49 U.S.C. § 44721 — Aeronautical charts and related products and services

(a) Publication. (1) The FAA may arrange to publish aeronautical maps and charts needed for the safe, efficient movement of aircraft in air navigation, using the help of other federal departments, agencies, and instrumentalities as far as practical. (2) In doing so, the FAA must update and arrange to publish clearly defined routes for navigating through complex terminal airspace and to and from airports there, if it decides publishing them would promote air-navigation safety. Those routes must be developed with pilots and other affected-airport users, for the optional use of pilots flying under visual flight rules. (b) Indemnification. The government must agree to indemnify anyone who publishes an aeronautical map or chart against any part of a claim arising from that person's depiction of a defective or deficient flight procedure or airway, as long as the procedure or airway was (1) prescribed by the FAA, (2) depicted accurately on the map or chart, and (3) not obviously defective or deficient. (c) Authority of Office of Aeronautical Charting and Cartography. Effective October 1, 2000, the FAA holds and must exercise the functions, powers, and duties that the Secretary of Commerce and other Commerce Department officers had over the Office of Aeronautical Charting and Cartography, to provide aeronautical charts and related products and services, under (1) sections 1 through 9 of the 1947 Act defining the Coast and Geodetic Survey's functions, and (2) section 6082 of the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985. (d) Authority. So the public can get full benefit from this data, the FAA may (1) develop, process, disseminate, and publish digital and analog data, information, compilations, and reports; (2) compile, print, and disseminate aeronautical charts and related products and services covering the United States and its territories; (3) do the same for international airspace charts primarily needed by U.S. civil aviation; and (4) do the same for nonaeronautical navigational, transportation, or public-safety-related products and services when that's in the government's best interests. (e) Contracts, Cooperative Agreements, Grants, and Other Agreements. (1) The FAA may contract with qualified organizations to perform parts of the Office's authorized functions when it decides doing so serves the public interest and won't compromise public safety. (2) The FAA may also enter cooperative agreements, grants, reimbursable agreements, memoranda of understanding, and other agreements with a state, a subdivision of a state, a federal agency, a public or private organization, or an individual, to carry out this section. (f) Special Services and Products. (1) At the request of a state, subdivision of a state, federal agency, public or private organization, or individual, the FAA may conduct special services — including special studies or developing special publications or products — on matters related to navigation, transportation, or public safety. (2) The FAA must charge a fee for any such special service, capped at the actual or estimated full cost of the service. The fee may be reduced or waived for research, educational, or nonprofit organizations when the FAA decides that serves the government's best interest by furthering public safety. (g) Sale and Dissemination of Aeronautical Products. (1) Aeronautical products created or maintained under this section must be sold at prices the FAA sets annually, consistent with: (A) a maximum price that, subject to (B), is no more than needed to recover costs for database management and processing, compilation, printing or other reproduction, and dissemination; (B) a requirement that the FAA adjust the price as needed to avoid any adverse impact on aviation safety from the price otherwise required; (C) a rule that the price may not include the cost of acquiring the underlying aeronautical data; and (D) a rule that a product's price created under (d) may match a comparable federal product's price as it stood on September 30, 2000, until changed by regulation under section 9701 of title 31. (2) The FAA must publish its prices for aeronautical products annually. (3) The FAA may distribute aeronautical products and provide aeronautical services (A) free to any foreign government or international organization with a no-cost exchange agreement with the FAA or another federal agency; (B) at FAA-set prices to federal departments and officers needing them for official use; and (C) at reduced or no charge where, in the FAA's judgment, giving the product or service is a reasonable trade for the recipient's voluntary contribution of information to these activities. (4) These fees only reimburse the government for the costs of creating, printing, and disseminating the products and services, and don't alter, expand, or create any government duty or liability, or any promise to perform any activity a certain way. (5) Amounts received from selling these products and performing these services must be credited fully to the FAA account that funded them, and stay available until spent.