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U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 

PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY 

AND HEALTH 

+ + + + + 

ADVISORY BOARD ON RADIATION AND 

WORKER HEALTH 

MEETING 59 

+ + + + + 

THURSDAY, 

NOVEMBER 6, 2008 

+ + + + + 

 The Advisory Board meeting 

convened telephonically at 11:00 a.m., Dr. 

Paul Ziemer, Chair, presiding. 

MEMBERS PRESENT: 

PAUL ZIEMER, Chair 

JOSIE BEACH 

BRADLEY CLAWSON 

MICHAEL GIBSON 

MARK GRIFFON 

JAMES LOCKEY 

JAMES MELIUS 

WANDA MUNN 

ROBERT PRESLEY 

GENEVIEVE ROESSLER 

PHILLIP SCHOFIELD 
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ALSO PRESENT: 

NANCY ADAMS, NIOSH Contractor 

JANINE ANDERSON, Coalition for a Healthy 

 Environment 

BOB ANIGSTEIN, SC&A 

TERRIE BARRIE, ANWAG 

SHARON BLOCK, Office of Senator Ted Kennedy 

LARRY ELLIOTT, OCAS 

JOE FITZGERALD, SC&A 

STUART HINNEFELD, OCAS 

LIZ HOMOKI-TITUS, HHS 

EMILY HOWELL, HHS 

TED KATZ, Designated Federal Official 

JOYCE LIPSZTEIN, SC&A 

STEVE MARSCHKE, SC&A 

JOHN MAURO, SC&A 

JIM NETON, OCAS 

CHICK PHILLIPS, SC&A 

STEVE OSTROW, SC&A 

MATT PICKETT, Office of Representative 

 John Shimkus 

LAVON RUTHERFORD, OCAS 

DAVID STAUDT, CDC 

MIKE WASKI, Office of Senator Patty Murray 
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1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 

2 11:03 a.m. 

3 MR. KATZ: I am just going to run 

4 down the list alphabetically. So, Ms. Beach? 

5 MEMBER BEACH: I'm here. 

6 MR. KATZ: Mr. Clawson? 

7 MEMBER CLAWSON: I'm here. 

8 MR. KATZ: Mr. Gibson? 

9 MEMBER GIBSON: I'm here. 

10 MR. KATZ: Mr. Griffon? 

11 MEMBER GRIFFON: I'm here. 

12 MR. KATZ: Dr. Lockey? 

13 MEMBER MEMBER LOCKEY:: Here. 

14 MR. KATZ: Dr. Melius? 

15 (No response.) 

16 MR. KATZ: Okay. And Ms. Munn? 

17 MEMBER MUNN: Here. 

18 MR. KATZ: Dr. Poston's not 

19 available, for the record. Mr. Presley? 

20 MEMBER PRESLEY: Here. 

21 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Roessler? 

22 MEMBER ROESSLER: Here. 
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1 MR. KATZ: And Mr. Schofield? 

2 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: Here. 

3 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Ziemer? 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: Here. 

5 MR. KATZ: Okay and then let me -- 

6 I should probably -- we can go back and check 

7 and see if Jim's joined us, but what I'll next 

8 run through, since there is some participation 

9 by OCAS ORAU team and SC&A and run through 

10 those lists too. So, OCAS ORAU, who's on the 

11 line? 

12 MR. ELLIOT: Larry Elliot, the 

13 Director of OCAS is on the line. 

14 MR. HINNEFELD: Stu Hinnefeld. 

15 MR. NETON: Jim Neton, OCAS here. 

16 MR. RUTHERFORD: LaVon Rutherford, 

17 OCAS. 

18 MR. KATZ: And any ORAU members? 

19 (No response.) 

20 MR. KATZ: Okay then. And how 

21 about SC&A? 

22 MR. MAURO: John Mauro here, SC&A. 
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1 MR. FITZGERALD: Joe Fitzgerald. 

2 MR. ANIGSTEIN: Bob Anigstein, 

3 SC&A. 

4 MR. OSTROW: Steve Ostrow SC&A. 

5 MR. MARSCHKE: Steve Marschke. 

6 MR. PHILLIPS: Chick Phillips. 

7 MR. KATZ: I'm sorry, the last 

8 person we couldn't hear. 

9 MR. PHILLIPS: Chick Phillips, 

10 SC&A. 

11 MR. KATZ: Oh, Chick, welcome, Hi. 

12 MR. PHILLIPS: Thank you. 

13 MS. LIPSZTEIN: Joyce. 

14 CHAIR ZIEMER: I didn't catch that 

15 last one. 

16 MS. LIPSZTEIN: Joyce Lipsztein, 

17 SC&A. 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, Joyce. Okay. 

19 MR. KATZ: Joyce, welcome. Okay, 

20 it sounds like that does it for SC&A and then 

21 just also, let me check other NIOSH or HHS 

22 personnel. 
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1 MS. HOMOKI-TITUS: Liz Homoki-Titus 

2 with HHS. 

3 MS. HOWELL: Emily Howell, HHS. 

4 MR. STAUDT: David Staudt, CDC. 

5 MS. ADAMS: Nancy Adams, 

6 contractor, NIOSH. 

7 MR. KATZ: Okay. And then this is 

8 Ted Katz, the acting DFO and just remind 

9 everybody to use mute when you're not speaking 

10 and, Paul, it's all yours. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Did we double 

12 check, did Dr. Melius get -- 

13 MR. KATZ: Oh, I'm sorry. Thank 

14 you. Jim Melius? 

15 (No response.) 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, we do have a 

17 quorum so we will proceed. So I will 

18 officially call the meeting to order. This is 

19 meeting 59 of the Advisory Board on Radiation 

20 Worker Health. 

21 Welcome everybody. I think there 

22 are some members of the public on the line as 
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1 well. Janine Anderson identified herself. I 

2 don't know if there's any congressional people 

3 aboard. 

