STEVEN RAY GREEN AND ASSOCIATES 

NATIONALLY CERTIFIED COURT REPORTERS 

404/733-6070 

THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 

PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH 

convenes the 

WORKING GROUP MEETING 

ADVISORY BOARD ON 

 

RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 

ROCKY FLATS

 

The verbatim transcript of the Working 

Group Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 

Worker Health held telephonically on June 17, 2008. 
2

C O N T E N T S

June 17, 2008 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 6 

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO 

SEC CLASS FOR ROCKY FLATS 11 

COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 60 
3

TRANSCRIPT LEGEND

The following transcript contains quoted material. Such 

material is reproduced as read or spoken. 

In the following transcript: a dash (--) indicates 

an unintentional or purposeful interruption of a 

sentence. An ellipsis (. . .) indicates halting speech 

or an unfinished sentence in dialogue or omission(s) of 

word(s) when reading written material. 

-- (sic) denotes an incorrect usage or pronunciation 

of a word which is transcribed in its original form as 

reported. 

-- (phonetically) indicates a phonetic spelling of 

the word if no confirmation of the correct spelling is 

available. 

-- "uh-huh" represents an affirmative response, and 

"uh-uh" represents a negative response. 

 -- "*" denotes a spelling based on phonetics, 

without reference available. 

-- (inaudible)/ (unintelligible) signifies speaker 

failure, usually failure to use a microphone. 
4

 P A R T I C I P A N T S 

(By Group, in Alphabetical Order) 

DESIGNATED FEDERAL OFFICIAL

BRANCHE, Christine, Ph.D. 

Principal Associate Director 

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 

Washington, DC 

 

 

MEMBERSHIP

GIBSON, Michael H. 

President 

Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Union 

Local 5-4200 

Miamisburg, Ohio 

GRIFFON, Mark A. 

President 

Creative Pollution Solutions, Inc. 

Salem, New Hampshire 

MUNN, Wanda I. 

Senior Nuclear Engineer (Retired) 

Richland, Washington 

PRESLEY, Robert W. 

Special Projects Engineer 

BWXT Y12 National Security Complex 

Clinton, Tennessee 

 
5

IDENTIFIED PARTICIPANTS

ADAMS, NANCY, NIOSH 

BARRIE, TERRIE, ANWAG 

BLOSSER, FRED, NIOSH 

BOLLER, CAROLYN, CONGRESSMAN UDALL 

BROEHM, JASON, CDC WASHINGTON 

CHANG, CHIA-CHIA, NIOSH 

ELLIOTT, LARRY, NIOSH 

FITZGERALD, JOE, SC&A 

GNIRK, GALE, CONGRESSMAN JOHN SALAZAR 

HOWELL, EMILY, HHS 

KESSLER, ZANE, SENATOR KEN SALAZAR 

KOTSCH, JEFF, DOL 

MCGOLERICK, ROBERT, HHS 

RUTTENBER, MARGARET, STATE HEALTH DEPT. 

ULSH, BRANT, NIOSH 
6

P R O C E E D I N G S

1 (2:30 p.m.) 

2 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO

3 DR. BRANCHE: Good afternoon. I’m Dr. 

4 Christine Branche, and I have the pleasure of 

5 being the Designated Federal Official for the 

6 Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health, 

7 and this is the Rocky Flats work group meeting. 

8 Let’s begin please with the Board members, 

9 please mention your names. 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Mark Griffon. 

11 MR. GIBSON: Mike Gibson. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you. Are there any other 

13 Board members participating in the call? 

14 (no response) 

15 DR. BRANCHE: At this point we do not have a 

16 quorum, so we can proceed. Would the NIOSH 

17 staff please mention your names and say if you 

18 have a conflict with Rocky Flats? 

19 DR. ULSH: Yeah, this is Brant Ulsh, and I have 

20 no conflict. 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: This is Larry Elliott, Director 

22 of OCAS, and I have no conflict. 
7

1 MS. ADAMS: Nancy Adams, Office of the 

2 Director, no conflict. 

3 MS. CHANG: Chia-Chia Chang, Director’s Office, 

4 no conflict. 

5 MR. BLOSSER: Fred Blosser, Director’s Office, 

6 no conflict. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: ORAU staff, would you please 

8 mention your names and say if you have a 

9 conflict? 

10 (no response) 

11 DR. BRANCHE: SC&A staff, would you please 

12 mention your names and say if you have a 

13 conflict? 

14 MR. FITZGERALD: This is Joe Fitzgerald. I 

15 don’t have a conflict. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Staff from HHS, would you please 

17 state your names, and state whether or not you 

18 have a conflict? 

19 MR. MCGOLERICK: Robert McGolerick, no 

20 conflict. 

21 MS. HOWELL: Emily Howell, HHS, no conflict. 

22 MR. BROEHM: Jason Broehm, CDC Washington 

23 Office, no conflicts. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Other federal agency staff, would 

25 you please state your names and say whether or 
8

1 not you have a conflict? 

2 (no response) 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Are there any petitioners or 

4 their representatives who would like to state 

5 their names? 

6 MR. GRIFFON: Hold on one second. Somebody’s 

7 on the other line giving the call-in number. 

8 Hold on one second. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Sorry, I’m back, this is Mark. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 

13 MR. PRESLEY: This is Bob Presley. 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Oh Bob, good. 

15 DR. BRANCHE: Good, wonderful. Are there any 

16 workers or their representatives who would like 

17 to state their names? 

18 MS. BARRIE: This is Terrie Barrie with ANWAG. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you, Ms. Barrie. 

20 Are there any members of Congress or their 

21 representatives who would please state their 

22 names? 

23 MS. BOLLER: Carolyn Boller, Congressman 

24 Udall’s office. 

25 MS. GNIRK: Gale Gnirk, Congressman John 
9

1 Salazar’s office. 

2 MR. KESSLER: Zane Kessler, Senator Ken 

3 Salazar’s office. 

4 MS. RUTTENBER: Margaret Ruttenber, State 

5 Health Department. 

6 DR. BRANCHE: Are there any others who would 

7 like to state their names for the record? 

8 COURT REPORTER: Dr. Branche, this is Ray. I’m 

9 sorry to interrupt, but could I please ask the 

10 two people from Senator Salazar’s office to 

11 state your names kind of slowly for me, please? 

12 (Whereupon, multiple speakers spoke.) 

13 DR. BRANCHE: I’m sorry, there are three of 

14 you. One second, there were three of you, and 

15 if all three of you could please state your 

16 name slowly, that would help us I think. 

17 MR. KESSLER: Zane Kessler, U.S. Senator Ken 

18 Salazar’s office. 

19 MS. GNIRK: Gale Gnirk, Congressman John 

20 Salazar’s office. 

21 COURT REPORTER: I’m sorry, could you spell 

22 that last name, please? 

23 MS. GNIRK: Yes, it’s G-N-I-R-K. 

24 COURT REPORTER: Thank you. And there was 

25 another one, please? 
10

1 MS. BOLLER: Carolyn Boller, Congressman Mark 

2 Udall’s office. 

3 COURT REPORTER: Right, I got yours. Okay, 

4 thank you very much. 

5 MR. KOTSCH: Christine, this is Jeff Kotsch 

6 with Labor. I’m sorry I’m running late. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Oh, well thank you for joining 

8 us. 

9 MS. MUNN: And Christine, this is Wanda Munn. 

10 I’m sorry I’m late. I was on another 

11 teleconference. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. Are there any other -– 

13 right now I have Mr. Griffon, Mr. Gibson, Mr. 

