[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 74 (Tuesday, April 16, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 26868-26869]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-07999]


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DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION


Arbitration Panel Decisions Under the Randolph-Sheppard Act

AGENCY: Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, 
Department of Education.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: This notice lists arbitration panel decisions under the 
Randolph-Sheppard Act that the Department of Education (Department) has 
made publicly available in accessible electronic format during the 
first quarter of calendar year 2024. All decisions are available on the 
Department's website and by request.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: James McCarthy, U.S. Department of

[[Page 26869]]

Education, 400 Maryland Avenue SW, Room 4A212, Washington, DC 20202-
2800. Telephone: (202) 245-6458. Email: [email protected].
    If you are deaf, hard of hearing, or have a speech disability and 
wish to access telecommunications relay services, please dial 7-1-1.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: For the purpose of providing individuals who 
are blind with remunerative employment, enlarging their economic 
opportunities, and stimulating greater efforts to make themselves self-
supporting, the Randolph-Sheppard Act, 20 U.S.C. 107 et seq. (Act), 
authorizes individuals who are blind to operate vending facilities on 
Federal property and provides them with a priority for doing so. The 
vending facilities include, among other things, cafeterias, snack bars, 
and automatic vending machines. The Department administers the Act and 
designates an agency in each participating State--the State licensing 
agency (SLA)--to license individuals who are blind to operate vending 
facilities on Federal and other property in the State.
    The Act provides for arbitration of disputes between SLAs and 
vendors who are blind and between SLAs and Federal agencies before 
three-person panels, convened by the Department, whose decisions 
constitute final agency action. 20 U.S.C. 107d-1. The Act also makes 
these decisions matters of public record and requires their publication 
in the Federal Register. 20 U.S.C. 107d-2(c).
    The Department publishes lists of Randolph-Sheppard Act arbitration 
panel decisions in the Federal Register. The full texts of the 
decisions listed are available on the Department's website (see below) 
or by request (see 82 FR 41941 (Sept. 5, 2017)). Older, archived 
decisions are also added to the Department's website as they are 
digitized.
    Throughout 2023 and the last quarter of 2022, the Department 
received eight new decisions issued by Randolph-Sheppard arbitration 
panels that were made publicly available during the first quarter of 
2024. The following table lists these eight decisions from most recent 
to oldest based on their decision dates.

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               Case name                        Docket No.              Date                   State
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Sparks v. Business Enterprises of       R-S/22-08................      12/21/2023  Texas.
 Texas, Texas Workforce Commission.
Conway v. State of Illinois,            R-S/22-05................      12/11/2023  Illinois.
 Department of Human Services,
 Business Enterprise Program For The
 Blind.
Mitchell v. Louisiana Workforce         R-S/22-07................       12/7/2023  Louisiana.
 Commission.
Mahler v. Texas Workforce Commission..  R-S/22-09................      10/13/2023  Texas.
Kean v. South Carolina Commission For   R-S/18-02................      10/11/2023  South Carolina.
 The Blind.
State of Hawaii, Department of Human    R-S/16-07 (remand).......       6/12/2023  Hawaii.
 Services, Division of Vocational
 Rehabilitation, Ho'opono Services For
 The Blind v. United States Department
 of The Army, Schofield Barracks.
Mahler v. Texas Workforce Commission..  R-S/22-02................       5/15/2023  Texas.
The Colorado Business Enterprise        R-S/20-09................       9/29/2022  Colorado.
 Program v. United States Department
 of the Air Force, Schriever Space
 Force Base.
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    These decisions and other decisions that we have already posted are 
searchable by key terms, are accessible under Section 508 of the 
Rehabilitation Act, and are available in Portable Document Format (PDF) 
on the Department's website at https://rsa.ed.gov/about/programs/randolph-sheppard-vending-facility-program/decisions-of-arbitration-panels or by request to the person listed under FOR FURTHER INFORMATION 
CONTACT.
    Accessible Format: On request to the program contact person listed 
under FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT, individuals with disabilities 
can obtain this document in an accessible format. The Department will 
provide the requestor with an accessible format that may include Rich 
Text Format (RTF) or text format (txt), a thumb drive, an MP3 file, 
braille, large print, audiotape, or compact disc, or other accessible 
format.
    Electronic Access to This Document: The official version of this 
document is the document published in the Federal Register. You may 
access the official edition of the Federal Register and the Code of 
Federal Regulations at www.govinfo.gov. At this site you can view this 
document, as well as all other documents of this Department published 
in the Federal Register, in text or PDF. To use PDF, you must have 
Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is available free at the site.
    You may also access documents of the Department published in the 
Federal Register by using the article search feature at 
www.federalregister.gov. Specifically, through the advanced search 
feature at this site, you can limit your search to documents published 
by the Department.

Glenna Wright-Gallo,
Assistant Secretary for Special Education and Rehabilitative Services.
[FR Doc. 2024-07999 Filed 4-15-24; 8:45 am]
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