4 MR. WASKI: This is Mike Waski from 

5 Senator Patty Murray's Employment Workplace 

6 Safety Sub-Committee. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, very good. 

8 Thank you Mike. Any other congressional folks 

9 aboard? 

10 MS. BLOCK: Yes. Sharon Block from 

11 Senator Kennedy's office online. 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you, Sharon. 

13 MR. PICKETT: Matt Pickett with 

14 Congressman Shimkus' office. 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Very good. 

16 Any others? 

17 (No response.) 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you 

19 very much. Again, welcome everybody. I would 

20 like to make sure that everyone has a copy of 

21 the agenda. It was distributed to board 

22 members by e-mail and it appeared on the 
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1 website as well. So if you don't have a copy 

2 and need one, you should be able to go 

3 directly to the website and pick that up. 

4 We will proceed down through the 

5 agenda as it is given. There are no times 

6 certain on there so we'll just go as the 

7 agenda shows and take whatever time is needed 

8 for each item. 

9 Are there any questions or any 

10 board members that are in need of a copy of 

11 the agenda. Wanda, did you get a copy? 

12 MEMBER MUNN: Yes, I did, Paul. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Very good. 

14 MS. BARRIE: Dr. Ziemer, this is 

15 Terrie Barrie with ANWAG. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, Terrie, yes. 

17 Thank you. 

18 MS. BARRIE: How are you? Has 

19 there been any changes to the agenda? 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: I'm not aware of 

21 any. Let's see, let me ask Ted Katz what's 

22 the most recent version that went on to the 
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1 website and there were no changes, I do not 

2 think. 

3 MR. KATZ: Yes, I don't believe 

4 there's -- I mean, there's some details that 

5 may not be listed. I haven't lookED at what's 

6 on the website, frankly, but it's more or less 

7 as it's laid out. 

8 It's really, you know, we have, for 

9 members of the public and I'm sorry for not 

10 calling roll for all of you, but since there's 

11 no public comment session, I didn't do that. 

12 But we have a series of updates on ongoing 

13 activities and a variety of things that are 

14 almost of an administrative manner as well. 

15 But, I don't think -- there are no surprises 

16 in here on the agenda. 

17 MS. BARRIE: Okay. Thank you. 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. The first 

19 item after our roll call and the official 

20 opening of the meeting is a status on the 

21 CANEL SEC petition. I'll simply point out the 

22 board took action on this petition at its last 
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1 meeting, but one member was absent and, under 

2 our rules, we're required to get the vote of 

3 that individual. 

4 So, Ted, if you will give us an 

5 update on that recommendation. 

6 MR. KATZ: Right. Thank you, Dr. 

7 Ziemer. And you've already given us most of 

8 the update. 

9 Dr. Lockey, who was absent did vote 

10 afterwards according to procedure on September 

22nd 11 . He voted affirmatively in support of 

12 adding the Connecticut Aircraft Nuclear Engine 

13 Laboratory to the SEC and I wanted to make 

14 that a matter of record. 

15 And then also I should just note 

that on 10/24, October 24th 16 , the Secretary of 

17 HHS, Secretary Leavitt concurred with the 

18 NIOSH recommendation and the board 

19 recommendation and sent a designation to 

20 Congress to add this class. 

21 So that designation's sent to 

22 Congress. It has 30 days with Congress and 
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1 should, as long as Congress doesn't take any 

2 action, it becomes effective. So I assume 

November 24th 3 or thereabouts. 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you 

5 very much. Are there any questions on that 

6 petition? My recollection is that the vote to 

7 recommend, that was unanimous, if we include 

8 Dr. Lockey's vote. 

9 MR. KATZ: That's correct. It was 

10 unanimous. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much. 

12 Next we have -- 

13 MR. ELLIOT: Dr. Ziemer, this is 

14 Larry Elliot. 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. Larry. 

16 MR. ELLIOT: I would just make note 

17 for the board and for the public that this 

18 class designation will come to full maturity 

19 in the class that will be established later 

this month on the 23rd 20 I believe. 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. That's the 

22 cutoff date for congress to -- 
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1 MR. ELLIOT: That's correct. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: -- act if they wish 

3 to reverse. 

4 MR. ELLIOT: So we anticipate that 

5 the claims that are effected by this class 

6 will start being processed that following 

7 Monday. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much. 

9 Next, we're going to have an update on 

10 special exposure cohort petition status. That 

11 is all the numbers and the various actions and 

12 status of the various petitions. And LaVon 

13 Rutherford will provide that. LaVon, you're 

14 on the line I believe. 

15 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes, I am, Dr. 

16 Ziemer. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much. 

18 Go ahead. 

19 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. This will 

20 not be as detailed as the face-to-face 

21 advisory board meetings, but I'm going to give 

22 you an update on the petitions that are with 
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1 the advisory board awaiting recommendation, 

2 petitions that we plan to present at the 

3 December board meeting, petition evaluations 

4 that we anticipate we'll be presenting at the 

5 February board meeting and other petitions 

6 that are in the evaluation phase. 

7 Currently we have 10 petitions, 

8 actually we have 11 that are with the board 

9 for recommendation if you include the Dow 

10 addendum 2. 

11 We have Chapman Valve, the Feed 

12 Material Production Center, Bethlehem Steel, 

13 Hanford, Blockson Chemical, Pantex, Nevada 

14 Test Site, Texas City Chemical, Mound, Santa 

15 Susanna and again as I mentioned we have the 

16 Dow addendum 2, which addresses the residual 

17 period. 

18 Each one of those petition 

19 evaluations are with the board, with the 

20 various work groups with the board. 

21 At the December board meeting, we 

22 plan to present the Savannah River Site 
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1 evaluation that's for construction workers. 

2 The final report is in our office now and for 

3 final approval so that should go out soon. We 

4 do have to have a review that has to be 

5 completed on that by the Department of Energy. 