14 Presley and Ms. Munn. Are there any other 

15 Board members who have joined us? 

16 (no response) 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. We do not have a quorum of 

18 the Board and so we can proceed. I ask that 

19 everyone participating today, if you could 

20 please mute your phones, we are all on by phone 

21 and it’s important for us to mute our phones 

22 when we are not speaking. If you do not have a 

23 mute button, then please use star 6 to mute 

24 your phones. And when you’re ready to speak, 

25 please use that same star 6 so we can hear you. 
11

1 And again I ask that everyone observe telephone 

2 etiquette, and if you need to go off the call 

3 please do not put us on hold because whatever 

4 music or sounds your hold system uses will 

5 interrupt the quality of our sound today. 

6 Thank you so much. Mr. Griffon. 

7 SEC CLASS FOR ROCKY FLATS

8 MR. GRIFFON: Okay, yeah, I didn’t send out an 

9 agenda but I think at the last Board meeting we 

10 made it fairly clear that the only discussion 

11 item is really around the implementation of the 

12 SEC class for Rocky Flats, and with that in 

13 mind I guess what we had -- the advice that I 

14 asked the Board for was you know how do we 

15 proceed and one thing that we all agreed on at 

16 the Board meeting, objective, was to have the 

17 Department of Labor give us a better sort of 

18 briefing on how on this bulletin and how they 

19 are implementing this class. And then maybe we 

20 can have a little bit of discussion about you 

21 know whether we have remaining concerns about 

22 that or whether that meets our intent of our 

23 original definition as we had crafted it in our 

24 letter to the Secretary. So with that in mind 

25 I had asked and I hope, Jeff, I hope you 
12

1 received my e-mail and would be willing to give 

2 us sort of a step-through on how, you know, 

3 this bulletin and your criteria and how you’re 

4 implementing this class when you’re having to 

5 make the decision, and then you know we can 

6 discuss it after your, after you give a 

7 briefing. Jeff Kotsch? 

8 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, do you want me to start now? 

9 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, if you could. 

10 MR. KOTSCH: Basically I’m going to just read 

11 through some stuff which basically takes us 

12 through, there’s three criteria in both –- 

13 well, in the initial bulletin which was dated 

October 15th 14 , and then there was a supplemental 

15 bulletin on January -- I’m sorry, the first one 

was on October 15th 16 , 2007, and the second one 

17 was an 814, was January 23, 2008, which 

18 clarified some of the requirement, you know, 

19 one of the requirements in there. 

20 So let me just step through. There’s 

21 three basic criteria that we use to interpret 

22 the SEC class at Rocky Flats. The way the 

23 class definition is written, it requires that 

24 an employee worked at least 250 days at the 

25 plant during the designated time period and 
13

1 that the employee was monitored, or should have 

2 been monitored for neutron exposures for at 

3 least 250 days during that time period. So the 

4 real crux of it is how do we get to the, how do 

5 we determine the, relate it to neutron 

6 exposures, language of this definition. 

7 So to do that we use three different 

8 tests. The tests are applied separately and 

9 satisfying a single criterion is sufficient to 

10 place the individual in the SEC class. The 

11 first one is, and the most important one is 

12 inclusion in the Rocky Flats neutron dose 

13 reconstruction project, the NDRP, which 

14 contains 5300 names of workers. For the 

15 employees that are listed on the NDRP list, the 

16 250-day requirement is measured for their 

17 employment at the Rocky Flats facility. Every 

18 employee on that list is actually monitored for 

19 neutron exposure while working at Rocky Flats 

20 or was known to have worked in the plutonium 

21 building which would have given them exposure 

22 to neutron and was assessed for neutron 

23 exposure as part of the project. 

24 The workers on the NDRP list were those 

25 with significant neutron exposure and thus for 
14

1 these employees DOL presumes 250 workdays of 

2 exposure for duration. Basically if you have -

3 - if you’re on the list and you have 250 days 

4 of employment, this criterion would affect, 250 

5 days at the site. This seems to have been the 

6 most common avenue for inclusion in the class. 

7 Those on the list need show nothing further 

8 beyond the employment of 250 days during the 

9 SEC period at Rocky Flats. So that’s the first 

10 of the three criteria. 

11 The second test is the employment in a 

12 building identified as the plutonium building. 

13 Most employees who worked in the known 

14 plutonium buildings are included in the NDRP 

15 list and are included in the SEC class on the 

16 basis without further analysis. Employees at 

17 Rocky Flats who are not on the list and are 

18 potentially qualified for inclusion in the SEC 

19 by virtue of having worked in a building in 

20 which plutonium was present have to demonstrate 

21 250 days in that building as specified by HHS 

22 when it found that the health endangerment was 

23 demonstrated by minimum employment within the 

24 parameters established for the class. 

25 For workers who were included in the 
15

1 class based specifically upon employment in 

2 certain buildings, there must be a showing that 

3 they were present in such buildings, not just 

4 at Rocky Flats, as a whole. So this one is 

5 specific to the buildings, 250 days in the 

6 particular buildings that are considered as one 

7 or all plutonium facilities. So it could be 

8 time in just one or in a collection of all the 

9 buildings that are considered plutonium 

10 buildings. 

11 To do this, DOL accepts credible 

12 evidence. Again, all these things are done on 

13 a case by case basis in the district office. 

14 Credible evidence of presence, including DOE 

15 employment and dosimetry record information 

16 collected by NIOSH for its dose reconstruction 

17 and claimant and coworker affidavit. 

18 So if either of these first two tests or 

19 criteria are met, the employee has a specified 

20 cancer, DOL will accept their inclusion into 

21 the SEC. If neither of the first two criteria 

22 is met, DOL considers whether the employee 

23 should have been monitored for neutron dose 

24 based on NIOSH’s completed dose reconstruction 

25 report. 
16

1 The current, and this is where the 

2 hundred millirem per year limit stems from 

3 based on DOE regulations. Employees expected 

4 to receive that amount of radiation exposure 

5 during a year are to be monitored, and those 

6 expected to receive less were probably not 

7 monitored -- or were not required to be 

8 monitored. 

9 Under our bulletin 814 which is the 

10 second one, the clarifying one, the claims 

11 examiner reviews the NIOSH dose reconstruction 

12 report to determine if there is at least one 

13 year during the period 1952 through 1966 in 

14 which the dose reconstruction assigned the 

15 employee with at least 100 millirem of neutron 

16 dose for that particular year. Only one year 

17 at or above the hundred millirem during this 

18 period is needed for finding to be made that 

19 the employee should have been monitored. For 

20 employees determined to have met the current 

21 threshold level of neutron exposure to require 

22 monitoring at at least one year during the SEC 

23 period, that is the hundred millirem, the 250 

24 day requirement is measured by their employment 

25 at Rocky Flats as a whole. Since under the 
17

1 current standards they should have been 

2 monitored for the entire period during which 

3 they were exposed to neutron. 

4 Hang on one second. 

5 I mean there’s other information in 

6 those bulletins. There’s guidance for the 

7 claims examiners, but those are basically the 

8 three tests. 

9 These were developed -- Let me just go 

10 on a little bit more. These were developed in 

11 consultation with NIOSH, and we took, as we 

12 did, we took steps to expand the class actually 

13 by adding Building 881 to the list of known 

14 plutonium buildings under the second criterion. 

