'15 Justification

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Justification - Supporting Statement

1. Necessity of Information Collection

The National Endowment for the Arts’ mission is “to advance artistic excellence, creativity, and innovation for the benefit of individuals and communities.”

With the advice of the National Council on the Arts and advisory panels, the Chairman establishes eligibility requirements and criteria for the review of applications for funding. Section 959 ( c ) of the Endowment’s enabling legislation, as amended, directs the Chairman to utilize advisory panels to review applications and to make recommendations to the National Council on the Arts, which in turn makes recommendations to the Chairman.

The legislation requires the Chairman “(1) to ensure that all panels are composed, to the extent practicable, of individuals reflecting a wide geographic, ethnic, and minority representation as well as to (2) ensure that all panels include representation of lay individuals who are knowledgeable about the arts… ” These panels are considered to be committees under the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), which also requires that committees be balance geographically and ethnically. In addition, the membership of each panel must change substantially from year to year and each individual is ineligible to serve on a panel for more than three consecutive years. To assist with efforts to meet these legislated mandates regarding representation on advisory panels, the Endowment has established an Automated Panel Bank System (APBS), a computer database of names, addresses, areas of expertise and other basic information on individuals who are qualified to serve as panelists for the Arts Endowment.

The Panelist Profile Form, for which clearance is requested, is used to gather basic information from qualified individuals recommended by the arts community; arts organizations; Members of Congress; the general public; local, state and regional arts organizations; Endowment staff, and others.

2. Needs and Uses of Information

Information provided on this Panelist Profile Form is entered into the Automated Panel Bank System (APBS), a computer database of names, addresses, areas of expertise and other basic information on individuals who are qualified to serve as panelists for the Arts Endowment. This system is used by Endowment staff in the selection and approval of panelists to ensure that the legislative mandates cited above are fulfilled. Short biographies are kept on file to supplement the information contained in the database. In addition to providing a more detailed picture of an individual’s suitability for a particular panel, the biography also provides specifics about the individual’s affiliations that are helpful in avoiding possible conflicts of interest with the applications to be reviewed. The biographies replace the previously requested resumes, and provide a snapshot of the individuals’ qualifications in a more readily reviewed format.

3. Uses of Information Technology

The use of information technology has been a prime consideration in the design of this form. It is designed to provide general expertise and background information through inclusion of numerical codes that are entered into the database. The information currently is manually entered into the database, although we hope to be able to transfer information electronically in the future. The form is available electronically, via e-mail. In 2014, approximately 99% of the forms received were in electronic form – sent and received via e-mail, and we now use the electronic version of this form almost exclusively. We also anticipate the possibility, through the shared use of the National Endowment for the Humanities’ system, that in the future individuals will be able to enter and submit this information online themselves.

4. Efforts to Identify Duplication

This form may be accompanied by a biography that provides additional details about an individual’s experience, which the automated system is not equipped to do at this time.

5. Minimizing the Burden in Small Businesses or Small Entities

Not Applicable

6. Consequences of Not Conducting Data Collection

Information collected through the use of the Panelist Profile Form is necessary to fulfill the Endowment’s obligation to ensure that the panels adhere to the requirements of FACA and the Endowment’s legislation to provide review panels that are geographically and racially and ethnically diverse. The database also allows us to ensure that, in accordance with our Congressional mandate, no panelist serves for more than three consecutive years. In addition, through our data collection activities we widen the pool of potential panelists who demonstrate diverse ethnic and artistic backgrounds. If the Endowment abandoned its data collection efforts, the Endowment’s ability to fulfill Congress’ mandates would be severely hampered. Any failure to do periodic updates will result in stale and inaccurate information in the database.

7. Special Circumstances

An individual who wants to be considered for inclusion in the APBS will complete this form once. In order to keep information current, periodic updates will be requested. Additionally, as individuals serve on panels, they are requested to review the information currently on file, and to update the information as necessary. This is to ensure that the records are kept as accurate as possible.

8. Public Comment and Consultation Outside the Agency

The collection is conducted consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.6. A notice in the Federal Register was published on Monday, March 5, 2015 (Vol. 77, No. 43), to solicit comments on the approval of the Panelist Profile Form. (A copy of this notice is attached.) No comments were received.

9. Payment to Respondents

Not Applicable

10. Assurance of Confidentiality

Assurance of confidentiality is provided under the terms of the Privacy Act of 1974.

11. Questions of a Sensitive Nature

Some items are potentially sensitive (relating to gender, disability, and languages spoken), but these are optional, and that is indicated on the form.

12. Estimated Hour Burden of Respondents

The estimated burden to respondents for this collection is explained in table A-1 below:

A-1 Estimated Response Burden of Data Collection Activities Based on FY 14 Figures

Hour Burden to Respondents

Number of Forms in FY 2014	x	Time to Complete Form	=	Total FY 2014 (Annual) Hour Burden to Respondents
300	x	6% of an hour or 10 minutes	=	50.0 hours

Annualized Cost

There is no cost to the respondent other than that of their time (10 minutes) to respond.

13. Cost Burden to Respondent

Collection of this information will be done electronically.

14. Cost to the Federal Government

All Panelist Profile Forms are reviewed and created by employees of the Federal Government, therefore no additional cost is incurred to the government in terms of contracting. Since the forms are electronic, no mailing costs will be incurred.

15. Explanation of Changes

We are proposing only minimal changes to the form. These changes should reduce reporting burden:

1. Under “Arts Experience” we are significantly decreasing the number of choices that individuals select from. We have found, over the past few years, that many of the selections we had included were not being used, and were not helpful to staff.

2. Under “Work Experience” we are simplifying/decreasing the number of choices, as we found that some of the categories included were not useful for the purpose of assisting staff in selecting potential panelists.

The instructions have been updated to clarify some of the information we are requesting (and that this information is for internal use only) and to better define some of our terminology. We also are requesting a short biography rather than a resume.

16. Statistics

Not applicable. We do not plan to publish data.

17. Seeking Approval to Not Display OMB Expiration date

Not applicable. We are not seeking this approval.

18. Exception to the Certificate Statement

Not applicable. There are no exceptions to the certification statements.