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June 28, 2007
Headlines - EPA Website Helps Consumers Calculate How Individual Energy Use Contributes to Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Air Pollution
- White House Counsel Informs Judiciary Committee President Will Assert Executive Privilege
- GAO Analysis of the Special Operations Command's Management of Weapon System Programs
- DOJ FOIA Post - Guidance on Submitting Updated Status Reports to the
- FDA Detains Imports of Farm-Raised Chinese Seafood
- DHS OIG Reports Review FEMA Contracts
- GAO Report on Terminated Defined Benefit Pensions and Enforcement Challenges
- Baltimore Sun Launches Mapping Tool to Track City's Homicide Rate
- FTC Issues Administrative Complaint Seeking to Block Whole Foods Market's Acquisition of Wild Oats Markets
- BJS Report on Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies
- FDIC OIG Semiannual Report to the Congress
- Census Bureau Announces Most Populous Cities
- Merrill Lynch and Capgemini Release 11th Annual World Wealth Report
 EPA Website Helps Consumers Calculate How Individual Energy Use Contributes to Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Air Pollution : "With just a few clicks of the mouse and a ZIP code, consumers can see how their individual energy use is affecting the Earth. EPA's Power Profiler calculates how much air pollution results from individual electricity use, the fuels used to produce that electricity and how to reduce the impact...All you need is a ZIP code and you're on your way to understanding your environmental impact...Power Profiler uses information from EPA's Emissions & Generation Resource Integrated Database (eGRID), a comprehensive source of data on the environmental characteristics of nearly all electric power generated in the United States." White House Counsel Informs Judiciary Committee President Will Assert Executive Privilege Follow up to June 13 posting, Judiciary Chairmen Leahy, Conyers Issue Subpoenas For White House Officials, Documents see these related government documents and Congressional statements issued today: Press release from Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT): "As the Committee opens its Executive Business meeting today, I note that the deadline has passed for the White House and its former Political Director, Sara Taylor, to produce documents from a subpoena issued on June 13. This Committee's subpoena and a similar subpoena issued by the House Judiciary Committee compelled the White House to turn over documents related to our continuing investigation into the firings of United States Attorneys around the country. The Committee's subpoena has been met not with compliance, but with Nixonian stonewalling. This morning, I received a phone call and a letter from White House Counsel Fred Fielding informing me that the President intends to assert executive privilege in response to our subpoena." House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) Statement in Response to the President's Assertion of Executive Privilege in Response to the Committee's June 13 Subpoena for Documents What Is Executive Privilege, Anyway? by Eric Weiner, NPR CRS Report - Presidential Claims of Executive Privilege:History, Law, Practice and Recent Developments, September 21, 1999, Morton Rosenberg, Specialist in American Public Law, American Law Division: "This report provides a brief review and discussion of the historical and legal development ofthe constitutionally-based prerogative of the President to maintain the confidentiality ofdocuments or other materials or information that reflect presidential decisionmaking anddeliberations. The evolving nature and scope of the presidential privilege is described anddiscussed and recent court decisions are analyzed to determine how they illuminate currentinterbranch information disputes." CRS Report, Presidential Advisers' Testimony Before Congressional Committees: An Overview, Updated April 10, 2007 GAO Analysis of the Special Operations Command's Management of Weapon System Programs Defense Acquisitions: An Analysis of the Special Operations Command's Management of Weapon System Programs, GAO-07-620, June 28, 2007. "Special Operations Command's (SOCOM) duties have greatly increased since the attacks of September 11, 2001. Today, Special Operations Forces are at work in Afghanistan and Iraq, and SOCOM has been assigned to lead U.S. efforts in the Global War on Terrorism. SOCOM's acquisitions budget has also greatly increased in this period--more than doubling from $788 million in 2001 to approximately $1.91 billion in 2006. In light of SOCOM's expanded duties, Congress requested that GAO review SOCOM's management of its acquisition programs. GAO's evaluation includes an assessment of: the types of acquisition programs SOCOM has undertaken since 2001 and whether the programs are consistent with its mission; the extent to which SOCOM's programs have progressed as planned; and the challenges SOCOM faces in managing its acquisition programs." DOJ FOIA Post - Guidance on Submitting Updated Status Reports to the "As part of the June 1, 2007 report to the President on agency progress under Executive Order 13,392, "Improving Agency Disclosure of Information," the Attorney General recommended that agencies submit to the President's Management Council an Updated Status Report concerning any deficiency reported by the agency in its Fiscal Year 2006 annual FOIA report. This Updated Status Report must describe the specific steps already taken, or which the agency has committed to take in the future, to remedy any deficiency the agency has encountered in implementing its FOIA Improvement Plan. Set out [ in this release] is the text of the guidance distributed by the Office of Information and Privacy to all Chief FOIA Officers concerning the content of the Updated Status Reports. These reports are required to be submitted first in draft form to the Office of Information and Privacy by July 18, 2007. Each agency, through its Chief FOIA Officer, must then submit the final report to the Chair of the President's Management Council by August 1, 2007." FDA Detains Imports of Farm-Raised Chinese Seafood Press release: "The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today announced a broader import control of all farm-raised