15 That was one thing, and then further, our 

16 inclusion in the third criterion was based on 

17 the belief that the definition of the class 

18 required us to include in the class any worker 

19 with a final NIOSH dose reconstruction report 

20 that credited 100 millirems of neutron dose to 

21 the worker, provided, again, they met the 250 

22 workday test. The last thing is we have 

23 discussed -- DOL has discussed with NIOSH 

24 whether we are correctly interpreting, or if we 

25 need to correctly interpret like a dose 
18

1 reconstruction that has some indication of 

2 neutron dose, whether that, whether NIOSH, 

3 whether we’re correctly reading the dose 

4 reconstruction as far as the extent of the 

5 neutron dose that it calculates, and also we 

6 would discuss with NIOSH any further inclusion 

7 of buildings under the second criterion, too. 

8 So Mark, I mean that’s a brief overview 

9 of the -- I mean the core of those bulletins 

10 are those three tests or criteria. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Right, and I guess, I mean it 

12 brings up a couple of questions. But can you, 

13 just on the front end, can you tell me if you 

14 look at that time frame right now, you know, 

15 people that would fit into the class by the 

16 time frame we defined, how many cases did not 

17 meet one of these three criteria? 

18 MR. KOTSCH: I don’t know, I mean I don’t have 

19 that -– 

20 MR. GRIFFON: You don’t have those numbers 

21 there? 

22 MR. KOTSCH: I’m trying to think how to figure 

23 that out. I guess you’d have to look at the 

24 denied ones. I could check on that. I mean I 

25 don’t have that number right -- 
19

1 MR. GRIFFON: I thought at one point you told 

2 me it was very few cases. 

3 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah I don’t think -- that’s what 

4 I’m saying. It’s not a large number. There 

5 were six cases I think I discussed at the last 

6 Board meeting that kind of caught between the 

7 two bulletins and actually one of them, I think 

8 there’s only one of them that might have been 

9 actually caught, would have been affected by 

10 the second one but not the first one. You know 

11 what I’m saying? 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I think I know what you’re 

13 saying, yeah. ‘Cause I mean, I don’t know, 

14 there’s several little questions within these 

15 criteria that I have, like the third one to me 

16 seems you know really potentially problematic, 

17 but if it’s just, you know, catching the final 

18 cases, that’s one thing, but if you know, 

19 you’re, it almost seems a little bit circular 

20 because you’re looking at NIOSH’s dose 

21 reconstruction report to determine if someone 

22 was monitored or should have been monitored, 

23 but I think a lot of what the DR’s based on are 

24 the first two items, NDRP or presence in one of 

25 those buildings. If they’re present, they 
20

1 might assign a missed dose. I don’t know if 

2 that’s, you know, shedding any more light onto 

3 the question of whether someone, you know, was 

4 you know, went unmonitored and could have 

5 received a hundred millirem. You know what I’m 

6 saying, Jeff? 

7 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, and that’s what we grappled 

8 with, too. I think there’s some -- I don’t 

9 know how high a level of confidence, but that 

10 the first two catches most of the people that 

11 probably were exposed to neutrons, either 

12 through the actual monitoring or their presence 

13 in a facility that had, you know, plutonium 

14 facility or the one with the generator that 

15 actually had neutron exposure associated. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

17 MR. KOTSCH: The last one was a mechanism that 

18 we had seen a couple of dose reconstructions 

19 that appeared to be, have some indication of 

20 neutron, but were not contained in either of 

21 those two other ones. They were buildings 

22 outside of the list, and they were not on -- I 

23 mean outside the list of buildings and also 

24 outside the list of the NDRP employees. So 

25 that was the trigger to say well, one trigger 
21

1 would be well should that building maybe 

2 perhaps be included in the -- which I think 

3 what happened with, you know, with the addition 

4 of 881, and/or did NIOSH have reason to believe 

5 that there was some neutron exposure there, for 

6 whatever reason, and they’re not either in one 

7 of those buildings or on that list. But from 

8 what we can tell, or at least what I’ve seen, 

9 they seem to be a very small number of people 

10 being affected by that last criterion. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, but certainly it’s 

12 important to those few people. I mean we want 

13 to make sure we get it correct, and if we can’t 

14 be perfect, I think we all want to err on the 

15 side of the claimant, and my question would be 

16 if it’s so, you know if it’s, I mean we go back 

17 to these anecdotal examples that we’ve had of 

18 people that were assigned to the other 

19 buildings but did jobs in the plutonium 

20 buildings, as you’re describing them, and you 

21 know, if they were, you know, if the program 

22 was perfect and monitored everyone, then it 

23 would be in the NDRP and there’d be no issue 

24 there. But you know, I think we’ve got some 

25 reason to believe there might be some gaps in 
22

1 that database, so then you know, and their work 

2 history would show them not working in the 

3 plutonium buildings. And that’s the few, maybe 

4 it’s only a few, but that’s the few that we’re 

5 a little concerned about whether we are 

6 capturing them, or how to capture them. 

7 MS. BOLLER: Mark, it’s Carolyn. I have a 

8 question for someone. Of these 5,308 on the 

9 NDRP list, how many of those folks filed 

10 claims, and how many of those have been paid? 

11 MR. KOTSCH: Well, I mean I don’t know that 

12 Labor has, how we’d sort that ‘cause we’d have 

13 to check that list against... 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, that’s probably a tough 

15 statistic to -- 

16 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, we certainly don’t have it; 

17 we certainly haven’t sliced it that way. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

19 MR. KOTSCH: Because it also obviously is 

20 dependent upon you know this element of one of 

21 the cases. 

22 MS. BOLLER: But would you not know how many 

23 people you have paid under the SEC? 

24 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, I mean I don’t have that 

25 number. Unfortunately I don’t have that number 
23

1 right in front of me, but yeah. I’m sorry, I 

2 can’t tell you whether those people were on 

3 that list or not. 

4 MS. BOLLER: But we can get that number. 

5 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah. 

6 MS. BOLLER: Yeah. Now here’s my other 

7 question. What are you, what, how in this 

8 formula are you accounting for the surviving 

9 spouse or family member who has no clue where 

10 their spouse worked at Rocky Flats? Because 

11 they were all on a Q clearance and they 

12 couldn’t discuss their work. So in some of the 

13 notices we’ve seen come back it’s like provide 

14 us with the information that tells us where 

15 your spouse or your family member worked. How 

16 do they fit into this, or are they just SOL? 

17 MR. KOTSCH: Well, I mean beyond what they 

18 provide obviously, NIOSH is picking up from DOE 

19 information on their work locations and their 

20 activities, you know their work titles and 

21 things like that. Plus if they had any, like I 

22 said, for the number two, or actually for any 

23 of them, they can you know they can provide, 

24 each one is done on a case-by-case basis based 

25 on you know the evidence that’s provided, so 
24

1 they could, if they had, if they happened to 

2 know coworkers, they could get affidavits or 

3 you know there are other sources of information 

4 that corraborate (sic) --- 

5 MS. BOLLER: An 83-year-old woman is gonna go 

6 find coworkers of her late husband who she 

7 doesn’t know worked with? 

8 MR. KOTSCH: Well, I just said that’s a 

9 possibility. 

