is necessary for program management and is not research. Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval is not required (Attachment 6).

Sensitive information will not be reported to ATSDR.

A.12. Estimates of Annualized Burden Hours and Costs

The total number of annualized burden hours requested is 269 hours. This reflects a minor increase of 2 hours from the revision in 2020. However, is it still less than the 272 hours previously approved in 2017. Details about the requested revisions are found in Section A.15.

Current estimates of burden hours for each information collection (IC) were derived as follows:

ATSDR Health Education Activity (HE) Form: For each environmental health assessment and health education activity conducted at ATSDR sites, APPLETREE Recipients shall quantitatively assess and report efforts to educate community members about site recommendations and health risks using indicators to assess community understanding of site findings about health risks and community understanding of agency recommendations to reduce health risks. This information will be entered into the ATSDR HEAT system for each activity at ATSDR sites. Based on 2022 activities, ATSDR estimates a maximum of 500 health education activities. Each of the 30 recipients will enter an average of 17 activities into ARMSS, resulting in 34 total burden hours per year and 102 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4a.
ATSDR Technical Assistance (TA) Activity Form: Throughout the budget year, this form will be used to record the routine requests made by the recipients and their program responses. These responses do not evaluate environmental data and do not make health calls, but they are monitored by ATSDR as part of the recipients’ performance. Based on 2022 activities, ATSDR assumes a maximum of 500 TA activities. Each of the 30 recipients will enter an average of 17 activities into ARMSS, resulting in 34 total burden hours per year and 102 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4b.
ATSDR Site Impact Assessment (SIA) Form: For each environmental health assessment and health education activity conducted at ATSDR sites, recipients shall estimate and report the number of people protected from exposure to toxic substances at each site where implementation of agency recommendations has taken place and at each childcare center where safe siting guidelines have been implemented. To the extent possible, recipients shall estimate and report the disease burden prevented due to the implementation of site recommendations and safe siting guidelines. Based on 2022 activities, ATSDR estimates a maximum of 85 sites will undergo an environmental assessment, an average of 3 sites per recipient. This will result in 11 total burden hours per year and 33 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4c.
ATSDR Success Story Form: Recipients will provide one success story per quarter (four success stories total per year) that highlights the impact of any of their programs. Recipients will report a brief summary, background, intervention/action taken, and accomplishment/impact for each story. Optionally, they may include a photo or quote. ATSDR estimates that each entry will take 30 minutes. This equates to 60 burden hours per year and 180 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4d.
APPLETREE Annual Performance Report (APR) Template: Recipients will provide an Annual Performance Report each year and at the end of the grant cycle, which summarizes their annual and grant cycle performances respectively. APRs will be due in December of each year to coincide with the CDC Grants Management annual reports to reduce the overall reporting burden, and the final report will be due at the end of the funding cycle. The purpose of the performance reports will be to assess Partners based on performance measures and evaluation projects. The reports should include a summary of performance measures, results of any evaluation projects, an accompanying narrative of progress and interpretation of results, optional successes, challenges, and an updated work plan. ATSDR estimates that APRs will take 2 hours for each recipient to prepare, resulting in 60 burden hours per year and 180 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4e.¹ ATSDR provides the APR Guidance Document for recipients in Attachment 4e1.
Choose Safe Places for Early Care and Education (CSPECE) Qualitative Narrative Form: Recipients will complete and submit the narrative once a year and at the end of the grant cycle as a supplement with their APRs to document descriptive details of their state’s landscape, program plan, program implementation, and results that cannot be captured through numbers. ATSDR estimates it will take 1 hour per response for 30 burden hours each year and 90 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4f.¹
CSPECE Quantitative Form: Recipients will complete and submit the quantitative spreadsheet once a year and at the end of the grant cycle as a supplement with their APRs to quantify aspects of their program such as children reached, target audiences screened, and recommendations implemented. ATSDR estimates it will take 15 minutes per response for 8 burden hours each year and 24 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4g.¹
ATSDR SoilSHOP Form: SoilSHOPs are not a required activity; however, if conducted, a recipient will need to complete the ATSDR SoilSHOP Form. This form gathers data on the inputs, activities, outputs, and outcomes of the event, such as the number of soil samples screened, the number of elevated soil samples, the number of individuals receiving health consultations, and the number of individuals receiving referrals. The form should be provided back to ATSDR via email within three weeks of the SoilSHOP completion. Based on 2022 activities, ATSDR estimates that ten recipients will participate in a SoilSHOP event. This will result in 1 total burden hour each year and 3 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4h.
ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up Form: For each environmental health assessment, recipients will provide an update on the status of acceptance and implementation of all recommendations to understand whether and how recommendations have been implemented, and the subsequent impact on communities. Recipients will complete this reporting form annually on the anniversary date of the release of each health assessment. ATSDR expects that recommendation follow-up will be necessary 4 times per year per recipient. ATSDR estimates that each response will take 10 minutes for a total burden of 20 hours each year and 60 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4i.
ATSDR Requests Form: For each environmental health assessment, recipients will provide the request, dates, and triage information and can associate the request with a hazardous waste site. Site scoping and clearance information are completed for about 15% of environmental health assessments that complete ATSDR’s clearance process (i.e., certified). This information will be entered into ARMSS. Based on 2022 activities, ATSDR estimates a maximum of 85 sites will undergo an environmental assessment, an average of 3 sites per recipient. This will result in 11 total burden hours per year and 33 hours over the length of the ICR. See Attachment 4j.

