116 STAT. 2940 PUBLIC LAW 107-347—DEC. 17, 2002 Deadline. 44 USC 3501 note. Deadline. (c) REPORT. —Not later than December 31, 2004, the Administrator shall submit to the Committee on Government Reform of the House of Representatives and the Committee on Governmental Affairs of the Senate a report on the implementation and effects of the amendment made by subsection (a). SEC. 212. INTEGRATED REPORTING STUDY AND PILOT PROJECTS. (a) PURPOSES.— The purposes of this section are to— (1) enhance the interoperability of Federal information systems; (2) assist the public, including the regulated community, in electronically submitting information to agencies under Federal requirements, by reducing the burden of duplicate collection and ensuring the accuracy of submitted information; and (3) enable any person to integrate and obtain similar information held by 1 or more agencies under 1 or more Federal requirements without violating the privacy rights of an individual. (b) DEFINITIONS.—In this section, the term— (1) "agency" means an Executive agency as defined under section 105 of title 5, United States Code; and (2) "person" means any individual, trust, firm, joint stock company, corporation (including a government corporation), partnership, association, State, municipality, commission, political subdivision of a State, interstate body, or agency or component of the Federal Government. (c) REPORT.— (1) IN GENERAL. —Not later than 3 years after the date of enactment of this Act, the Director shall oversee a study, in consultation with agencies, the regulated community, public interest organizations, and the public, and submit a report to the Committee on Governmental Affairs of the Senate and the Committee on Government Reform of the House of Representatives on progress toward integrating Federal information systems across agencies. (2) CONTENTS. —The report under this section shall— (A) address the integration of data elements used in the electronic collection of information within databases established under Federal statute without reducing the quedity, accessibility, scope, or utility of the information contained in each database; (B) address the feasibility of developing, or enabling the development of, software, including Internet-based tools, for use by reporting persons in assembling, documenting, and validating the accuracy of information electronically submitted to agencies under nonvoluntary, statutory, and regulatory requirements; (C) adcfi-ess the feasibility of developing a distributed information system involving, on a voluntary basis, at least 2 agencies, that— (i) provides consistent, dependable, and timely public access to the information holdings of 1 or more agencies, or some portion of such holdings, without requiring public users to know which agency holds the information; and (ii) allows the integration of public information held by the participating agencies;
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