6 General Steel Industries, we have 

7 already issued that report and sent that to 

8 the petitioner of the board. And Linde 

9 Ceramics, all three of those are 83.13s. 

10 Linde Ceramics was approved yesterday. 

11 The petition evaluation went to the 

12 petitioner electronically this morning, it 

13 will go to the board electronically this 

14 afternoon and be FedExed out as well today. 

15 That Linde Ceramics evaluation addresses the 

16 residual period only. 

17 We have three 83.14s we plan to 

18 present at the board meeting in December. The 

19 Metallurgical Laboratory, that is the roughly 

20 1942 through 1946, Mallinckrodt, 1958 and the 

21 Vitro Manufacturing in Canonsburg. All three 

22 of those are 83.14s. The evaluations will be 
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1 out later this month. 

2 At the February board meeting we 

3 plan to present three, possibly four, 83.13s. 

4 Westinghouse Atomic Power Development, we 

5 have been back and forth with the Department 

6 of Labor on the covered activity at 

7 Westinghouse Atomic Power Development. We 

8 have come to a conclusion of covered activity 

9 for the period and we're moving forward with 

10 that 83.13 and we will be ready to present in 

11 February. 

12 Tyson Valley Powder Farm in St. 

13 Louis we will -- that report should be out no 

14 later than early December. Not quite soon 

15 enough to present at the December meeting, but 

16 will be out at that time. 

17 And then the Los Alamos National 

18 Lab, the report, we did not make the 180 days, 

19 we did extend beyond, but we will be ready for 

20 the February board meeting. 

21 Brookhaven National Lab, we again 

22 did not make the 180 days on that report. We 
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1 have had some difficulties retrieving data and 

2 getting data from the site. We are getting 

3 that data now and moving forward on that, but 

4 with the short period after the December board 

5 meeting and the holidays it will be a tight 

6 squeeze to whether we actually make the 

7 February board meeting. I should have a 

8 better answer on that within the next few 

9 weeks. 

10 We have one 83.14 we plan to 

11 present and that's the Hood Building in 

12 February. We have three other petitions that 

13 are in various stages of the evaluation 

14 process: United Nuclear Core Hematite, it 

15 qualified recently; Piqua Organic Moderated 

16 Reactor in Piqua, Ohio and Standard Oil 

17 Development Company of New Jersey. All three 

18 of those petitions recently were qualified for 

19 evaluation and we are moving forward with 

20 those evaluations. 

21 I know that recently we have had a 

22 few -- more than normal number of petitions 
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1 that have exceeded the 180 days. I'm going to 

2 briefly identify which ones those are and the 

3 reasons behind them. 

4 The Savannah River site, that was a 

5 petition where -- it's a petition where it was 

6 over a very large period of time, roughly 40 

7 or 50 years, a large site, a lot of data and 

8 due to the size and complexity of that, we 

9 were unable to complete that report within the 

10 180 days. We did let the board know that at a 

11 fairly early stage of that evaluation once it 

12 was recognized. 

13 Brookhaven National Lab, we have 

14 had trouble. This is a site where we had 

15 trouble initially getting the data and the 

16 information from the site. 

17 Over the last couple of months -- 

18 over the last month, month and a half, that 

19 has eased up and we are getting that 

20 information. However, it's still coming in 

21 and there's still a lot there. And so, 

22 there's information that has to be evaluated 
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1 and reviewed and data quality and so on that 

2 has slowed us down on the 180 days. 

3 Los Alamos National Lab, I think 

4 this is another site where we had difficulty 

5 getting the data. We -- Greg Lewis with the 

6 Department of Energy has worked very hard over 

7 the last month and we are getting a good 

8 response from the site now, but we did 

9 struggle for a period of time getting that 

10 information. 

11 General Steel Industries, that 

12 report was issued roughly a week after the 180 

13 days. We had worked hard to get that report 

14 out and had hoped to get it out on the Friday, 

15 which would have made the 180 days; however, 

16 we had a couple of minor comments that came 

17 that we had to resolve that forced us into the 

18 following week. 

19 Typically we try, as soon as it's 

20 recognized that we are not going to make the 

21 180 days on a report, we notify the 

22 petitioners, the board and our congressional 
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1 contacts to make them aware of that. With 

2 GSI, again, we were right up to the deadline 

3 and thought we were going to make it; however, 

4 we did notify the petitioner and the board on 

5 the Monday following that Friday that were 

6 weren't going to make it and we did get that 

7 report out that week. 

8 Linde Ceramics was a little 

9 different. Linde Ceramics, the petition was 

10 submitted, did not provide enough -- did not 

11 provide a good basis for qualification 

12 initially and did not provide good supporting 

13 documentation. 

14 After a roughly 30-day period, 30 

15 to 45-day period of back and forth with the 

16 petitioner, the petitioner came in with a new 

17 basis and new supporting documentation that 

18 ultimately qualified the petition. But 

19 roughly 60 days was lost in that process, that 

20 slowed us down. That report, again, was 

21 approved today -- or yesterday and is out. 

22 So we have had a few that have not 
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1 made the 180 days and I wanted to brief the 

2 board on the reasons behind those and 

3 hopefully we don't have any here in the 

4 future. And that's pretty much it for my 

5 summary update. Any questions? 

6 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much, 

7 LaVon. Just for clarification, the Metallurgy 

8 Lab, is that the U of Chicago facility? 

9 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes, it is. 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. And the Hood 

11 Building is -- 

12 MR. RUTHERFORD: MIT. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: MIT. Okay. 

14 MR. RUTHERFORD: Actually, if you 

15 remember, Dr. Ziemer, we had went forward with 

16 a report, evaluation report on MIT and the 

17 Department of Labor sent us a letter reminding 

18 us, well actually, pointing out that the Hood 

19 Building was a separate designation than the 

20 MIT facility. 

21 Although they're listed under the 

22 DOE facility database, under the same heading, 
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1 they're separate designations and we can't 

2 move forward with an SEC class for two, two 

3 facilities for one class. And so we're moving 

4 forward with the Hood Building. The MIT 

5 facility, we do not have a qualified 

6 petitioner at this time. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. So the Hood 

8 Building, although it's part of the MIT will 

9 be a separate action; is that correct? 