Table A.12.1. Estimated Annualized Burden Hours

Type of Respondents	Form Name	No. of Respondents	No. of Responses per Respondent	Avg. Burden per Response (in hrs.)	Total Burden (in hours)
APPLETREE Recipients	ATSDR Health Education (HE) Activity Form	30	17	4/60	34
	ATSDR Technical Assistance (TA) Activity Form	30	17	4/60	34
	ATSDR Site Impact Assessment (SIA) Form	30	3	7/60	11
	ATSDR Success Story Form	30	4	30/60	60
	APPLETREE Annual Performance Report (APR) Template	30	1	2	60
	Choose Safe Places for Early Care and Education (CSPECE) Qualitative Narrative Form	30	1	1	30
	CSPECE Quantitative Form	30	1	15/60	8
	ATSDR SoilSHOP Form	10	1	7/60	1
	ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up	30	4	10/60	20
	ATSDR Requests	30	3	7/60	11
Total					269

Estimates of the annualized cost burden to respondents for the collection of information are based on the Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics “May 2022 National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates, United States” (see http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#19-0000).

Table A.12.2. Hourly Wage Estimates for APPLETREE Recipients

Occupation Code	Occupation Title	Mean Hourly Wage
19-2041	Environmental Scientists and Specialists, Including Health*	$40.30
* Conduct research or perform investigation for the purpose of identifying, abating, or eliminating sources of pollutants or hazards that affect either the environment or the health of the population. Using knowledge of various scientific disciplines, may collect, synthesize, study, report, and recommend action based on data derived from measurements or observations of air, food, soil, water, and other sources.

Table A.12.3. Estimated Annualized Burden Costs

Type of Respondent	Form Name	Total Burden Hours	Hourly Wage Rate	Total Respondent Costs
APPLETREE Recipients	ATSDR Health Education Activity (HE) Form	34	$40.30	$1,370.20
	ATSDR Technical Assistance (TA) Activity Form	34	$40.30	$1,370.20
	ATSDR Site Impact Assessment (SIA) Form	11	$40.30	$443.30
	ATSDR Success Story Form	60	$40.30	$2,418.00
	APPLETREE Annual Performance Report (APR) Template	60	$40.30	$2,418.00
	CSPECE Qualitative Narrative Form	30	$40.30	$1,209.00
	CSPECE Quantitative Form	8	$40.30	$322.40
	ATSDR SoilSHOP Form	1	$40.30	$40.30
	ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up	20	$40.30	$806.00
	ATSDR Requests	11	$40.30	$443.30
Total				$10,840.70

A.13. Estimates of Other Total Annual Cost Burden to Respondents and Record Keepers

Capital and start-up costs will not be required for APPLETREE recipients.

A.14. Annualized Cost to the Federal Government

The total annualized cost to the Federal Government is $14,855,506 based on the yearly costs itemized below.

The project funding for the five-year cooperative agreement is $69,750,000, or $13,950,000 per year.
Annual salary for 8 Technical Project Officers is $905,506, based on an annual salary of $117,875 per GS-13 staff and $99,128 per GS-12 staff.²

A.15. Explanation for Program Changes or Adjustments

The requested annualized burden hours have increased by 2 hours from the 2020 revision, totaling 269 hours. However, this is still less than the 272 hours approved in 2017. The increase in hours is mainly due to two new recipients, bringing the total to 30 for the current five-year funding cycle. Furthermore, a new APPLETREE information collection form (Attachment 4j) has been included to allow recipients to enter request information more efficiently, with the information being directly entered into ARMSS.

