2012-24758. Agency Forms Undergoing Paperwork Reduction Act Review

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) publishes a list of information collection requests under review by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in compliance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35). To request a copy of these requests, call [phone] or send an email to [e-mail]. Send written comments to CDC Desk Officer, Office of Management and Budget, Washington, DC or by fax to [phone]. Written comments should be received within 30 days of this notice.

Proposed Project

EHS-Net National Voluntary Environmental Assessment Information System (NVEAIS)—New—National Center for Environmental Health (NCEH), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Background and Brief Description

The CDC is requesting OMB approval for a National Voluntary Environmental Assessment Information System to collect data from foodborne illness outbreak environmental assessments routinely conducted by local, state, territorial, or tribal food safety programs during outbreak investigations. Environmental assessment data are not currently collected at the national level. The data reported through this information system will provide timely data on the causes of outbreaks, including environmental factors associated with outbreaks, and are essential to environmental public health regulators' efforts to respond more effectively to outbreaks and prevent future, similar outbreaks.

The information system was developed by the Environmental Health Specialists Network (EHS-Net), a collaborative project of federal and state public health agencies. The EHS-Net has developed a standardized instrument for reporting data relevant to foodborne illness outbreak environmental assessments.

State, local, tribal, and territorial food safety programs are the respondents for this data collection. Although it is not possible to determine how many programs will choose to participate, as NVEAIS is voluntary, the maximum potential number of program respondents is approximately 3,000.

These programs will be reporting data on outbreaks, not their programs or personnel. It is not possible to determine exactly how many outbreaks will occur in the future, nor where they will occur. However, we can estimate, based on existing data, that a maximum of 1,400 foodborne illness outbreaks will occur annually. Only programs in the jurisdictions in which these outbreaks occur would report to NVEAIS. Consequently, we have based our respondent burden estimate on the number of outbreaks likely to occur each year. Assuming each outbreak occurs in a different jurisdiction, there will be one respondent per outbreak.

There are three activities associated with NVEAIS that require a burden estimate. The first activity is the manager interview that will be conducted at each establishment associated with an outbreak. Most outbreaks are associated with only one establishment; however, some are associated with multiple establishments. We estimate that a maximum average of 4 manager interviews will be conducted per outbreak. Each interview will take about 20 minutes.

The second activity is entering all requested environmental assessment data into NVEAIS. This will be done once for each outbreak. This will take approximately 2 hours per outbreak.

Additionally, all food safety program personnel participating in NVEAIS will also have to take training on how to conduct environmental assessments, how to enter data into NVEAIS, and how to conduct the manager interview. We estimate the burden of this training to be a maximum of 12 hours. Respondents will only have to take this training one time. Assuming a maximum number of outbreaks of 1,400, the estimated burden for this training is 16,800.

The total estimated annual burden is 21,467 hours (see Table). There is no cost to the respondents other than their time.

Estimated Annualized Burden Hours

Type of respondent	Form name	Number of respondents	Responses per respondent	Average burden per response (in hours)
Food safety program personnel	Manager interview	1,400	4	20/60
Food safety program personnel	NVEAIS Data Reporting Instrument	1,400	1	2
Food safety program personnel (No form used)	Food safety program personnel training	1,400	1	12

Dated: October 2, 2012.

Ron A. Otten,

Director, Office of Scientific Integrity (OSI), Office of the Associate Director for Science (OADS), Office of the Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.