[Federal Register Volume 87, Number 223 (Monday, November 21, 2022)]
[Notices]
[Pages 70856-70857]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2022-25273]
[[Page 70856]]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
[Docket No. CISA-2022-0015]
Revision of a Currently Approved Information Collection for the
State, Local Tribal and Private Sector (SLTPS) Clearance Program
AGENCY: Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA),
Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
ACTION: 60-Day notice and request for comments; revision of information
collection request: 1670-0013.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: CISA is issuing a 60-day notice and request for comments to
revise Information Collection Request (ICR) 1670-0013. CISA will submit
the ICR to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and
clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.
DATES: Comments are due January 20, 2023.
ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by docket number CISA-
2022-0015 through the Federal eRulemaking Portal available at http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments.
Instructions: All comments received via https://www.regulations.gov
will be posted to the public docket at https://www.regulations.gov,
including any personal information provided.
Do not submit comments that include trade secrets, confidential
commercial or financial information, Protected Critical Infrastructure
Information (PCII), or Sensitive Security Information (SSI) directly to
the public regulatory docket. Contact the individual listed in the FOR
FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section below with questions about comments
containing such protected information. CISA will not place comments
containing such protected information in the public docket and will
handle them in accordance with applicable safeguards and restrictions
on access. Additionally, CISA will hold them in a separate file to
which the public does not have access and place a note in the public
docket that CISA has received such protected materials from the
commenter. If CISA receives a request to examine or copy this
information, CISA will treat it as any other request under the Freedom
of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552, and the Department's FOIA
regulation found in part 5 of Title 6 of the Code of Federal
Regulations (CFR).
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Quintin Whitaker, 202-805-4959
[email protected].
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Partnerships between the U.S. Government and
the state, local tribal and private sector at times necessitate the
sharing of classified information. The State, Local, Tribal and Private
Sector (SLTPS) Clearance Request Form facilitates this sharing by
sponsoring security clearances for certain members of each sector based
on either their membership on a Sector Coordinating Council (SCC)/
association or their infrastructure protection job-related duties and
their need-to-know. The SLTPS is designed to sponsor security
clearances for state, local, tribal and private sector officials
involved in the infrastructure protection mission. These partners are
subject matter experts within specific industries and have specialized
knowledge not available within the Department of Homeland Security
(DHS) and other Federal Departments or Agencies. Private citizens do
not receive monetary compensation for their time. CISA created this
program to sponsor clearances for these individuals who are not
employed by or contracted with another Federal agency (the traditional
means of obtaining a clearance) and must have clearances.
The Cyber Information Sharing and Collaboration Agreement (CISCA)
and Classified Critical Infrastructure Protection Program (CCIPP)
nominees will also use the form in the same manner as the SLTPS. The
form updates will include adding State and Local, CISCA and CCIPP to
the drop-down capabilities. Type of submission will have a dropdown
capability added. Subsectors will be added to some of the Sectors. A
generic approving signature title will be added.
CISA collects necessary information through 1670-0013 to facilitate
security clearances needed for sharing classified information with the
vetted SLTPS Stakeholders. The U.S. Government is authorized to ask for
this information under sections 201 and 229 of the Homeland Security
Act (Pub. L. 107-296, 6 U.S.C. 121, 150), and Executive Orders 12968,
13526, 13549, 13636, and 13691 which authorize the collection of this
information.