The forms listed in Attachments 4a-4c have been successfully transferred to ARMSS with some slight modifications to facilitate streamlined data entry and accommodate the new system. There have been no significant changes to their content. Attachment 4d is currently in the process of being migrated, while Attachments 4e-4i will be moved to an electronic system, like ARMSS or REDCap, to simplify data collection in the future. The remaining information collection forms have undergone no content changes, except for the removal of unnecessary or repetitive questions.

Table A.15.1. Program Changes and Adjustments for Requested Time Burden.

Form Name	2020 Approval Status	Current Request	Mode of Collection
Attachment 4a - ATSDR HEAT Form	Approved 52 hours	Decreased to 34 total hours requested.	New IT system, ARMSS.
Attachment 4b – ATSDR TA Activity Form	Approved 35 hours	Decreased to 34 total hours requested.
Attachment 4c – ATSDR SIA Form	Approved 13 hours	Decreased to 11 total hours. There has been on a downward trend for 5 years, and ATSDR does not anticipate SIAs to increase.
Attachment 4d – ATSDR Success Story Form	Approved 56 hours	Increased to 60 total hours; same amount of time as previous revision, 30 minutes per response, but two additional recipients.	Migration to new IT system, ARMSS.
Attachment 4e – APPLETREE APR Template	Approved 56 hours	Increased to 60 total hours; same amount of time as previous revision, 2 hours per response, but two additional recipients.	Approved in Word document via email in 2020. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.
Attachment 4f – CSPECE Qualitative Narrative Form	Approved 28 hours	Increased to 30 total hours; same amount of time as previous revision, 1 hour per response, but two additional recipients.	Approved in Word document via email in 2020. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.
Attachment 4g – CSPECE Quantitative Form	Approved 7 hours	Increased to 8 total hours; same amount of time as previous revision, 15 minutes per response, but two additional recipients.	Approved in Excel file via email. ATSDR may migrate this form to an electronic system (e.g., ARMSS or REDCap) in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.
Attachment 4h – ATSDR SoilSHOP Form	Approved 1 hour	No change. SoilSHOPs are not a mandatory program requirement for all recipients. Request 1 total hour, reported by subset of 10 recipients, only if they choose to conduct a SoilSHOP.	Word file via email. ATSDR plans to migrate this form into ARMSS in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved and before this form is migrated.
Attachment 4i – ATSDR Recommendation Follow-up Form	Approved 19 hours	Increased to 20 total hours; same amount of time as previous revision, 10 minutes per response, but two additional recipients.	Submit Excel file via email. ATSDR plans to migrate this new form to ARMSS in the future. If migrated, ATSDR will submit a change request after the current package is approved.
Attachment 4j – ATSDR Requests Form	N/A	New Form Request 11 total hours.	New IT system, ARMSS

A.16. Plans for Tabulation and Publication and Project Time Schedule

ATSDR requests PRA clearance for three years, which will coincide with the five-year program period.

Although the current PRA clearance expires on 09/30/2023, ATSDR requests approval by 10/01/2023 as a critical date by which information collection must begin. Several forms require year-round reporting. ATSDR anticipates all awards will be obligated by that time to begin the new five-year program period. Each budget year, recipients must submit an initial annual plan of work (APOW) via the application process, SoilSHOP, HEAT, TA, SIA, Requests, and Success Stories database entries throughout, and APRs (including updated APOWs), CSPECE Quantitative and Qualitative forms, and Recommendation Follow-up Forms at the end of the budget year.

Data on performance measures will be analyzed and presented in a variety of ATSDR products as descriptive statistics.

Table A.16.1. Project Time Schedule

Activity	Time Schedule
Date of Awards	04/1/2023
PRA Clearance Obtained	Requested by 10/01/2023
Information Collection and Reporting	FY2024 - FY2026

A.17. Reason(s) Display of OMB Expiration Date is Inappropriate

The display of the OMB expiration date is appropriate.

A.18. Exceptions to Certification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions

There are no exceptions to the certification.

1 In addition to the required annual reporting, at the end of the five-year program, each recipient will report cumulative five-year data in the APR, the CSPECE Qualitative Narrative Form, and the CSPECE Quantitative Form to summarize recipient efforts and performance. This will result in six total responses in a five-year period per form. The estimated annualized number of required responses is thus rounded down to once per year for these three forms, as 6 hours divided by five years equals 1.2 hours per year.

2 Assuming 6 FTEs are GS-13 Step 5 and 2 FTEs are GS-12 Step 5 using the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Salary and Locality Pay for Atlanta at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/salaries-wages/salary-tables/pdf/2023/ATL.pdf.

File Type	application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document
Author	Richardson, Tony (CDC/OD/OADS)
File Modified	0000-00-00
File Created	2023-09-20

1 - SSA APPLETREE PMs 2023 Rev 20230831_final