10 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. Board 

12 members, any questions on the information from 

13 LaVon? 

14 MEMBER MELIUS: No. This is Jim 

15 Melius, I'm on now. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, Jim. Thank you. 

17 We note that you're aboard. 

18 MR. KATZ: Yes. 

19 MR. RUTHERFORD: Jim, Dr. Melius, 

20 your being on reminded me, at the last board 

21 meeting, when we were discussing CANEL, one of 

22 the questions that we brought up was the issue 
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1 of potential additional covered work or 

2 covered employment at the site because of 

3 dismantlement activities. 

4 We have provided all of our 

5 references that support that dismantlement 

6 activity to the Department of Labor and sent a 

7 letter to them, so we are following up on that 

8 action. 

9 MEMBER MELIUS: Okay. Thanks a 

10 lot. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Any other 

12 questions, board members, on the updates of 

13 the SEC petition, status of these various 

14 ones? 

15 LaVon, on the Linde one, I just 

16 want to give us a heads up because we have a 

17 response letter to Senators Schumer and 

18 Clinton and Representative Slaughter that 

19 we'll be looking at later, it concerns Linde 

20 and we'll probably have to make an appropriate 

21 modification. 

22 But just for the record, can you 
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1 tell us the status of the period before the 

2 residual period? 

3 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes, I can. 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: The years, I believe 

5 they are `47 to `53. 

6 MR. RUTHERFORD: That's correct. 

7 It's at the end of `53. Yes, that was that we 

8 received a petition a while back that was for 

9 that period. We did not qualify the petition 

10 because the petition basis was not met. 

11 The petition basis surrounded 

12 monitoring data and we had monitoring data 

13 that that petition, the petitioner requested 

14 an administrative review, it went through the 

15 administrative review team. 

16 The administrative review team 

17 reviewed the information and concurred with 

18 OCAS's findings that it did not, or that we 

19 had followed the process properly and it did 

20 not qualify. 

21 At that time, we received from the 

22 petitioner a letter that indicated that they 
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1 felt that there was a classified document that 

2 included the information that supported that 

3 Belgian Congo ore was processed at Linde 

4 during the `43 to `44, 1943 to `44 period. 

5 Even though we had completed the 

6 administrative review and effectively could 

7 have closed the petition, we committed to the 

8 petitioner that we would go back and look at 

9 that document and we indicated that if that 

10 document supported a reason, whether it was a 

11 reason the petitioner provided or not, a 

12 reason for qualification, we would qualify the 

13 petition and move forward. 

14 We contacted the Department of 

15 Energy in Germantown, we supplied the 

16 Department of Energy in Germantown a list of 

17 questions that focused around what types of 

18 ore were processed during the period, whereas 

19 Belgian Congo or the 65% percent Belgian Congo 

20 processed. 

21 We asked a number of questions and 

22 based on the answers to those questions, they 
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1 came back and it was no, that it was not 

2 processed at Linde. We do know that the 

3 material was there and that there was roughly, 

4 I can't remember, around 2,000 pounds of the 

5 material was at the site, but the material was 

6 never processed, it was there. 

7 They had anticipated possibly 

8 processing it, but tests and experiments that 

9 were done by Electromet, I guess did not 

10 support putting that into the process, so they 

11 did not do that. So we concluded that the 

12 classified document did not provide new 

13 information that would support qualifying the 

14 petition. 

15 I also pointed out to the 

16 petitioner that the period that the Belgian 

17 Congo ore was at Linde was already a SEC -- a 

18 currently covered SEC class. We had a class 

19 at Linde that covers up to 1947 and we do have 

20 documentation that the material was not onsite 

21 after 1946. 

22 So that gives you a little update. 
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1 We have not -- we did send a letter recently 

2 back to the petitioner indicating that the new 

3 information did not support qualifying for 

4 that period. 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. That's 

6 very helpful. When we get down in the agenda 

7 to that point I want to make sure that the 

8 words we include in the letter, and I may want 

9 to add a sentence or two about the period from 

10 `47 to `53, that we correctly characterize 

11 that. 

12 So we'll come back to the Linde 

13 issue in a little bit. Board members, any 

14 other questions? 

15 (No response.) 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: If there are none, 

17 we are going to proceed with updates from the 

18 various work groups as well as the dose 

19 reconstruction subcommittee. And I think 

20 probably we will start with the subcommittee 

21 and then Ted, if you will do it sort of by 

22 roll call, take us through the various work 
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1 groups and we'll hear from the chairs of each 

2 of the work groups. 

3 MEMBER GRIFFON: Do you want me to 

4 go first? This is Mark Griffon. 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, Mark, do you 

6 want to begin with the dose reconstruction 

7 subcommittee and then we'll move to the work 

8 groups? 

9 MEMBER GRIFFON: Sure. Sure. This 

10 will be a very brief one. The subcommittee 

11 hasn't met since the last board meeting. We 

do have a meeting planned for December 8th 12 , I 

believe, yes December 8th 13 in Cincinnati and 

14 I'll be prepared to give a full report at the 

board meeting, you know, on the 16th 15 through 

the 18th 16 . 

17 But the topics for discussion at 

18 that, we're just going to continue on with our 

19 sets of cases. I think we're on matrix items 

20 six, seven and eight -- will be on the agenda. 

21 Additionally, the first 100 cases 

22 letter will be discussed also at that meeting. 
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1 We had a preliminary draft that was put out 

2 and I asked for some feedback from some of the 

3 subcommittee members and I think we're going 

4 to further work on editing that letter at the 

December 8th 5 meeting. 

6 And that's the only updated point 

7 at this point for the subcommittee. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. Board 

9 members, any questions for Mark? 