catfish, basa, shrimp, dace (related to carp), and eel from China. FDA will start to detain these products at the border until the shipments are proven to be free of residues from drugs that are not approved in the United States for use in farm-raised aquatic animals. This action by FDA, a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, will protect American consumers from unsafe residues that have been detected in these products. There have been no reports of illnesses to date." Import Alert Timeline: Farm-Raised Fish Imported from China Questions and Answers on FDA's Import Alert on Farm-Raised Seafood From China Consumer Article on How FDA Regulates Seafood GAO Report on Terminated Defined Benefit Pensions and Enforcement Challenges Defined Benefit Pensions: Conflicts of Interest Involving High Risk or Terminated Plans Pose Enforcement Challenges, GAO-07-703, June 28, 2007. "To protect workers' retirement security, the requesters asked GAO to assess: 1) What is known about conflicts of interest affecting private sector defined benefit (DB) plans? 2) What procedures does the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) have to identify and recover losses attributable to conflicts? 3) What procedures does Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) have to detect conflicts among service providers and fiduciaries for PBGC-trusteed plans? 4) To what extent do EBSA, PBGC, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) coordinate their activities to investigate conflicts? GAO interviewed experts, including agency officials, attorneys, financial industry representatives, and academics, and GAO reviewed PBGC documentation and EBSA enforcement materials. GAO analyzed Labor, SEC, PBGC, and private sector data, including data on pensions, pension consultants, and rates of return data, and conducted statistical and econometric analyses." Baltimore Sun Launches Mapping Tool to Track City's Homicide Rate Via Editor and Publisher, from the Baltimore Sun, an interactive map of Baltimore Homicides 2007, displays points for each homicide in the city specified by the reader, including: time frame, zip code, age, gender, race, cause of death and any related articles. FTC Issues Administrative Complaint Seeking to Block Whole Foods Market's Acquisition of Wild Oats Markets Press release: "The Federal Trade Commission has issued an administrative complaint challenging Whole Foods Market Inc.'s approximately $670 million acquisition of Wild Oats Markets Inc. The administrative complaint preserves the Commission's legal option to pursue an administrative remedy following the federal district court proceeding. According to the complaint, the transaction would violate federal antitrust laws by eliminating the substantial competition between these two uniquely close competitors in the operation of premium natural and organic supermarkets nationwide. The FTC contends that if the transaction goes forward Whole Foods would have the ability to raise prices and reduce quality and services." BJS Report on Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies Press release: "There were about 1.1 million full-time state and local law enforcement employees in the U.S., including about 732,000 sworn personnel as of September 30, 2004, the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. Local police departments were the largest employers, with 447,000 officers; followed by sheriffs' offices, with 175,000; state law enforcement agencies, with 58,000 and other types of agencies, with 52,000. From 2000 to 2004, the number of full-time sworn personnel employed by state and local law enforcement agencies increased by about 24,000, a smaller increase than that during prior four-year periods. From 1996 to 2000, 44,500 officers were added; and from 1992 to 1996, 55,400 were added. From 2000 to 2004, the nationwide ratio of sworn personnel to residents actually declined slightly, from 252 per 100,000 to 249 per 100,000." Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies, 2004 (NCJ-212749) , was written by BJS statistician Brian A. Reaves Census Bureau Announces Most Populous Cities Press release: "Phoenix has become the nation's fifth most populous city, according to U.S. Census Bureau population estimates released today. As of July 1, 2006, this desert metropolis had a population of 1.5 million. New York continued to be the nation's most populous city, with 8.2 million residents. This was more than twice the population of Los Angeles, which ranked second at 3.8 million. (See Table 1 Excel | PDF.) The estimates reveal that Phoenix moved into fifth place ahead of Philadelphia, the latest evidence of a decades-long population shift. Nearly a century ago, in 1910, each of the 10 most populous cities was within roughly 500 miles of the Canadian border. The 2006 estimates show that seven of the top 10 — and three of the top five — are in states that border Mexico. Only three of the top 10 from 1910 remained on the list in 2006: New York, Chicago and Philadelphia. Conversely, three of the current top 10 cities (Phoenix; San Jose, Calif.; and San Diego) were not even among the 100 most populous in 1910, while three more (Dallas, Houston and San Antonio) had populations of less than 100,000. (See fact sheet. [PDF])...Florida and Arizona each had two cities among the 10 fastest growing: Port St. Lucie (third) and Cape Coral (fourth) in Florida; and Gilbert (fifth) and Peoria (seventh) in Arizona, both near Phoenix. North Carolina (Cary, near Raleigh) and California (Lancaster, near Los Angeles) each contributed one city to the list. (See Table 2 Excel | PDF.) California had seven cities among the 25 fastest growing, leading all states." Merrill Lynch and Capgemini Release 11th Annual World Wealth Report Press release: "Driven by a strong global economy, the wealth of the world's high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs1) increased 11.4 percent to US$37.2 trillion in 2006, according to the 11th annual World Wealth Report, released...by Merrill Lynch and Capgemini. The number of HNWIs in the world increased 8.3 percent in 2006 to 9.5 million and the number of ultra-high-net-worth individuals (Ultra-HNWIs2) grew by 11.3 percent to 94,970." World Wealth Report 2007 (36 pages, PDF)
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