[Federal Register Volume 85, Number 37 (Tuesday, February 25, 2020)]
[Notices]
[Pages 10823-10824]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2020-03748]
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DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
Community Development Financial Institutions Fund
ACTION: Notice and request for public comment.
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SUMMARY: The Department of the Treasury, as part of its continuing
effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general
public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment
on proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by
the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995. Currently, the Community
Development Financial Institutions Fund (CDFI Fund), U.S. Department of
the Treasury, is soliciting comments concerning the Community
Development Financial Institutions CDFI Program (CDFI Program) and New
Markets Tax Credit Program (NMTC Program) Annual Report including the
Awards Management and Information System (AMIS) Compliance and
Performance Reporting (ACPR).
DATES: Written comments must be received on or before April 27, 2020 to
be assured of consideration.
ADDRESSES: Submit your comments via email to Greg Bischak, Program
Manager for Financial Strategies and Research, CDFI Fund, at [email protected].
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Greg Bischak, Program Manager for
Financial Strategies and Research, Community Development Financial
Institutions Fund, U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1500 Pennsylvania
Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20220 or by telephone at (202) 653-0300. Other
information regarding the CDFI Fund and its programs may be obtained
through the CDFI Fund's website at http://www.cdfifund.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Title: CDFI Program and NMTC Program Annual Report including AMIS.
OMB Number: 1559-0027.
Abstract: This collection captures quantitative information from
Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) and Community
Development Entities (CDEs) at the institution and transaction levels.
This information is used to assess: (1) The recipient's/allocatee's
activities as detailed in its application materials; (2) the
recipient's/allocatee's approved use of the assistance; (3) the
recipient's/allocatee's financial condition; (4) the socio-economic
characteristics of recipient's/allocatee's borrowers/investees, loan
and investment terms, repayment status, and community development
outcomes; and (5) overall compliance with the terms and conditions of
the assistance/allocation agreement entered into by the CDFI Fund and
the recipient/allocatee.
A CDFI Program or Native American CDFI Assistance Program (NACA
Program) recipient must submit an Annual Report that is comprised of
several sections that depend on the program and the type of award. The
specific components that comprise a recipient's Annual Report are set
forth in the assistance agreement that the recipient enters into with
the CDFI Fund in order to receive a CDFI Program or a NACA Program
award. The current CDFI/NACA reporting requirements can be found in the
assistance agreement templates located on the CDFI Fund website at
www.cdfifund.gov.
For CDFI/NACA recipients, three significant changes were made to
annual reporting. First, as part of its IT modernization strategy, the
CDFI Fund developed a unified technology platform called the Awards
Management Information System (AMIS) that facilitates better data
collection and efficiency for users, improves data validations, and
enhances computing capacity. Second, in developing the AMIS-based
Compliance and Performance Reporting platform (ACPR), we sought to
reduce the reporting burden by eliminating the Institution Level Report
(ILR) which cut aggregate recipient reporting time by 3,066 hours.
Third, the CDFI/NACA Transaction Level Report (TLR) requirements were
substantially reduced by 70% by limiting transactional reporting to
only newly originated and closed loans and investments and eliminating
reporting on outstanding loans and investments.
For NMTC Program allocatees, the reporting structure remained the
same. Each allocatee must submit an Annual Report that comprises: (i) A
financial statement that has been audited by an independent certified
public accountant; (ii) an Institution Level Report (ILR) (including
the IRS Compliance Questions section), if the allocatee has issued any
Qualified Equity Investments; and (iii) a Transaction Level Report
(TLR) if the allocatee has issued any Qualified Low-Income Community
Investments in the form of loans or investments. The components that
comprise an allocatee's Annual Report are set forth in the allocation
agreement that the allocatee enters into with the CDFI Fund in order to
receive a NMTC Program allocation. These NMTC requirements can be found
in the allocation agreement templates located on the CDFI Fund website
at www.cdfifund.gov. With the efficiency gains from the implementation
of AMIS, the average NMTC reporting time has gone down slightly, while
the total number of reporting entities has remained the same so there
is a slight net reduction in total burden. Altogether, the total annual
burden for
[[Page 10824]]
both CDFI/NACA and NMTC annual reporting has decreased substantially
from 53,175 hours in 2017 to 34,000 hours in 2020.
Type of Review: Regular Review.
Affected Public: CDFIs and CDEs; including businesses or other for-
profit institutions, non-profit entities, and State, local and Tribal
entities participating in CDFI Fund programs.
Estimated Number of Respondents:
CDFI Annual TLR: 300.
NMTC Annual TLR and ILR: 275.
Estimated Annual Time (in hours) per Respondent:
CDFI Annual TLR: 40.
NMTC Annual TLR and ILR: 80.
Estimated Total Annual Burden in Hours: 34,000.
CDFI Annual TLR: 12,000.
NMTC Annual TLR and ILR: 22,000.
Request for Comments: Comments submitted in response to this notice
will be summarized and/or included in the request for OMB approval. All
comments will become a matter of public record. Comments are invited on
all aspects of the information collections, but commentators may wish
to focus particular attention on: (a) The cost for CDFIs and CDEs to
operate and maintain the services/systems required to provide the
required information; (b) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and
clarity of the information to be collected; (c) whether the collection
of information is necessary for the proper evaluation of the
effectiveness and impact of the CDFI Fund's programs, including whether
the information has practical utility; (d) the accuracy of the CDFI
Fund's estimate of the burden of the collection of information; (e)
ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information including
through the use of technology, such as software for internal accounting
and geocoding to capture geographic detail while streamlining and
aggregating TLR reporting for upload to AMIS, and; (f) what methods
might be used to improve the data quality, internal accounting and
efficiency of reporting transactions for serving other targeted
populations.
Please note that this request for public comment is necessary in
order to renew the OMB data collection 1559-0027 under the Paperwork
Reduction Act, (formerly CIIS) and now executed through AMIS. Later in
2020 the CDFI Fund plans to publish a request for public comment to
solicit feedback on proposed additions and revisions to the NMTC and
CDFI TLRs and estimates on reporting burdens which are not contained in
this notice.
(Authority: 12 U.S.C. 4707 et seq.; 26 U.S.C. CFR part 1805)
Jodie Harris,
Director, Community Development Financial Institutions Fund.
[FR Doc. 2020-03748 Filed 2-24-20; 8:45 am]
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