10 (No response.) 

11 MR. KATZ: Okay then -- 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Before we leave 

13 that, just one other point. I'll simply 

14 indicate to the board members that I 

15 distributed to you within the last few days, a 

16 copy of a letter that came from the Secretary 

17 via CDC basically acknowledging the last 

18 report on the cases 61 through 100, just as a 

19 matter of record. And a copy of that letter 

20 was distributed to all board members. 

21 Okay, let's proceed. 

22 MR. KATZ: Okay then, let's go 
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1 alphabetically. Blockson Chemical, Ms. Munn? 

2 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. The Blockson 

3 work group met in Cincinnati face-to-face on 

October 15th 4 . We had had very specific 

5 instructions from the full board as a result 

6 of our presentations there during the previous 

7 meeting. 

8 We were instructed to focus 

9 specifically on the radon issue, which was the 

10 first item of our agenda. We spent a 

11 significant amount of time on that and also 

12 reviewed the bounding value determination. 

13 We visited the surrogate daily use 

14 issues, talked about the co-worker model, 

15 identified the assumptions that were used for 

16 coverage of the maintenance workers and 

17 discussed the data quality concerns. 

18 The meeting lasted most of the day. 

19 We had one or two technical items that were 

20 going to be discussed further by SC&A and 

21 NIOSH prior to our upcoming December meeting. 

22 We had agreed that that technical exchange 
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1 would occur sometime in the very near future 

2 now. 

3 If I had been notified of that, 

4 it's occurred during the last 48 hours while 

5 my computer system is down. So far as I know 

6 we are in the process of establishing a date 

7 for that now. It is hoped that the entire 

8 work group will be able to have one final 

9 telephone call of the work group itself to 

10 discuss the information that's exchanged in 

11 that technical exchange that's ongoing and 

12 that we will have a report for the December 

13 meeting. 

14 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you 

15 very much. Any questions? 

16 (No response.) 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, let's proceed. 

18 MR. KATZ: Okay, then it's -- well 

19 the next is Chapman Valve and Dr. Poston isn't 

20 with us. Mark, can you fill in? 

21 MEMBER GRIFFON: Sure. I can take 

22 a stab at it. I know we have not had a work 
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1 group meeting on Chapman Valve since the last 

2 meeting. I do remember as they left and I 

3 might want to go back to the record for the 

4 exact action items, but we did ask NIOSH to 

5 follow up on certain things. 

6 One was the question about the 

7 naval operations and second was whether there 

8 was any reports or if they could contact the 

9 company that was involved in the actual 

10 cleanup of the site to see if there's any 

11 records -- any discussions. 

12 Mainly, both the reasons for those 

13 were to pursue this question of the enriched 

14 uranium, the possible use of enriched uranium 

15 and the timing of that on the site. So I 

16 think that was where we left it. 

17 I don't know if John has heard 

18 anything back from NIOSH, but we haven't had 

19 another meeting yet and we were kind of 

20 waiting, I think, until we had some more new 

21 information to be discussed, otherwise there 

22 wasn't a need for a meeting. 
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1 MR. ELLIOT: This is Larry Elliot, 

2 if I can. 

3 MEMBER GRIFFON: Sure. 

4 MR. ELLIOT: I'm offering a comment 

5 here that might help inform. Yes, we took an 

6 action item for NIOSH to attempt to see if we 

7 could get the Department of Defense to give us 

8 some feedback on questions about what 

9 Department of Defense activities might have 

10 occurred at Chapman Valve that could have 

11 resulted in this enriched uranium sample 

12 that's been the subject of conversation and 

13 debate. 

14 We have advanced that issue to the 

15 Department of Defense and we have not yet 

16 heard back from them. We had one exchange for 

17 clarification and we provided that 

18 clarification, but we have not received 

19 anything further at this time. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: So we are awaiting a 

21 reply from DOD and depending on what that is, 

22 the work group then can proceed. Any 
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1 questions or comments? 

2 (No response.) 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. 

4 MR. KATZ: Okay. Fernald site, 

5 then, by Clawson. 

6 MEMBER GIBSON: Ted, this is Mike. 

7 Could I interrupt for just a minute? 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: You bet. Mike 

9 Gibson. 

10 MEMBER GIBSON: Yes, I just got an 

11 e-mail from Dan McKeel that looks like it's 

12 addressed to Paul, Ted and the board that he 

13 tried to call into this conference call and it 

14 says that it's reached capacity and he 

15 wondered if more ports can be made available. 

16 MR. KATZ: Mike, thank you for 

17 that. Let me check into that. 

18 MEMBER GIBSON: Okay. Thanks. 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: Mike, would you mind 

20 if you have your e-mail open, could you reply 

21 to Dan and indicate that we are trying to see 

22 about opening more ports? 
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1 MEMBER GIBSON: Yes, I'll do that. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much. 

3 

4 MR. KATZ: I'm sorry, I'm going to 

5 have to just take a 30 second break to do 

6 that. But I'll be right back with you. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Well, let's 

8 go ahead with the Fernald site. Brad Clawson, 

9 if you want to report? 

10 MEMBER CLAWSON: Okay. Can you 

11 hear me okay? 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Sure. 

13 MEMBER CLAWSON: Okay. We met the 

28th 14 of this month, we're proceeding on -- 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Well actually last 

month, right? October 28th 16 ? 

17 MEMBER CLAWSON: Yes, well I guess 

we are into the next month. Yes, the 28th 18 of 

19 last month, the Fernald work group met in 

20 Cincinnati. We've got several issues that 

21 we're looking into. 

22 SC&A has provided that they're 
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1 going to do sampling plan force at this 

2 meeting we reconstructed a little bit and made 

3 it more clear what we wanted to be able to get 

4 out of that. We're still dealing with several 

5 issues, the radon issues, they're looking into 

6 the Tiger Team reports back in those areas. 