In order to begin this process of adjudicating a nominee to
participate in the clearance program, federal nominators will complete
the DHS Form 9014, State, Local, Tribal and Private Sector Clearance
Request Form, excluding their date of birth, place of birth and social
security number. The federal nominator will sign the form and have it
approved by a senior-level official from the corresponding Federal
Department or Agency. Before being submitted to the CISA Office of the
Chief Security Officer (OCSO) SLTPS Administrator via the CISA Action
Task Tracker (CATT), the nominee would have been deemed to have a CISA
mission and meet the requirements and criteria as outlined in Executive
Order (E.O.) 13549, the Department of Homeland Security, Classified
National Security Information Program for SLTPS Implementing Directive
and E.O. 13691, sec. 4(c), and 32 CFR part 117, sec. 117.22 of the
National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual (NISPOM). The
SLTPS Administrator will extract the application from the electronic
tracking system and will capture first and last name, clearance level
being requested, sector or subsector they are involved in, company, job
title, city and state the company is located, work and personal email
and work phone number. This information is entered into a SharePoint
system in order to track the clearance process and to provide a real-
time status of a nominee [and Stakeholders] to federal nominators and
DHS employees who have a need to know. The OCSO Security Specialist is
informed that the nominee is ready to start the clearance process and
the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) is requested and input
into the Electronic Questionnaires for Investigations Processing (e-
QIP) system, the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) secure portal
for investigation processing. Once the data is entered into e-QIP, the
nominee is provided a password and can access the system and complete
the online security questionnaire.
This information is only available to Security Specialists within
OCSO working on the program and is maintained in the Integrated
Security Management System (ISMS), which is ``owned'' by the OCSO. The
two-part PII request process helps minimize the collection of sensitive
PII for only those nominees who meet the threshold and are sponsored by
CISA.
Number of Respondents
The current estimate of annual respondents is 660, however, based
on recent program data, CISA is revising the estimate to 550.
Estimated Time per Response
CISA is choosing to retain the estimate of 10 minutes (0.1667
hours) per response in the current information collection.
[[Page 70857]]
Annual Burden Hours
In the current information collection, the estimated annual burden
is 110 hours. To estimate the annual burden hours for this collection,
the CISA multiplied the number of annual respondents by the estimated
time burden of 0.1667 hours (10 minutes), for an estimated annual
burden of 91.67 hours (i.e., 0.1667 hours multiplied by 550 annual
respondents).
Total Annual Burden
To estimate the total annual burden, CISA multiplied the annual
burden of 24,879 hours by the average loaded hourly wage rate computer
and information systems managers of $110.66 \1\ per hour. Therefore,
the total annual burden cost for the collection is $10,144 (91.67 hours
x $110.66). For the three-year period for which this collection will be
approved, the total cost burden would be $6,603,456 ($2,201,152 annual
cost multiplied by 3 years).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The above Average Hourly Wage Rate is the May 2021 Bureau of
Labor Statistics average wage for Computer and Information Systems
Managers (11-3021) of $78.33 times the wage rate benefit multiplier
of 1.4127 (to account for fringe benefits) equaling $110.66. The
benefits multiplier is estimated by dividing total compensation of
$37.24 by salaries and wages of $26.36, based on Employer Cost for
Employee Compensation, September 2021, released December 16, 2021
(https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/ecec_12162021.pdf).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is a revised information collection.
OMB is particularly interested in comments that:
1. 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;
2. 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;
3. Enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to
be collected; and
4. 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
submissions of responses).
Analysis
Agency: Department of Homeland Security, Cybersecurity and
Infrastructure Security Agency.
Title of Collection: State, Local, Tribal and Private Sector
(SLTPS) Clearance Request Program.
OMB Number: 1670-0013.
Instrument: DHS Form 9014: State, Local, Tribal and Private Sector
(SLTPS) Clearance Request Form.
Frequency: ``Other''.
Affected Public: Business or other for-profit.
Number of Respondents: 550 respondents.
Estimated Time per Respondent: 0.1667 hours (10 minutes).
Total Burden Hours: 91.67 annual burden hours.
Total Burden Cost (capital/startup): $0.
Total Recordkeeping Burden: $0.
Total Burden Cost: $10,144.
Authority: 6 U.S.C. 121, 150.
Robert Costello,
Chief Information Officer, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security
Agency, Department of Homeland Security.
[FR Doc. 2022-25273 Filed 11-18-22; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE P