[Federal Register Volume 68, Number 91 (Monday, May 12, 2003)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 25308-25310]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 03-11707]


 ========================================================================
 Proposed Rules
                                                 Federal Register
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 This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER contains notices to the public of 
 the proposed issuance of rules and regulations. The purpose of these 
 notices is to give interested persons an opportunity to participate in 
 the rule making prior to the adoption of the final rules.
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 

  Federal Register / Vol. 68, No. 91 / Monday, May 12, 2003 / Proposed 
Rules  

[[Page 25308]]



DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service

9 CFR Part 130

[Docket No. 02-041-1]


Veterinary Services User Fees; Fee for Use of Animal Ramp at 
Miami International Airport

AGENCY: Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, USDA.

ACTION: Proposed rule.

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SUMMARY: We are proposing to establish a user fee for a Government-
owned ramp at Miami International Airport used to move animals off of 
and onto airplanes. Under the present user fee schedule we can recover 
the cost of labor in supervising and assisting importers and exporters 
in the ramp's use, but we currently must absorb all other costs 
associated with the ramp. The proposed new user fee would ensure that 
we recover costs incurred by the ramp's purchase and use and would 
shift the cost of the ramp to those who receive benefits from its use.

DATES: We will consider all comments that we receive on or before July 
11, 2003.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments by postal mail/commercial delivery 
or by e-mail. If you use postal mail/commercial delivery, please send 
four copies of your comment (an original and three copies) to: Docket 
No. 02-041-1, Regulatory Analysis and Development, PPD, APHIS, Station 
3C71, 4700 River Road Unit 118, Riverdale, MD 20737-1238. Please state 
that your comment refers to Docket No. 02-041-1. If you use e-mail, 
address your comment to [email protected]. Your comment must 
be contained in the body of your message; do not send attached files. 
Please include your name and address in your message and ``Docket No. 
02-041-1'' on the subject line.
    You may read any comments that we receive on this docket in our 
reading room. The reading room is located in room 1141 of the USDA 
South Building, 14th Street and Independence Avenue SW., Washington, 
DC. Normal reading room hours are 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through 
Friday, except holidays. To be sure someone is there to help you, 
please call (202) 690-2817 before coming.
    APHIS documents published in the Federal Register, and related 
information, including the names of organizations and individuals who 
have commented on APHIS dockets, are available on the Internet at 
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/ppd/rad/webrepor.html.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For information concerning program 
operations for Veterinary Services, contact Ms. Inez Hockaday, 
Director, Management Support Staff, VS, APHIS, 4700 River Road Unit 44, 
Riverdale, MD 20737-1231, (301) 734-7517. For information concerning 
rate development of the proposed user fee, contact Ms. Kris Caraher, 
Accountant, User Fees Section, Financial Management Division, APHIS, 
4700 River Road Unit 54, Riverdale, MD 20737-1232, (301) 734-8351.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background

    User fees to reimburse the Animal and Plant Health Inspection 
Service (APHIS) for the costs of providing veterinary diagnostic 
services and import- and export-related services for live animals and 
birds and animal products are contained in 9 CFR part 130 (referred to 
below as the regulations). APHIS receives no directly appropriated 
funds to provide these services; our ability to provide them depends on 
user fees.
    APHIS has purchased a ramp that is used to move animals on and off 
airplanes at APHIS's Animal Import/Export and Plant Inspection Station 
at Miami International Airport. The ramp is used to move approximately 
5,000 to 6,000 animals per year. Last year, approximately 117 users 
(brokers or livestock owners) required the aid of the ramp to either 
load or unload their animals. The animals moved using this ramp were 
cattle (75 percent), sheep (10 percent), goats (10 percent), and horses 
and other animals (5 percent).
    Both the purchase and maintenance of this ramp are costly; however, 
because there is no specific user fee for the ramp's use under the 
current regulations, APHIS can only recover some of the labor costs 
incurred by its use through its current hourly rate user fee. We are, 
therefore, proposing to amend the regulations to establish a user fee 
of $151 per use to importers and exporters who use the animal ramp, so 
that APHIS may recover its costs. This would ensure that the importers 
and exporters who use the ramp pay for the benefits they receive.

