[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 217 (Wednesday, November 9, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 78809-78810]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-27075]


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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[EPA-HQ-ORD-2016-0632; FRL--9955-05-ORD]


Proposed Information Collection Request; Comment Request; 
Willingness To Pay Survey To Evaluate Recreational Benefits of Nutrient 
Reductions in Coastal New England Waters

AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is planning to 
submit an information collection request (ICR), ``Willingness to Pay 
Survey to Evaluate Recreational Benefits of Nutrient Reductions in 
Coastal New England Waters'' (EPA ICR No. 2558.01, OMB Control No. 
2080-NEW) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and 
approval in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) (44 
U.S.C. 3501 et seq.). Before doing so, EPA is soliciting public 
comments on specific aspects of the proposed information collection as 
described below. This is a request for approval of a new collection. An 
Agency may not conduct or sponsor and a person is not required to 
respond to a collection of information unless it displays a currently 
valid OMB control number.

DATES: Comments must be submitted on or before January 9, 2017.

ADDRESSES: Submit your comments, referencing Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-ORD-
2016-0632, online using www.regulations.gov (our preferred method), by 
email to [email protected], or by mail to: EPA Docket Center, 
Environmental Protection Agency, Mail Code 28221T, 1200 Pennsylvania 
Ave. NW., Washington, DC 20460.
    EPA's policy is that all comments received will be included in the 
public docket without change including any personal information 
provided, unless the comment includes profanity, threats, information 
claimed to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) or other 
information whose disclosure is restricted by statute.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Marisa Mazzotta, U.S. Environmental 
Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development, Atlantic Ecology 
Division, 27 Tarzwell Drive, Narragansett, Rhode Island 02882; 
telephone number: 401-782-3026; fax number: 401-782-3139; email 
address: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Supporting documents which explain in detail 
the information that the EPA will be collecting are available in the 
public docket for this ICR. The docket can be viewed online at 
www.regulations.gov or in person at the EPA Docket Center, WJC West, 
Room 3334, 1301 Constitution Ave. NW., Washington, DC. The telephone 
number for the Docket Center is 202-566-1744. For additional 
information about EPA's public docket, visit http://www.epa.gov/dockets.
    Pursuant to section 3506(c)(2)(A) of the PRA, EPA is soliciting 
comments and information to enable it to: (i) Evaluate whether the 
proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper 
performance of the functions of the Agency, including whether the 
information will have practical utility; (ii) evaluate the accuracy of 
the Agency's estimate of the burden of the proposed collection of 
information, including the validity of the methodology and assumptions 
used; (iii) enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the 
information to be collected; and (iv) minimize the burden of the 
collection of information on those who are to respond, including 
through the use of appropriate automated electronic, mechanical, or 
other technological collection techniques or other forms of information 
technology, e.g., permitting electronic submission of responses. EPA 
will consider the comments received and amend the ICR as appropriate. 
The final ICR package will then be submitted to OMB for review and 
approval. At that time, EPA will issue another Federal Register notice 
to announce the submission of the ICR to OMB and the opportunity to 
submit additional comments to OMB.
    Abstract: Researchers at the EPA's Office of Research and 
Development (ORD), Atlantic Ecology Division (AED) are piloting an 
effort to better understand how reduced water quality due to nutrient 
enrichment affects the economic prosperity, social capacity, and 
ecological integrity of coastal New England communities. This project 
proposes a survey to collect data for a case study of changes in 
recreation demand and values due to changes in nutrients in 
northeastern coastal waters. This includes the development of methods 
and tools for estimating recreational values that can be applied in 
other locations, either by EPA researchers, EPA's regional offices or 
state partners. Our initial geographic focus for these efforts will be 
Cape Cod, Massachusetts (``the Cape''; Barnstable County), and New 
England residents within 100 miles of the Cape. We focus on Cape Cod 
and its surrounding coastal areas both in order to limit the scope of 
the work to remain feasible within our research budget and to 
coordinate this socio-economic analysis with extensive ecological 
research being conducted on the Cape by ORD researchers, researchers at 
EPA's Region 1 office, and other external research groups. Cape Cod is 
also in the midst of an extensive regional planning effort related to 
its coastal waters, and this research can provide helpful socio-
economic information to decision makers about the use of those waters. 
Because the 100-mile radius from Cape Cod includes a large area of 
southern New England and the largest population centers in New England, 
the results will be more broadly applicable to residents of southern 
New England.
    One of the key water quality concerns on Cape Cod, and throughout 
New England, is nonpoint sources of nitrogen, which lead to ecological 
impairments in estuaries, with resultant socio-economic impacts. The 
decisions needed to meet water quality standards are highly complex and 
involve significant cross-disciplinary challenges in identifying, 
implementing, and monitoring social and ecological management needs. We 
will focus on understanding recreational uses as valued economic goods 
in coastal New England (including beachgoing, swimming, fishing, 
shellfishing, and boating).