10 MS. BOLLER: Yeah. 

11 MR. KOTSCH: And I would think that the primary 

12 information should be coming through out of 

13 basically DOE records and then you know that 

14 NIOSH is collecting. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: And then I think, Jeff, we have 

16 you know this question of you know some of 

17 those buildings that people were –- like the 

18 example I’ve been using for several calls, is 

19 the maintenance building where there clearly a 

20 maintenance worker assigned to that maintenance 

21 building, I forget the number offhand. But 

22 the, you know what I’ve heard from several 

23 people they would go out on assignments to 

24 these other buildings. Now often they were 

25 probably badged to go in those buildings, but 
25

1 was that always the case? I’m not sure we know 

2 that. So that’s the question I have, is those 

3 people that... 

4 And then I think the other thing I’m 

5 trying to grapple with is in the 250 day 

6 criteria, I could certainly see a case where 

7 someone is on the NDRP list who was not exposed 

8 to neutrons for 250 days. You know, they may 

9 have been one of these maintenance people that 

10 got assigned a badge and worked in there for 

11 two weeks or something on a particular job and 

12 then they, that was the only time they were in 

13 there for the five years. So they, in this 

14 case, they were the lucky one I guess, or 

15 whatever, you know... 

16 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, we presume, we knew that 

17 exists, that situation exists but you know we 

18 also know that they were definitely -- if they 

19 were on that list they were pretty, it seemed 

20 pretty evident that they had some neutron 

21 exposure. Now we realize it may not be 250 

22 days. That’s why we apply the criteria for the 

23 site rather than just try to put them in a 

24 particular building or something. You know, in 

25 an effort at least for them, to be you know 
26

1 somewhat claimant favorable, just use that 

2 presumption. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: But in that last category you 

4 have to show 250 days in the particular 

5 building, right? 

6 MR. KOTSCH: In the second one, yeah. 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. And in that case couldn’t 

8 you have the same situation where you had a 

9 maintenance worker went there for a couple 

10 weeks job, certainly got exposed to more than a 

11 hundred millirem per year, or could you know; 

12 this is just my hypothetical example, you know, 

13 got exposed to more than a hundred millirem in 

14 those two weeks but wasn’t in the NDRP, you 

15 know. 

16 MR. KOTSCH: Are you saying the one that, 

17 something is showing up in the dose 

18 reconstruction? 

19 MR. GRIFFON: No, I’m saying the person that 

20 could slip through the cracks here, that you 

21 have you know that they, they’re not on the 

22 list and then you look at your building 

23 criteria and based on their work history, 

24 they’re not in there; they’re assigned to a 

25 maintenance building. But the reality was you 
27

1 know they got sent over for occasional 

2 maintenance job there, but even if you added up 

3 every one of those little maintenance jobs they 

4 wouldn’t have done that for more than 250 days, 

5 but they might have you know if it was current 

6 standards, they might have been required to 

7 have a badge ‘cause they might have exceeded 

8 the hundred millirem. 

9 MR. KOTSCH: Yeah, but in your example they 

10 were not even badged, right? 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Right, right. 

12 MS. MUNN: This is Wanda –- 

13 MR. GRIFFON: And you know if that’s not a 

14 potential then I guess, you know, we drop this 

15 thing, but from what I’ve heard, that might be 

16 a potential that is out there. 

17 MS. MUNN: It’s been a long time since I’ve 

18 read through the materials supporting our 

19 concerns here, but didn’t Rocky Flats have the 

20 same kind of process in place that other sites 

21 had which required essentially work 

22 instructions for any activity that took place 

23 inside radiation zones? Wasn’t there a process 

24 in place where the job description had to be 

25 outlined and the work instruction approved by -
28

1 - 

2 MR. GRIFFON: Wanda, I’m having a very hard 

3 time hearing you. 

4 MS. MUNN: Maybe it’s the telephone that I’m 

5 on. I’m using an unusual one. Is this better? 

6 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, try that, yeah. 

7 MS. MUNN: Can you still not hear me? 

8 DR. BRANCHE: This is Christine. One second. 

9 Ray Green, can you hear her? 

10 COURT REPORTER: Actually I’m hearing her very 

11 well, yeah. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Mark, can you hear her now? 

13 MS. MUNN: Now? 

14 (no response) 

15 MS. MUNN: Have we lost Mark? 

16 MR. GRIFFON: I’ve got you. It’s better now. 

17 Okay. 

18 MS. MUNN: Would you like me to rephrase the 

19 question? 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, go ahead Wanda, thank you. 

21 MS. MUNN: My question was since it’s been such 

22 a long time since I’ve looked at any of the 

23 documentation supporting any of the activities 

24 of how work was performed at the plant, my 

25 question was didn’t Rocky Flats have the same 
29

1 kind of process in place that was in place at 

2 other sites, which when work was going to be 

3 performed inside any radiation or potential 

4 radiation zone, work plans had to be presented 

5 and signed off by RPTs. Wasn’t that process in 

6 place? The reason I’m asking that is because 

7 if that process were in place then the 

8 individual, regardless of where they were 

9 assigned, would have had to have been issued at 

10 least a temporary badge. And I can’t imagine 

11 that jobs would have been undertaken at any 

12 radiation zone that didn’t have work procedure 

13 associated with it. 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, Wanda, I hear what you’re 

15 saying. I think it might be a little more 

16 complicated in the NDRP because someone along 

17 the line had to make the decision that they 

18 were exposed to neutrons. Unless they had a 

19 neutron film. A lot of times they would have 

20 the gamma, and it would just be you know an 

21 estimate of the dose based on N/P ratios. So 

22 someone along the line had to look, but they’re 

23 looking at the same job history cards we are is 

24 my fear, you know? So someone along the line 

25 had to make a decision of whether certain 
30

1 individuals, you know, they had gamma badges 

2 and I think they were pretty global with the 

3 gamma monitoring. But then they wouldn’t have 

4 found a neutron unless they felt they were in a 

5 neutron area. They did have some neutron films 

6 but not for everyone. That’s at least my -- 

7 it’s been a long while since we discussed this 

8 as well, for me, so... 

9 MS. RUTTENBER: Mark, this is Margaret. That 

10 is true. Everybody wore a dosimetry badge for 

11 gamma, but they did not all have neutron 

12 badges. 

13 MR. GRIFFON: And this is Margaret Ruttenber 

14 for -- I did ask Margaret -- Thank you 

15 Margaret. I did ask Margaret to join us since 

16 she’s spent a lot of time researching this site 

17 and to the extent she can help clarify, that 

18 would be great. 

19 DR. ULSH: Mark, this is Brant Ulsh. The 

20 trigger for entry into the NDRP was not having 

21 neutron dosimetry. It was having beta gamma 

22 dosimetry in one of the plutonium buildings as 

23 listed in the NDRP. If you had a gamma 

24 dosimeter issued in those buildings, then 

25 you’re in, even if no neutrons. 
31

1 MR. GRIFFON: Issued in one of those buildings, 

2 so... I mean, are you making my point for me 

3 again, Brant, or clarifying? 

4 DR. ULSH: No, I’m just clarify -- 

5 DR. BRANCHE: He’s clarifying. 

6 DR. ULSH: Yeah, I think the misperception is 

7 out there that you had to have neutron 

8 dosimetry to be in the NDRP, and that’s not the 

9 case. 

10 MS. MUNN: Un-uh. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Right, right, and I agree with 

12 that, but –- 

13 MS. MUNN: And so that means if you were 

14 badged, period, then you were going to be in 

15 the NDRP, right? 

16 DR. ULSH: That is correct. 

17 MR. GRIFFON: If you were badged in one of 

18 those buildings. 