Calculation of the User Fee

    Costs excluded from this calculation. We began our calculation of 
the appropriate user fee for the APHIS animal ramp at Miami 
International Airport by identifying the services APHIS provides while 
the ramp is being used for which we already charge user fees. Under 
Sec.  130.30, ``Hourly rate and minimum user fees,'' APHIS currently 
charges for services such as sweeping the ramp, fully cleaning and 
disinfecting the ramp, supervising the use of the ramp, driving the 
ramp to and from the service site, and assisting with the use of the 
ramp. We omitted fees for these services in the calculation of the 
proposed ramp fee. We are proposing to charge the proposed ramp fee in 
addition to the fees for the labor associated with the ramp's use that 
we currently charge. Such labor fees would be charged to the ramp user 
at the existing applicable hourly rate user fee, or premium hourly rate 
user fee if the service is provided outside the normal tour of duty of 
the employee(s), for these services.
    Equipment costs. The ramp assembly consists of the ramp itself, a 
truck on which the ramp is moved, and piston equipment. This assembly 
costs $45,100 and has an expected useful life of 5 years before it will 
need to be replaced. The cost of purchasing the ramp was therefore 
spread over 5 years to arrive at an annual figure for the cost of its 
purchase. This figure is $9,020.
    Labor costs not covered under Sec.  130.30. We estimated that a 
mechanic at the GS 9, step 5, salary level would spend 7 percent of his 
or her time maintaining the ramp. The benefit (e.g., health insurance, 
etc.) costs included in the total cost of this labor were set at 20.42 
percent of salary. To arrive at our final figure for the labor cost of 
maintenance, we used the actual salary figure for fiscal year (FY) 2002 
and

[[Page 25309]]

included cost-of-living salary increases in fiscal years 2003 and 2004, 
as described in the President's FY 2003 budget. Based on this approach, 
we estimate the direct labor cost of the maintenance on the ramp to be 
$3,926.17 per year.
    Administrative support costs not covered under Sec.  130.30. 
Administrative support costs include the cost of local clerical and 
administrative activities, indirect labor hours, travel and 
transportation for personnel, supplies, equipment, and other necessary 
items, training, general office supplies, rent, equipment 
capitalization, utilities, and contractual services. Indirect labor 
hours include supervision of personnel and time spent doing work that 
is not directly connected with use of the ramp but which is nonetheless 
necessary for its use, such as repairing other equipment. Rent is the 
cost of using the space required to perform this work. Billing costs 
are the costs of managing user fee accounts for our customers who wish 
to receive monthly invoices for the services they receive from APHIS. 
Collection expenses include the costs of managing customer payments and 
ensuring that those payments are accurately reflected in our accounting 
system. Utilities include water, telephone, electricity, gas, and 
heating oil. Contractual services include security service, 
maintenance, trash pickup, and other such services. To estimate these 
costs, we used the standard APHIS administrative support costs rate of 
62.31 percent of direct labor costs. Thus, we estimate administrative 
support costs for this service to be $2,818.49 per year.
    Agency overhead not covered under Sec.  130.30. Agency overhead is 
the pro-rata share, attributable to this service, of the Agency's 
management and support costs. Management and support costs include the 
costs of providing budget and accounting services, regulatory services, 
investigative and enforcement services, debt-management services, 
personnel services, public information services, legal services, 
liaison with Congress, and other general program and agency management 
services provided above the local level. We estimate agency overhead to 
be $1,089.26 per year.
    Departmental charges not covered under Sec.  130.30. Departmental 
charges are APHIS's share, expressed as a percentage of the total cost, 
of services provided centrally by the United States Department of 
Agriculture. Services the Department provides centrally include the 
Federal Telephone Service, mail, National Finance Center processing of 
payroll and other money management, unemployment compensation, Office 
of Workers Compensation Programs, and central supply for storing and 
issuing commonly used supplies and department forms. The Department 
notifies APHIS of how much it owes for these services. We estimate the 
pro-rata share of these departmental charges attributable to these 
services to be $358.01 per year.
    Reserve funds. We added an amount that would provide for a 
reasonable balance, or reserve, in the Veterinary Services user fee 
account. All user fees contribute to the reserve proportionately. A 
reserve ensures that we have sufficient operating funds in cases of bad 
debt, customer insolvency, and fluctuations in the volume of activity. 
We intend to monitor the balance of the reserve closely, and we will 
propose adjustments in our fees as necessary to ensure a reasonable 
balance. We have included $409.60 per year as this fee's proportional 
contribution to the reserve.

Conclusion

    The sum of the above items, $17,621.53, represents our calculation 
of the annual cost for the purchase, use, and maintenance of the ramp. 
The number of importers and exporters expected to use the ramp each 
year is about 117. Thus, the expected cost per user of the ramp is 
$17,621.53 divided by 117, or $150.6114; rounded to the nearest whole 
dollar, this is $151. We are therefore proposing a fee of $151 for use 
of the animal ramp at Miami International Airport.
    This fee would apply regardless of the length of time the ramp is 
used or the number of animals being transported across it. The fees 
charged for the hourly labor APHIS provides while the ramp is being 
used, of course, would vary with the length of time the ramp is used.
    We believe that this fee would adequately cover the cost of 
providing the ramp to importers and exporters of animals. As is the 
case with all APHIS user fees, we intend to review the user fee 
proposed in this document on an annual basis. We will publish any 
necessary adjustments to the fee in the Federal Register.