[[Page 78810]]

    As a part of these efforts, EPA's ORD/AED is seeking approval to 
conduct a revealed preference survey to collect data on: People's 
saltwater recreational activities; how recreational values are related 
to water quality; how perceptions of water quality relate to objective 
measures; the connections between perceptions of water quality, 
recreational choices and values, and sense of place; and demographic 
information. If approved, the survey will be administered using a 
mixed-mode approach that includes a mailed invitation to a web survey 
with an optional paper survey for people who are unable or unwilling to 
answer the web survey. The survey will be sent to a total of 8,400 
residents living in counties where more than 25% of the county's 
geographic boundaries falls within 100 miles of the Cape as measured 
from Bourne, Massachusetts, which is the first town on Cape Cod heading 
east. This area includes coastal counties of New Hampshire, the eastern 
half of Massachusetts, all of Rhode Island, and the eastern part of 
Connecticut. In addition, we will oversample two populations: residents 
of Cape Cod and people who shellfish recreationally. We will send 750 
surveys to each of these groups.
    ORD will use the survey responses to estimate willingness to pay 
for changes related to reductions in nutrient and pathogen loadings to 
coastal New England waters. The analysis relies on state of the art 
theoretical and statistical tools for non-market welfare analysis. A 
non-response bias analysis will also be conducted to inform the 
interpretation and validation of survey responses.
    All responses to the survey will be kept confidential to the extent 
provided by law. To ensure that the final survey sample includes a 
representative and diverse population of individuals, the survey 
questionnaire will elicit basic demographic information, such as age, 
race and ethnicity, number of children under 18, type of employment, 
and income. However, the survey questionnaire will not ask respondents 
for personal identifying information, such as names or phone numbers. 
Instead, each survey response will receive a unique identification 
number. Prior to taking the survey, respondents will be informed that 
their responses will be kept confidential to the extent provided by 
law. The name and address of the respondent will not appear in the 
resulting database, preserving the respondents' identities. The survey 
data will be made public only after it has been thoroughly vetted to 
ensure that all other potentially identifying information has been 
removed. After data entry is complete, the surveys themselves will be 
destroyed and only respondent codes will remain.
    Form Numbers: None.
    Respondents/affected entities: Eligible respondents for the survey 
are individuals 18 years of age or older who reside in counties where 
at least 25% of county's geographic area falls within a 100-mile radius 
of Cape Cod. This includes coastal counties of New Hampshire, the 
eastern half of Massachusetts, all of Rhode Island, and the eastern 
part of Connecticut. The sample will be stratified by geography, with 
Barnstable County, Massachusetts sampled at a rate 3.06 times higher 
than the rest of the population in the study area. Additionally, the 
sample will be a dual-frame sample, where the main frame is the general 
population address-based frame of the U.S. Postal Service Delivery 
Sequence File, and a supplementary frame is the frame of shellfish 
license holder records. Households will be selected randomly from the 
DSF, which covers over 97% of residences in the U.S. EPA will request 
participation from a random stratified sample of 10,270 households in 
two phases. The first phase, a pretest, will be sent to 370 addresses. 
The second phase, encompassing full survey administration, will be 
administered to an additional 9,900 addresses. In each phase, we 
anticipate a response rate of 27 percent, resulting in 90 and 2,365 
completed surveys, respectively, after accounting for expected 
undeliverable surveys.
    Respondent's obligation to respond: voluntary.
    Estimated number of respondents: 2,455 (total).
    Frequency of response: The survey is a one-time data collection 
activity.
    Total estimated burden: 614 hours (total). Burden is defined at 5 
CFR 1320.03(b).
    Total estimated cost: Assuming 15 minutes are needed to complete 
the survey, the total respondent cost comes to $21,386 for the pre-test 
and main survey combined, using an average wage rate for New England of 
$34.83 from the United States Department of Labor. This would be a one-
time expenditure of their time.
    Changes in Estimates: This is the first notice; there is no change 
in estimates at this time.

    Dated: October 31, 2016.
Wayne Munns,
Division Director, Atlantic Ecology Division.
[FR Doc. 2016-27075 Filed 11-8-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6560-50-P