Request for Fast Track Approval

Request for Approval under the “DOI Generic Clearance for the Collection of Qualitative Feedback on Agency Service Delivery”

OMB Control Number: 1090-0011

TITLE OF INFORMATION COLLECTION:

Artificial Night Lighting – request for published literature or proven best practices for minimizing environmental Impacts associated with artificial night lighting.

PURPOSE:

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is working with the Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) to develop a library of best management practices (BMPs) for minimizing environmental impacts from artificial night lighting. Concerns are growing over the environmental impacts associated with common methods of lighting outdoor spaces at night. Innovative lighting technologies and approaches to spatial lighting design are emerging that avoid or curtail these impacts. Federal public service will be improved by disseminating an outdoor lighting toolkit that will enable the target audience to implement effective artificial outdoor lighting BMPs that produce safe outdoor environments and protect natural night sky conditions.

The toolkit will be a web-based electronic library and a hard-copy publication.

The target audiences that will benefit from the toolkit include:

• Internal BLM programs that administer land use authorizations and oversee the design of public facilities that include outdoor night lighting elements.

• Industry enterprises with authorized facilities that include outdoor night lighting elements that may affect the public and/ or dark dependent wildlife habitats.

• Other federal agencies with similar interests and challenges (e.g., National Park Service).

The BLM assembled a network of agencies, organizations, industry enterprises, industry contractors, and universities believed to have published materials or other forms of information on the subject matter. Respondents will be representatives from within this assembled network.

DESCRIPTION OF RESPONDENTS:

Respondents will be internal and external.

Internal respondents will include:

• BLM program personnel and other federal agencies that construct and manage facilities that require exterior night lighting or that authorize others to construct and manage these types of facilities on federal public lands (e.g., National Park Service, USDA Forest Service, etc.).

• Other federal agencies with sensitive operations that may be affected by outdoor lighting (e.g., National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Aeronautics and Space Administration).

Non-federal external respondents will include:

• Non-governmental organizations (e.g., Nature Conservancy, International Dark Sky Association, American Wind Association, International Association of Lighting Designers),

• State and local governments,

• Research universities,

• Industry enterprises (e.g., Southern California Edison, Idaho Power),

• Industry contractors (e.g., lighting design engineers, environmental firms, etc.)

Respondents will be self-selected. Outreach will not require anyone to respond. Those that do respond will be volunteering to provide feedback on published sources of subject matter specific information or examples of proven best management practices.

TYPE OF COLLECTION: (Check one)

[ ] Customer Comment Card/Complaint Form [ ] Customer Satisfaction Survey

[ ] Usability Testing (e.g., Website or Software) [ ] Small Discussion Group

[ ] Focus Group [X] Other: Educational Resources

CERTIFICATION:

I certify the following to be true:

1. The collection is voluntary.

2. The collection is low-burden for respondents and low-cost for the Federal Government.

3. The collection is non-controversial and does not raise issues of concern to other federal agencies.

4. The results are not intended to be disseminated to the public.

5. Information gathered will not be used for the purpose of substantially informing influential policy decisions.

6. The collection is targeted to the solicitation of opinions from respondents who have experience with the program or may have experience with the program in the future.

Name: John McCarty _____________________________________

To assist review, please provide answers to the following questions:

Personally Identifiable Information:

1. Is personally identifiable information (PII) collected? [ ] Yes [X] No

2. If Yes, is the information that will be collected included in records that are subject to the Privacy Act of 1974? [ ] Yes [ ] No

3. If Applicable, has a System or Records Notice been published? [ ] Yes [ ] No

Gifts or Payments:

Is an incentive (e.g., money or reimbursement of expenses, token of appreciation) provided to participants? [ ] Yes [X ] No (If yes, please explain.)

BURDEN HOURS

Category of Respondents	No. of Respondents	Participation Time	Burden
Non-governmental organizations	20	20 minutes each	400 min
Industry enterprises	6	20 minutes each	120 min
Industry and environmental consultants	6	20 minutes each	120 min
Universities	5	20 minutes each	100 min
Private individuals	5	20 minutes each	100 min
State and local governments	5	20 minutes each	100 min
Total	47	20 minutes each	15.6 hrs

FEDERAL COST:
Outreach to the assembled network of potential responders will result in a significant reduction in BLM’s burden when compared to the BLM conducting its own internal internet and institutional search for published information.

ANL will catalog the information received from the network of responders. If ANL receives a 100% response of 47 submissions, then the burden to the BLM is estimated at $2,600 or less. However, a more realistic response would be 50% or less, which would significantly reduce the burden even further.

If you are conducting a focus group, survey, or plan to employ statistical methods, please provide answers to the following questions:

The selection of your targeted respondents

1. Do you have a customer list or something similar that defines the universe of potential respondents and do you have a sampling plan for selecting from this universe? [X] Yes [ ] No

If the answer is yes, please provide a description of both below (or attach the sampling plan). If the answer is no, please provide a description of how you plan to identify your potential group of respondents and how you will select them.

RESPONSE: Respondents were identified based their associations, research, and known knowledge on night sky and earth science, human concerns, and exterior night lighting methods affiliated with: human health and safety; security and law enforcement; astronomy; outdoor recreation experiences; science and education; cultural/ historic values; nocturnal animal habitats.

Spreadsheet with respondent organizations is attached.

Administration of the Instrument

1. How will you collect the information? (Check all that apply)

[ ] Web-based or other forms of Social Media

[ ] Telephone

[ ] In-person

[ ] Mail

[X] Other, Explain: Information will be collected through email messages from respondents that reply to an email message inviting them to volunteer sources of published information.

2. Will interviewers or facilitators be used? [ ] Yes [X] No

Please make sure that all instruments, instructions, and scripts are submitted with the request.

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