Executive Order 12866 and Regulatory Flexibility Act

    This proposed rule has been reviewed under Executive Order 12866. 
The rule has been determined to be not significant for the purposes of 
Executive Order 12866 and, therefore, has not been reviewed by the 
Office of Management and Budget.
    This proposed rule would establish a user fee of $151 for the 
animal ramp APHIS operates at Miami International Airport.
    Though the fee is $151 per use regardless of the number of animals 
being moved across the ramp, in the past clients have moved, on 
average, approximately 50 animals per ramp use. Thus the average cost 
per animal for use of the ramp would be approximately $3. This is a 
negligible fee compared to the market value of the breeding animals and 
other upper-end livestock that are transported by air and that may be 
moved using the ramp. For example, the average import/export price per 
head of purebred cattle in 2001 was $1,186, while the price of purebred 
horses was $9,653. Our customers, usually brokers, are likely to pass 
this fee on to their clients.
    This proposed user fee is also similar to the fees charged for the 
use of similar ramps elsewhere. For example, O'Hare International 
Airport in Chicago charges approximately $150 for use of its ramp, 
while one private horse-transporting entity charges approximately $800 
for the use of the ramp it owns.

Impact on Small Entities

    The Regulatory Flexibility Act requires that agencies consider the 
economic effects of their rules on small entities. The Small Business 
Administration (SBA) has published criteria for determining which 
economic entities meet the definition of a small business. The entities 
affected by this proposed fee are most likely to be brokers and 
livestock owners importing or exporting animals. The SBA considers an 
entity engaged in importing and exporting live animals, poultry, and 
birds to be small if its total sales are less than $5 million annually. 
The total revenue of livestock brokers who transport animals through 
Miami International Airport is not available, but we expect that a 
majority of these brokers can be classified as small entities. While 
the majority of entities affected by the proposed user fee may be 
small, this proposed rule is not expected to have a significant impact 
on them, due to the fact that the average fee per animal is quite small 
in comparison to the value of the livestock being transported.
    Under these circumstances, the Administrator of the Animal and 
Plant Health Inspection Service has determined that this action would 
not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small 
entities.

Executive Order 12372

    This program/activity is listed in the Catalog of Federal Domestic 
Assistance under No. 10.025 and is subject to

[[Page 25310]]

Executive Order 12372, which requires intergovernmental consultation 
with State and local officials. (See 7 CFR part 3015, subpart V.)

Executive Order 12988

    This proposed rule has been reviewed under Executive Order 12988, 
Civil Justice Reform. If this proposed rule is adopted: (1) All State 
and local laws and regulations that are inconsistent with this rule 
will be preempted; (2) no retroactive effect will be given to this 
rule; and (3) administrative proceedings will not be required before 
parties may file suit in court challenging this rule.

Paperwork Reduction Act

    This proposed rule contains no new information collection or 
recordkeeping requirements under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 
(44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.).

List of Subjects in 9 CFR Part 130

    Animals, Birds, Diagnostic reagents, Exports, Imports, Poultry and 
poultry products, Quarantine, Reporting and recordkeeping requirements, 
Tests.

    Accordingly, we propose to amend 9 CFR part 130 as follows:

PART 130--USER FEES

    1. The authority citation for part 130 would continue to read as 
follows:

    Authority: 5 U.S.C. 5542; 7 U.S.C. 1622 and 8301-8317; 21 U.S.C. 
136 and 136a; 31 U.S.C. 3701, 3716, 3717, 3719, and 3720A; 7 CFR 
2.22, 2.80, and 371.4.

    2. Section 130.8 would be amended by adding a new paragraph (b) to 
read as follows:


Sec.  130.8  User fees for other services.

* * * * *
    (b) The user fee for the transport ramp used to move animals on or 
off aircraft at APHIS's Animal Import/Export and Plant Inspection 
Station at Miami International Airport is $151 per use. For labor 
services associated with the ramp, the hourly user fees in Sec.  130.30 
will apply.
* * * * *

    Done in Washington, DC, this 6th day of May, 2003.
Peter Fernandez,
Acting Administrator, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
[FR Doc. 03-11707 Filed 5-9-03; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3410-34-P