19 DR. ULSH: That’s correct. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Right. So if you were badged as 

21 a maintenance, out of the maintenance shop and 

22 were sent to that building, how would the NDRP 

23 have put you on the list? 

24 MS. RUTTENBER: May I speak, Mark? 

25 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, yeah, please. 
32

1 MS. RUTTENBER: This is Margaret. The building 

2 is 334, and actually I’m looking at all the job 

3 titles associated with that, and as you know, 

4 that’s a multi-craft crew building, and there 

5 were a few people that remained in that 

6 building all the time, but their badges and 

7 their time cards were all housed in 334. And 

8 the hot buildings, such as 771 and actually 

9 444, the beryllium buildings, they had their 

10 own multi-craft crews for when they were doing 

11 big projects, so they had you know expansion 

12 issues or any kind of thing they would call in 

13 additional multi-craft crews like pipe fitters 

14 and other individuals to come and help, from 

15 the electric shop as well. And so they would 

16 still be assigned to 334, but they would go 

17 into the 771 area or the ^ area I should say or 

18 the beryllium area. So there is a group of 

19 workers that would fit into this little cohort 

20 that you’re talking about that could possibly 

21 have not been captured as having had neutron 

22 exposure. And it’s interesting, Mark and I 

23 have talked, there have been individuals that I 

24 have looked up on our database from our 

25 research, that they do in fact, as we get out 
33

1 of those SEC years and they started in the ‘70s 

2 breaking out neutron from gamma and beta, 

3 actually do have neutron exposure as well and 

4 have been assigned to, still 334. I think 

5 that’s the case we were talking about, Mark, 

6 when you called me. 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, yeah, that’s my question is 

8 you know are -- I fear that those, that kind of 

9 situation wasn’t incorporated into the NDRP. 

10 Maybe it was or maybe to the extent they knew, 

11 I don’t know if they tried to you know deal 

12 with that, but I’m not sure they had the 

13 information to deal with that. 

14 DR. ULSH: At this point there is a cohort in 

15 the NDRP that’s in the all other building 

16 category. 

17 MS. MUNN: Mm-hm. 

18 DR. ULSH: And that was at least meant to 

19 include those kinds of people, Mark. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

21 DR. ULSH: I can’t swear to you that there’s 

22 not a single person who fits into the category 

23 that you’re talking about, but there are 

24 certainly examples of people who were stationed 

25 outside of the plutonium buildings that were 
34

1 included in the NDRP, and presumably they are 

2 the kinds of people that you’re talking about. 

3 MS. RUTTENBER: And Mark, it is our intention, 

4 it’s the Health Department’s intention to work 

5 with NIOSH, and certainly within a short few 

6 weeks we will be providing them with our 

7 databases so that they compare them to what 

8 they have. I think ours is probably in a 

9 little bit more user friendly setup, but that’s 

10 our intention, within the next few weeks to 

11 help in supporting this effort. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, okay, I mean I guess my 

13 feeling is, and I don’t know how others in the 

14 work group feel, but you know if it’s, if we 

15 have a situation where you know we’re, I guess 

16 I would want to err toward the side of the 

17 claimant. And if we had very strong evidence 

18 or irrefutable evidence that the individual was 

19 never in any neutron areas, they were always in 

20 an administrative area and they worked there 

21 their whole career and you know the CATI agrees 

22 with that and you know, I think that would be 

23 one thing, but if you have this other situation 

24 where you’re you know in the maintenance 

25 building, DOE, I guess I had kind of assumed 
35

1 when we wrote the initial definition that if 

2 you had this kind of situation, DOL would look 

3 at the job title and say, you know since we 

4 can’t be sure, we’re gonna err on the side of 

5 the claimant, but I can understand DOL’s 

6 position, too, on this. They need some 

7 evidence to show they could have been in those 

8 buildings. So I’m not sure exactly how -- I’d 

9 like to hear from other work group members if 

10 you have an opinion at this point. 

11 MS. MUNN: This is Wanda. You’ve already heard 

12 from me but it seems to me that these folks 

13 would be on the list. That’s the only real 

14 thorny issue, and perhaps they might be on the 

15 list because they’ve only been in that building 

16 once or twice, but that the work project 

17 required the kind of -- that it required 

18 badging in order to get in so they had it for a 

19 short period of time regardless of what it was. 

20 I don’t know how one could ever prove by any 

21 record that might exist now. 

22 MR. GRIFFON: Well I guess, Wanda, I guess we 

23 just heard from Margaret, and we don’t have her 

24 database, but we just heard you know that there 

25 was a situation where there were, would have 
36

1 been badged in 334 and sent out to work in 

2 those other buildings. 

3 MS. MUNN: Right. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: And they were not, did not have 

5 any neutron dose prior to you know, so they 

6 weren’t accounted for in the NDRP. And I guess 

7 you know if it was done, and you know I know, I 

8 understand Brant saying you know we have, 

9 certainly have indication that they did try to 

10 do it, was it perfect, you know obviously we 

11 can’t attest to that. But on the flip side of 

12 that is, and that’s why I asked Jeff early on 

13 how many cases this affected, you know if it 

14 truly is a handful of cases. I don’t know if 

15 it’s still six; that might have been an early 

16 number. But if it’s a small number, and you 

17 know we’re making this kind of decision, 

18 obviously it’s overall it’s not a big deal but 

19 to those few individuals, it’s a big deal. So 

20 why not just err on the side of claimant 

21 favorability? 

22 MS. MUNN: Well, there’s one reason why not to 

23 always do that. And the one reason is the 

24 tendency to mislead the workers is in terms of 

25 whether or not they were harmed by the 
37

1 exposure. We want to be accurate in that 

2 regard as well. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Mark, this is Christine. I’m 

4 trying to make sure I understand what you mean 

5 by a decision because this is a closed case for 

6 the Board, and you wanted to explore how DOL 

7 was making decisions about the inclusion in the 

8 class and how they were making their funding 

9 decisions and that’s been explained to you. 

10 And so what decision is it that you’re seeking 

11 from the work group members? 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I -– maybe decision was a 

13 poor choice of words, but I was trying to get a 

14 sense of whether other work group members feel 

15 that we need to take any action in terms of our 

16 original definition and maybe that’s not the 

17 case. But you know do we have to take any 

18 action in terms of our original class 

19 definition? 

20 MR. PRESLEY: Hey Mark? 

21 MR. GRIFFON: Yes. 

22 MR. PRESLEY: This is Bob Presley. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: Hey Bob. 

24 MR. PRESLEY: I honestly do not see anywhere 

25 where we need to change anything over or do 
38

1 anything different than what we did. I mean 

2 what Jeff read has taken care of everything, 

3 seems like. That’s my opinion. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 

5 MR. GIBSON: Mark, this is Mike. 

6 MR. GRIFFON: Okay, Mike. 

7 MR. GIBSON: I, you know, I agree with you. If 

8 there’s a potential where the claimants could 

9 fall through the cracks like this, I’m not sure 

10 that the definition we gave to the Board or 

11 perhaps even the Board itself tried to send 

12 forward to the Secretary is maybe it got 

13 interpreted somewhere wrong down the line, but 

14 this may be something I believe we might ought 

15 to take back to the Board and let them know 

16 that we have concern here. 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I mean my sense is it’s 

18 either going to come down to these, this 

19 handful of individuals that you know were 

20 working during that time period and are not, 

21 don’t meet one of the criteria, you know, 

22 they’re either, they’re probably going to have 

23 to you know battle this individually and you 

24 know this question of you know provide us with 

25 more information. I think as Carolyn said 
39

1 earlier, that’s difficult, especially for these 

2 survivors, you know. They don’t have anything 

3 more to provide, you know. So, you know, my 

4 question was if we, you know, if we have you 

5 know very thin evidence to show, you know, to 

6 indicate that they couldn’t receive, they 

7 didn’t go unmonitored, then I think we better, 

8 you know... 