7 They're also looking at the co8 worker data model that's going to be used on 

9 the O: drive. We're still just proceeding on 

10 forward. We've got -- each side's got several 

11 things that they're working on and we're just 

12 proceeding forward. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

14 Questions for Brad or comments? 

15 (No response.) 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. 

17 MR. KATZ: Okay, I'm back with you. 

18 Let me just note, I hope someone would send 

19 an e-mail to Dr. McKeel because we have 50 

20 ports and it's hard for me imagine that there 

21 are 50 people listening in, although I've 

22 asked for them to expand the ports regardless, 
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1 but there should be enough ports already. 

2 MEMBER MELIUS: Ted, when I signed 

3 in which was a little bit late, I was told I 

was the 50th 4 caller. 

5 MR. KATZ: Oh, okay. Well there 

6 you have it then. I've asked for them to 

7 expand it. Thank you Jim. 

8 MR. KATZ: Okay, so let's move on 

9 then -- 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: That was Fernald, 

11 let's proceed. 

12 MR. KATZ: To Hanford site profile 

13 and that's you, Dr. Melius. 

14 MEMBER MELIUS: Yes. The work 

15 group hasn't met. I actually just got an 

16 update from NIOSH about some of their recent 

17 activities and we also have had a, sort of an 

18 internal report from SC&A looking at some of 

19 the neutron issues and I think we're -- we 

20 need to resolve some of the data access issues 

21 which we're working on now in terms of getting 

22 some information to -- so SC&A can review it. 
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1 So I think probably -- I don't 

2 expect any work group meetings until at least 

3 until the December meeting, but we will be 

4 active in terms of reviewing the SEC issues 

5 there. 

6 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

7 Questions? 

8 (No response.) 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, let's proceed. 

10 Ted, are you still there? We lost Ted there 

11 temporarily, I guess. Let me look at, to get 

12 the work group list here before me and see 

13 who's next here. He was doing them 

14 alphabetically I think. 

15 MS. BARRIE: Yes, he was. Just 

16 finished Hanford. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: That was Hanford, 

18 let's see. I think Los Alamos then is next, 

19 Mark? 

20 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes, Los Alamos is 

21 next. And I think LaVon just gave my update. 

22 They -- we're waiting for the LANL evaluation 
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1 report and as soon as we get that we're going 

2 to reconvene the work group on LANL. So 

3 there's no update on this at this point. 

4 MR. KATZ: I'm sorry. It's Ted, I 

5 was somehow -- I don't know if it's this port 

6 problem, but I was dropped and I'm back. 

7 You've already -- did you just get through INL 

8 and LANL? 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. We're ready 

10 for Linde Ceramics. 

11 MR. KATZ: We're ready for Mound, 

12 right? 

13 MEMBER MUNN: You didn't do INL; 

14 did you? 

15 MR. KATZ: We don't have a work 

16 group for -- we did LANL, next would be Mound; 

17 right? 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Well, Linde work 

19 group actually finished their task, I believe 

20 is the case, right? 

21 MEMBER MUNN: Right. 

22 MR. KATZ: Right. Right. So next 
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1 is Mound, Ms. Beach? 

2 MEMBER BEACH: Yes. The Mound work 

group last met face-to-face on October 27th 3 . 

4 SC&A reported on several issues. The work 

5 group is making progress and plans to schedule 

6 two technical calls between NIOSH and SC&A on 

7 the Plutonium-238 issue and neutrons. 

8 And hopefully we're going to have 

9 those scheduled before the end of this year. 

10 I also hope to be ready to schedule the next 

11 work group meeting right at the first of 2009. 

12 That's all I have. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

14 Questions or comments? 

15 (No response.) 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. 

17 MR. KATZ: Okay, the Nevada Test 

18 Site, Bob Presley. 

19 MEMBER PRESLEY: Okay. The Nevada 

Test Site met on the 29th 20 , all members were 

21 present either there in person or by phone. 

22 SC&A had turned in their comment evaluation on 
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1 the occupational internal or environmental 

2 dose. That was discussed at length by SC&A 

3 and NIOSH. 

4 We are presently waiting for some 

5 comments back from NIOSH. Also, there was an 

6 internal dosimetry data document that SC&A had 

7 prepared and that was also discussed in full. 

8 We're waiting on NIOSH's comment on that. 

9 I think that the NTS working group 

10 is moving forward. I believe there's some 

11 hope for us now. We will schedule a working 

12 group somewhere around the first of the year 

13 when NIOSH has a chance to make their comments 

14 and then get back to the working group. So, 

15 that's my report. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you, Robert. 

17 Again questions or comments? 

18 (No response.) 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. 

20 MR. KATZ: Okay. Before we go on, 

21 let me just make a note. If someone has Dr. 

22 McKeel's e-mail handy, and if he hasn't been 
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1 able to join us, we added 20 ports, so he 

2 should be able to now. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Mike, did you try -- 

4 Mike Gibson, did you try e-mailing Dr. McKeel? 

5 DR. MCKEEL: This is Dan McKeel, 

6 I'm on. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, Dan, you're on. 

 DR. MCKEEL: Okay, I was the 50th 8 

9 port joining at 11:30 and I missed all of 

10 LaVon's presentation. So I'm really very 

11 unhappy about that, but I'll turn it back. 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, and LaVon if 

13 you wouldn't mind at the end of the meeting, 

14 could you send Dr. McKeel a summary of what 

15 you presented? 

16 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes, there's no 

17 problem. I'll send that. 

18 MR. KATZ: Okay. And we apologize 

19 on that. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: We'll try to get you 

21 updated, Dr. McKeel, as quickly as we can. 

22 MR. KATZ: I don't know if we've 
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1 ever broached 50 before, but in the future we 

2 will have more ports for these calls. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Dr. McKeel, 

4 we'll try to get you that information as 

5 rapidly as we can here. 

6 DR. MCKEEL: Thank you very much. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Then let's 

8 see, where are we on -- 

9 MR. KATZ: We're on Pantex and 

10 that's Brad Clawson. 