9 On the other hand if we have a clear 

10 case, I agree. I think we’ve done the best we 

11 could and we -- I don’t want to give the 

12 impression necessarily, you know, I don’t want 

13 to give the impression that somebody that 

14 worked in an office building, you know, nowhere 

15 near any potential exposures, and we add them 

16 to the class. I don’t want to give, mislead 

17 people that they had health endanger when they 

18 were nowhere near stuff. On the other hand, 

19 you know, if you have people saying that they 

20 were on these maintenance crews, they know they 

21 were, you know, all right I know you can’t find 

22 my name in this NDRP record, but I’m telling 

23 you this is what we did. And we have at least 

24 some testimony here from Margaret Ruttenber, 

25 saying that you know this situation, that kind 
40

1 of situation did exist according to her 

2 research at the plant. Then maybe you know we 

3 should be a little more cautious of how we 

4 implement that criteria. I’m talking mainly 

5 about that second, but even I think the second 

6 and third criteria that Jeff presented kind of 

7 overlap a bit. But at least the second, you 

8 know, this question of being in the building 

9 for 250 days... 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Mark, this is Christine. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: This is my recommendation that 

13 you consider, given the information that you 

14 heard and as you cogitate what you need to do. 

15 I caution you to remember that there’s no open 

16 issue on this before the Board because it’s 

17 already been sent to the Secretary. However, 

18 based on the fact that as you learn more about 

19 how the information of the Board formally sent 

20 for this HHS Secretary’s signature, you can, 

21 your work group, I would recommend that the 

22 work group as a whole offer a letter for the 

23 Board’s consideration about, that would go to 

24 the Secretary to talk about your concerns, what 

25 you’ve heard from the Department of Labor, and 
41

1 how based on what you’ve learned about the 

2 implementation of the class, it’s given you 

3 some wisdom about how you would rectify class 

4 definitions in the future, if any future 

5 language were to come before the Secretary, you 

6 can share your concerns about how this 

7 particular class definition is being 

8 implemented, but again, you then leave it to 

9 the Secretary to do with it as he sees fit. 

10 You’re going to have to couch this, and you 

11 have to make certain that your work group is on 

12 the same page about what language would go 

13 before the Board. I don’t know if you can do 

14 that before our meeting next week. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: No, I’m not sure we can. I think 

16 we’re a little bit split on this issue right 

17 now. So you know I don’t know that we can come 

18 to any consensus, but mainly this was, you 

19 know, a question of, and I understand what 

20 you’re saying, Christine. It’s one thing to 

21 sort of I guess learn from this and understand 

22 how we need to write our definitions in the 

23 future. I’m not sure if we had to do it again, 

24 I’m not sure if we could have crafted it any 

25 better or any differently, but we certainly, 
42

1 this at least gives us a sense of how the 

2 language is being interpreted and implemented, 

3 so in this specific case. But one thing is 

4 it’s that one thing of direction going forward, 

5 but I think a lot of individuals on the phone 

6 are concerned about this particular class, so I 

7 think we do need to, you know, maybe at least 

8 consider action on this and the action may be 

9 just a letter clarifying our definition. But 

10 the work group doesn’t have consensus on that 

11 right now. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: But if I can interject, Mark. 

13 Actually by virtue of what you have learned, 

14 perhaps if you don’t want to have a letter, if 

15 there’s no consensus about a letter, certainly 

16 the wisdom of how future definitions as the 

17 Board moves forward on other of the issues 

18 before it, the wisdom that this work group has 

19 gained as you’ve considered other pieces of 

20 information that have come to light, a letter 

21 from the work group as far as -- This would 

22 just be a letter or a note or a memo or 

23 something from the work group to the Board as 

24 the Board deliberates in the future. That’s 

25 another avenue that you have at your disposal. 
43

1 In other words helping the Board mature as it 

2 understands the vagaries and language and what 

3 doors certain pieces of language open, what it 

4 means to have 250 days. There are a number of 

5 things that you all have discussed since I -- 

6 You know I joined this late in the game and 

7 after the decision was made and the information 

8 was sent to the Secretary. But over the months 

9 that you’ve deliberated on these finer points, 

10 if there’s something that can be helpful to 

11 your colleagues on the Board, that’s another 

12 avenue that you have as far as educating your 

13 colleagues. 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Right, right. And as I said, 

15 that is one thing we might want to consider, 

16 but my initial concern is this class itself, 

17 not future, you know, definitions. 

18 MS. BOLLER: Can I ask a question? This is 

19 Carolyn. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Sure. 

21 MS. BOLLER: You know, I’ve been accused of not 

22 being the brightest light on the porch, and 

23 that’s fine, but, and I can hear the 

24 snickering, so that’s okay. But this SEC was 

25 approved as I understood it because there was a 
44

1 lack of records, and you all could not prove 

2 who was and who was not exposed to neutrons. 

3 Now you had the list of folks, and that’s 

4 wonderful, but the other language then says, or 

5 who might have been, and you did not have 

6 accurate records in order to prove who was or 

7 who wasn’t. So what’s the issue here that we 

8 got to go through all this bureaucracy other 

9 than to intentionally deny people what they may 

10 have coming? I don’t get it. I mean we keep 

11 going around and around and around. I don’t 

12 get it. Will somebody please explain it? 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Well, there’s no formal -- the 

14 Board’s made its decision and sent the 

15 recommendation to the HHS –- 

16 MS. BOLLER: Christine, I clearly, I understand 

17 that, I understand they made the recommendation 

18 and they sent it to the Board. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: But my issue, there’s a closed 

20 issue for the Board format. 

21 MS. BOLLER: I understand that, but I’m asking 

22 for an explanation because here was my 

23 understanding from the Board’s original 

24 decision that they sent to the Secretary was 

25 that those who were monitored or should have 
45

1 been monitored, and the reason the SEC was 

2 granted was because they didn’t have, or the 

3 Board believed there were not adequate records 

4 to be able to evaluate everybody who worked 

5 there. So based on the lack of supporting 

6 documentation, they granted the SEC and said, 

7 here. So you got a group that’s on the list. 

8 Terrific. You can prove that, but you can’t 

9 prove anybody else, so they fall into the 

10 category of should have been tested. 

11 What the Board did was the right 

12 decision to say everybody who falls during that 

13 period of time, 250 days on the worksite, gets 

14 it. And yet we are moving forward in all of 

15 this in efforts to deny people these benefits, 

16 based on the SEC. That’s how I read it. 

17 Now could somebody please explain to me, 

18 didn’t the Board make their decision based on 

19 that information, that they didn’t have enough? 

20 DR. BRANCHE: I think your questions really are 

21 directed to the Department of Labor. 

22 MS. BOLLER: Well, we did that, but they come 

23 back and say that HHS is the one who made the 

24 decision, so -- 

25 DR. BRANCHE: And that is an incor -- I’m going 
46

1 to take the risk and -- That is an incorrect 

2 statement. 