11 MEMBER CLAWSON: Yes. Pantex work 

12 group, if you remember right, we just formed 

13 that last time. We're in the process -- and I 

14 believe you were assisting us with this, Ted, 

15 to be able to set up a meeting to be able to 

16 discuss how we're going to be able to handle 

17 this with the amount of classified material 

18 and so forth. As of yet, we have not been 

19 able to meet. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Any 

21 questions, board members? 

22 (No response.) 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, let's proceed. 

2 MR. KATZ: Okay. We have Pinellas, 

3 Phil? 

4 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: Yes. Pinellas, 

5 we're waiting on the review by DOE on OTIB-66 

6 on the metal tritides. Until that issue is 

7 kind of cleared up, we're not going to do 

8 anything to that. Hopefully that will be done 

9 soon and we will be able to proceed then with 

10 some guidance from DOE. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Did they provide any 

12 rough estimate of when that would be 

13 available? Are we talking about a few weeks? 

14 Any indication -- 

15 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: No idea on that, 

16 when it will actually be ready at this point. 

17 MR. KATZ: If I may, I mean, John 

18 Mauro may correct me if I'm wrong, but I 

19 believe I've heard from John recently that 

20 this is in the works and coming soon, I think. 

21 MR. MAURO: Yes, this is John 

22 Mauro. Yes, Ted, I've been told Joe 
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1 Fitzgerald is our point man working with 

2 Regina and he's been in touch with her on this 

3 matter. And I guess I was left with the 

4 impression that we're really close to getting 

5 that cleared. 

6 MR. FITZGERALD: Yes, this is Joe. 

7 That was held up at Hanford. I had it 

8 transferred to DOE headquarters. It's with 

9 headquarters now for about a week, a little 

10 over a week, so we expect to get that back 

11 within a week or so. 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. That's 

13 helpful. So then, Phil, your group can plan 

14 accordingly. 

15 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: Thank you. 

16 Appreciate that update there. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Let's 

18 proceed. 

19 MR. KATZ: Okay. Procedures 

20 review, Wanda? 

21 MEMBER MUNN: Procedures met in 

Cincinnati on October 14th 22 and spent a full day 
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1 going through the outstanding items that we 

2 have. We have now fully transferred our 

3 activities to electronic means and it seems to 

4 be working quite well. 

5 We spent a considerable amount of 

6 time discussing what the proper protocols were 

7 for some of the handling of electronic 

8 material, since that's a new process that 

9 we're feeling our way through, trying to 

10 establish, so that it will be workable for all 

11 involved. 

12 We are particularly concerned about 

13 the number and security of electronic links 

14 that we are incorporating into the database as 

15 we go along to clarify some of the decisions 

16 and comments that are made in the database 

17 proper. 

18 We feel we're making reasonable 

19 progress with this. Procedures, of course, by 

20 its very nature is going to be ongoing 

21 throughout the entire life of this board. So 

22 we are pleased that we've been able to 
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1 accomplish what we have so far insofar as 

2 collaborating with all of the entities 

3 involved to make this database what we feel it 

4 needs to be. 

5 We had assumed, and it appears to 

6 be the case, that other work groups and 

7 committees will be undertaking the use of this 

8 same type of format as we go forward. We have 

9 another meeting scheduled, prior to the 

10 December meeting, tentatively scheduled. 

11 We had not seen the agenda at that 

12 time and we're not sure that we could have the 

13 time available to us to do that. But at this 

14 moment, it is our expectation that we will 

15 meet again just prior to the December meeting 

16 that's upcoming. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you, Wanda. 

18 And let me make a note here that I believe Mr. 

19 Presley is trying to help us arrange for a 

20 site tour of the Savannah River Site also 

21 prior to that meeting. So we need to 

22 coordinate those activities. 
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1 MEMBER MUNN: We'll try to do that 

2 offline. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Robert, can you tell 

4 us what the plans are there or is it too early 

5 to say? 

6 MEMBER PRESLEY: Well, it's really 

7 too early. I got an e-mail message back just 

8 a few minutes ago and I forwarded it on to 

9 Ted, that their group that does the tours will 

10 be contacting me, hopefully today. And we 

11 have asked them to set the tour up for either 

the morning of the 15th 12 -- I'm sorry, the 

afternoon of the 15th 13 or the morning of the 

19th 14 . 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Just prior to or 

16 just following our -- 

17 MEMBER PRESLEY: Prior to or -- 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: -- actual board 

19 session? 

20 MEMBER PRESLEY: Right, yes. 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. 

22 MEMBER PRESLEY: So that's where we 
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1 stand. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. 

3 MEMBER MUNN: And procedures had 

4 discussed the possibility of meeting that 

morning of the 15th 5 . So we'll reconsider what 

6 our possibilities are, once we know what the 

7 tour schedule's going to be. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: And let me add to 

9 that, that it will be important for us to 

10 resolve that fairly fast because people making 

11 both flight arrangements and hotel 

12 arrangements for that meeting, it may be 

13 effected by that schedule. For example, if 

14 your work group is meeting that morning, folks 

15 may need to come in a day earlier than they 

16 otherwise would have planned. 

17 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. We will have to 

18 look at the overall schedule. And Bob 

19 Presley, when you get information, if you send 

20 it electronically and do not get a response 

21 from me, I would appreciate your calling me 

22 with that information, since I'm not sure how 
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1 long our system's going to be down. 

2 MEMBER PRESLEY: We can handle 

3 that. 

4 MEMBER MUNN: Thank you so much. 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: One other comment 

6 let me make concerning procedures review, you 

7 may recall this particular work group we have 

8 recommended it be transformed to the sub9 committee status and I'd like to ask Ted if he 

10 can -- or perhaps Liz could give us a comment 

11 on where that stands, or Emily? 