3 MS. BOLLER: Well, I mean the letter that we 

4 got basically said we’re following HHS’ 

5 directive. I’ve gone back and looked at HHS’ 

6 stuff; I can’t find anything that says, you got 

7 to be 250 days in a building in order to be 

8 eligible if you’re not on the NDRP. Where is 

9 it, other than the memo that came out from DOL? 

10 So, I’m sorry, I’m not yelling at you. 

11 I have swollen vocal cords, and I sound like 

12 I’m angry all the time. But I just am trying 

13 to figure out if the working group made the 

14 decision that said, and they gave it to the 

15 Secretary of HHS, and he approved it and it 

16 went through the process, yes, you’re right, 

17 there is a decision. But my understanding was 

18 the Board made a decision because they didn’t 

19 believe NIOSH could prove their case because 

20 they didn’t have accurate records. 

21 Now you’re asking these people to come 

22 back and prove that their husband or their 

23 spouse or their loved one actually worked in a 

24 building for 250 days. Impossible. Not gonna 

25 happen. If you can’t prove it through the 
47

1 records at DOE, then how do you expect a widow 

2 to prove it? I don’t get it, other than it 

3 seems to me there’s an effort to avoid granting 

4 these benefits to people who deserve them. End 

5 of my tirade. Thank you. 

6 Could somebody answer it? 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, and that’s what I, I mean I 

8 guess it comes down to in our language and the 

9 way it was interpreted by the Department of 

10 Labor, comes down to that question, monitored 

11 or should have been monitored, and we’ve always 

12 said monitored or should have been monitored 

13 based on the current regulatory standards which 

14 would mean, you know, a person had the 

15 potential to receive a hundred millirem per 

16 year. That’s actually you know PED -- I think 

17 that’s all external dose the way you know 

18 reads. 

19 But anyway it gets into the hundred 

20 millirem question. And then we get back to 

21 this, so I don’t actually think we’re too far 

22 apart. The question is you know we went 

23 through this with Y-12 a little bit, too. And 

24 Pete’s description sort of Y-12, Pete Turcic’s 

25 description for the Y-12 site was that you know 
48

1 if we have you know questionable jobs you know 

2 that, then it’s going to come down to there’s 

3 that judgment area, there’s that gray area, you 

4 know, the certain job titles or job 

5 descriptions may certainly show that they 

6 weren’t in any area requiring monitoring. But 

7 then there’s that gray area, and I guess that’s 

8 what we’re questioning around and discussing 

9 around so much here is that that gray area and 

10 that’s why I always use this maintenance. 

11 And and whether NIOSH may not agree with 

12 this, but I think the Board’s basis for our 

13 decision was that there you know, as Carolyn 

14 just described it, there were concerns about 

15 the adequacy of a neutron record so given that, 

16 you know, I guess we would have that question 

17 of you know was everybody, anybody, who was 

18 sent into those areas to work, would they have 

19 been captured in the NDRP. Would they have 

20 been monitored and included in the NDRP? And I 

21 have less confidence of that, I guess, than 

22 maybe NIOSH does, and that’s why I’m saying, 

23 now does that mean our definition was not 

24 appropriate, I’m not sure. And that goes back 

25 to Christine’s question, you know, what what, 
49

1 you know, what kind of action do we have from 

2 here? I’m not sure, but my concern is that, 

3 you know, we have some cases and some 

4 individuals, and even if it’s a small number we 

5 certainly want to get it right. So I guess it 

6 comes down to that question of this monitored 

7 or should have been monitored, and how well and 

8 how well or how that is interpreted. And I’m 

9 not sure next steps, you know, in terms of 

10 clarifying that. That’s why I was asking Jeff 

11 also, you know, maybe we can get an update on 

12 the number of cases that didn’t meet your 

13 criteria during this time period and maybe a, 

14 you know a -- I would like to see the number 

15 and a description, you know like job title, 

16 building, certainly without getting into 

17 Privacy Act issues. But that might help us to 

18 understand your, your logic through this 

19 process. 

20 MR. PRESLEY: Hey Mark? 

21 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, go ahead Bob. 

22 MR. PRESLEY: Bob Presley. I, number one, I’ve 

23 got to go here just in a minute. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I think we’re close to 

25 wrapping up, yeah. 
50

1 MR. PRESLEY: What I would like to see is, you 

2 know, Christine is 100 percent correct on this. 

3 If we do anything there needs to be a letter or 

4 us to have a discussion with the Board on 

5 correcting or clarifying some of these issues, 

6 and I honestly don’t think that we can do it 

7 today. If you -- what I would like to see is 

8 maybe put your concerns in writing and then 

9 let’s look at those things. We need to discuss 

10 a little bit more because -- 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I’m willing to draft a memo 

12 to the Board, and I’ll before this next meeting 

13 I’ll circulate it to work group members, and 

14 you know there may not be time to get -- but at 

15 the very least even if we don’t present a memo 

16 at the next meeting, we can have a verbal 

17 discussion. 

18 MR. PRESLEY: Right. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: But if I can circulate a draft 

20 memo and we can all send it to the Board, that 

21 would be wonderful. If not, maybe we can just 

22 have it as an open discussion item in the work 

23 group updates. But yeah, I think we need to 

24 try to move the ball along, and one way to do 

25 that might be for me to draft a memo and 
51

1 hopefully, if we get everyone agrees on the 

2 work group, we can submit it to the Board and 

3 formalize it that way and discuss it a little 

4 more formally. 

5 (Whereupon, Ms. Munn and Mr. Presley spoke at 

6 the same time.) 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Hold on, two of you are speaking 

8 at the same time. Please, one at a time. 

9 MR. PRESLEY: Hey Mark, do that and then we’ll 

10 cuss and discuss it back and forth in the 

11 Board, in the working group, and try to get 

12 something for the Board, okay? 

13 MR. GRIFFON: Right, right, right, and I think 

14 I’m anticipating Wanda’s question. If there’s 

15 not time, I’ll hand a memo, a draft, I’ll get a 

16 memo to the work group first. I won’t, I won’t 

17 you know forward it to any other Board members 

18 until we have consensus. 

19 MR. PRESLEY: That’s wonderful. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, if we don’t have time, we 

21 don’t, it’s a little tight right now. 

22 MS. MUNN: I really think that it’s unlikely 

23 that we’ll have time. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, yeah. 

25 DR. BRANCHE: I can tell you right now that 
52

1 there isn’t going to be time. 

2 MS. MUNN: And I do even question whether 

3 something written is in fact in order. Mark, 

4 we all recall the blood, sweat and tears that 

5 went into the crafting of words for our 

6 recommendations from the original opening of 

7 the Board’s deliberations. And this monitored 

8 or should have been monitored language is 

9 language that we sweat over mightily for 

10 several months before we decided to incorporate 

11 it into the recommendations that we made. I 

12 have never heard anything personally that I 

13 felt was more appropriate for the work that we 

14 do and that would apply as thoroughly as it 

15 does to the decisions that we have to make. If 

16 other people have language that they feel is 

17 more appropriate, more accurate, more easily 

18 defined, and is easily workable for the 

19 Department of Labor as well as for our own 

20 Secretary, then I for one would certainly 

21 welcome any suggestion of that language. 

22 You’ve worked hard on it, and I am very loathed 

23 to change it without -- 

24 MR. GRIFFON: But like I said, Wanda, I don’t 

25 think, and I’ve thought about this too, would I 
53

1 change anything in that language, and I’ve 

2 sweated over this for a long time, but you 

3 know, and I’m hard pressed to as well. I think 

4 this gets into more of the, you know, and I 

5 don’t know if it’s the case here, but you know 

6 the potential for unintending consequences, you 

7 know. So in the memo, and maybe I’ll just 

8 draft it and it’ll end up in the circular file, 

9 but I’ll at least take a stab at outlining 

10 things and circulate it to the work group. And 

11 if we think we can’t come to consensus or think 

12 it’s not worth forwarding to the full Board, 

13 then we can just scrap it. But I’ll at least 

14 try to outline. I think my concerns get more 

15 into implementation, and that really, that is a 

16 DOL, the DOL side, I understand that, so you 

17 know as far as updating our language it may not 

18 be important but it may be -- I don’t know, it 

19 may be important for us to share with the Board 

20 just so that the DOL understands some of our 

21 concerns. You know if I look back at this I 

22 can remember I think a number of us were 

23 surprised on the 250 day, you know, being in 

24 the particular buildings, but when I look 

25 closer at that, I realize well you know that 
54

1 probably was done accurately by DOL, but you 

2 know was that the way I was thinking about it 

3 when we were drafting this class, you know I 

4 wasn’t thinking about it that way, so I think 

5 it might be worth just outlining in a memo so 

6 we can all at least look at it at the work 

7 group level then we can decide if we need to 

8 bring it to the Board. 

9 MS. MUNN: I do think the work group needs to 

10 take a look at that. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Okay, I’ll take a stab at that as 

12 the next step. And the other question I would 

13 have, and this is more for Margaret and NIOSH, 

14 I don’t know is there any status on where or 

15 when your data transfer might occur and to what 

16 extent that might be useful in helping DOL 

17 implement this. 

18 DR. ULSH: Mark, could you repeat your 

19 question, please? I’m sorry. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Getting the data from Margaret 

21 Ruttenber. I think there have been some 

22 discussions and at least it’s been initiated. 

23 DR. ULSH: Yes, Margaret and I are meeting at 

24 9:30, Thursday morning. 

25 MR. GRIFFON: Oh, okay. 
55

1 DR. ULSH: To hand over the data, right, 

2 Margaret? 

3 (no response) 

4 DR. ULSH: Well, I guess -- 

5 MR. GRIFFON: She may be off the line. 

6 MR. ELLIOTT: Margaret may have left. This is 

7 Larry Elliott. I have sent a letter to -- 

8 MS. RUTTENBER: No, I’m on the line, I’m sorry. 

9 We are –- that was our intention, but we had, 

10 our attorneys had met. There’s just some 

11 questioning about confidentiality and data 

12 usage. And I spoke with Larry this morning, 

13 and we’re well on our way. I had thought it be 

14 done by Thursday, but Brant’s just going to 

15 look at what we have, and I’m hoping within the 

16 next two weeks that we can get this data to 

17 NIOSH. I’m almost certain we can, aren’t you, 

18 Larry? 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: Yes, I am. As Margaret says 

20 we’ve spoken about this today, and I have also, 

21 Margaret, talked with our chair of our HSRB -- 

22 MS. RUTTENBER: Oh, good. 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: -- other letter will be 

24 forthcoming. 

25 MS. RUTTENBER: Perfect. 
56

1 MR. ELLIOTT: Brant’s mission on Thursday will 

2 be to scope out what it will take to transfer 

3 the information to us. And as we’ve said many 

4 times, Mark, we think that we have the same 

5 information that the Ruttenbers have put 

6 together except for perhaps in some cases there 

7 may be some work history information that we 

8 may elaborate a better understanding of where a 

9 worker was and what they did. 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, and I think -- 

11 MR. ELLIOTT: Beneficial not only to us, but 

12 also it will be more beneficial perhaps to DOL 

13 as they try to take care of some of these 

14 claims that are in the difficult area. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: And Larry, I think I’m on the 

16 record -- if I’m not, I am now –- of saying 

17 that you know our conference call with 

18 Margaret, you and I and Brant, having these 

19 discussions about the data, does seem that we 

20 had all the same data for the work group to 

21 review. It helped going up to this SEC class 

22 decision except for, and that was the one 

23 question about this additional possible work 

24 history information that might be useful, so I 

25 agree with that, but that part might be very 
57

1 helpful in implementation stuff. So that’s 

2 good that that’s on course and that might be 

3 helpful. 

4 All right, so I guess the only action 

5 out of this is that I will draft a memo for the 

6 work group internally to look at first and 

7 we’ll decide as a work group whether we want to 

8 forward that on to the Board and take it up as 

9 an action, you know, a discussion item, at the 

10 Board level. But that’s the only action for 

11 now that I have. 

12 MS. MUNN: That’s very good. I think that’s 

13 appropriate, but my actually I think it would 

14 be foolish of us to assume that we’re going to 

15 get much further than that between now and the 

16 time that we meet in St. Louis. I don’t think 

17 we’re going to have anything that specific that 

18 can be brought to the whole Board at that time. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: Mark, this is Christine. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: I agree, yeah. Yes? 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Just so that everyone understands 

22 and can get their expectations tweaked 

23 accordingly, just about every minute that was 

24 before and after and between the meetings, the 

25 meeting of the Board next week, has pretty much 
58

1 been taken. So I just want to make sure you 

2 know that. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I understand that. 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Okay, ‘cause not every Board 

5 member has been involved with all of the 

6 discussions back and forth, and there are 

7 several times that are on hold and so until you 

8 hear a formal, get a formal announcement from 

9 Zaida about a work group meeting, understand 

10 that just about every cubbyhole of time has 

11 been eaten up. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Right, I appreciate that. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

14 MR. GRIFFON: The only other action that I 

15 would ask is for, and I guess we can’t really 

16 assign actions to the Department of Labor, but 

17 it would be appreciated, Jeff, if you could try 

18 to answer that question I had about how many 

19 cases are we, you know, during that time frame, 

20 how many cases are actually been left out of 

21 the SEC that obviously had a listed cancer but 

22 were left out for you know as a non-neutron 

23 worker, so to speak. 

24 MR. KOTSCH: I’ll see what I can do, Mark. 

25 MR. GRIFFON: And you can give us that maybe 
59

1 during your update or whatever. 

2 MR. KOTSCH: Right. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. All right, and I think 

4 that’s all I have. I appreciate everyone 

5 attending, and we’ll try to move the ball 

6 forward here on this. I know a lot of people 

7 have been concerned about this for a long time 

8 so we just want clarity on it and appreciate 

9 everybody helping out. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Thanks, folks. Thanks, Mark, but 

11 are you finished Mark? 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, that’s it. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Then that’s the formal close of 

14 our call. Thank you very much to everyone. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Thank you. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you. 

17 

18 

19 (Whereupon, the meeting was concluded at 3:45 

20 p.m.) 

21 

22 

23 
60

1 CERTIFICATE OF COURT REPORTER 

STATE OF GEORGIA 

COUNTY OF FULTON 

 I, Steven Ray Green, Certified Merit Court 

Reporter, do hereby certify that I reported the 

above and foregoing on the day of June 17, 

2008; and it is a true and accurate transcript 

of the testimony captioned herein. 

 I further certify that I am neither kin 

nor counsel to any of the parties herein, nor 

have any interest in the cause named herein. 

 WITNESS my hand and official seal this the 

18th day of June, 2008. 

___________________________________ 

STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR, CVR-CM, PNSC 

CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 

CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102