12 MR. KATZ: I can give you a comment 

13 on that, which is it's sitting in my hands, 

14 but it hasn't moved forward yet. So it's not 

15 going to take long to implement once I get to 

16 it. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, okay. That 

18 doesn't effect, in a sense, the committees or 

19 the work group's ability to operate, it's 

20 simply -- once it takes effect will impact how 

21 the meetings are announced. 

22 MR. KATZ: Yes, it will impact that 
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1 and it will require sort of scheduling further 

2 out too because there's a time -- a required 

3 time frame for making public notice at the 

4 Federal Register. 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: -- Federal Register 

6 announcements, right. 

7 MEMBER MUNN: We should be able to 

8 adapt to that in view of the fact that there 

9 is seldom much leeway in terms of how long the 

10 meeting is going to last, which is a common 

11 unknown for work groups, but in this 

12 particular case, virtually any meeting that we 

13 have is going to be a full day meeting. So we 

14 can handle that. 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. Let's 

16 proceed. 

17 MR. KATZ: Okay, then we have Rocky 

18 Flats. Mark? 

19 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes. Just a short 

20 update on Rocky Flats. I mean, the only item 

21 that's outstanding for the Rocky Flats work 

22 group, well, other than the site profile items 
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1 is related to the SEC, the only item 

2 outstanding is question on the implementation 

3 of the class and specifically the protocol for 

4 identifying who was monitored or should have 

5 been monitored for neutron exposures. I think 

6 people remember that. 

7 Where we stand right now is that 

8 NIOSH is working with the University of 

9 Colorado and I think they've at least been 

10 talking with Margaret Ruttenburg about the 

11 data she has versus the database that they 

12 have. 

13 I'm not sure, actually I think that 

14 the transfer of the physical database hasn't 

15 occurred yet, but hopefully it's going to 

16 happen soon. We just want to make sure that 

17 we're not talking past each other. There 

18 remains some concerns and we want to make sure 

19 that these databases are consistent and look 

20 at that from that angle. 

21 And I don't know if, Larry Elliot, 

22 if you can maybe give an update on your 
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1 progress with the University of Colorado folks 

2 on -- am I characterizing that correctly, 

3 Larry, or -- 

4 MR. ELLIOT: Yes. Mark, this is 

5 Larry. Yes, you have it correct. I don't 

6 know that I can add much at this time, simply 

7 awaiting a letter from Margaret Ruttenburg 

8 that will, I hope, effect the full transfer of 

9 the information to us. And we have had 

10 conversations, as you indicate, between her 

11 and technical staff here about ways to make 

12 comparisons and better understand the data 

13 sets that she has versus those that we have. 

14 MEMBER GRIFFON: So we are going to 

15 stay on this item, but we really need that 

16 data to review and we're going to get that 

17 hopefully as soon as we can and follow up on 

18 that. And that's the only update I have at 

19 this time. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

21 Questions or comments for Mark? 

22 (No response.) 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Then let's proceed. 

2 MR. KATZ: Okay. Santa Susanna, 

3 Mike Gibson? 

4 MEMBER GIBSON: Okay. Nothing new 

5 to report right now. Would still like to try 

6 to get a work group meeting scheduled in that 

7 area, if we can work it around everyone's 

8 holiday schedules and the upcoming board 

9 meeting. If not, we'll shoot for right after 

10 the first of the year. So that's about it. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. So you'll 

12 work with Ted in finding a suitable date. 

13 MEMBER GIBSON: Right. 

14 MR. KATZ: Okay. Savannah River 

15 Site, Mark? 

16 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes, this is my 

17 same update as for LANL. LaVon just gave a 

18 report, it looks like we're going to have the 

19 Savannah evaluation report soon. Is that 

20 correct, LaVon? 

21 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes, that's 

22 correct, Mark. It should be out after the 
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1 review by DOE within the next 10 to 14 days. 

2 MEMBER GRIFFON: So my proposal is 

3 that, at the next board meeti,ng we'll set a 

4 date to have our work group meet shortly after 

5 the next board meeting, probably early next 

6 year, is what it amounts to. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

8 MR. KATZ: Okay, SEC issues, Dr. 

9 Melius. Jim? 

10 MEMBER MELIUS: Yes. The SEC 

11 evaluation work group has a meeting scheduled 

in Cincinnati on November 17th 12 to discuss two 

13 issues. One is the 250-day issue and the 

14 second issue is the Dow SEC report and so 

we'll have that on the 17th 15 and report on those 

16 at the December board meeting, I suspect. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Very good. 

18 Questions for Jim? 

19 (No response.) 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Go ahead. 

21 MR. KATZ: Dr. Ziemer, you're up 

22 now for TBD-6000. 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. TBD-6000, 

2 6001 our work group will be meeting next week 

on November 10th 3 . We have just, this past 

4 week, received the dosimetry report, basically 

5 white paper from NIOSH. I do have once 

6 concern on that and that's undergoing review 

7 for -- it's currently still, I believe the 

8 review has not been completed for 

9 confidentiality so that report has not yet 

10 been made available to the petitioner. 

11 So I wonder if Larry or Stu or Jim 

12 can kind of tell us if there's any change on 

13 that, because I know the petitioners would 

14 certainly like to have that before our work 

15 group meeting. 

16 MR. ELLIOT: I'm sorry, Dr. Ziemer, 

17 I was -- could you restate your question 

18 again. 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: The white paper on 

20 the film dosimetry at General Steel 

21 Industries. I think the work group members 

22 just received that this past week, but it's 
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1 still undergoing confidentiality review and 

2 the petitioners have not yet received it. 

3 MR. ELLIOT: Right. We're working 

4 toward providing that to the petitioners in 

5 advance of your meeting and I think we'll be 

6 successful in that. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Because today 

8 is Thursday and the meeting is coming up this 

9 Monday. 

10 MR. ELLIOT: Sure. I understand. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: So, they will not 

12 have too much time to review it, but at least 

13 we'll have it in hand. SC&A is also -- has a 

14 copy of that and looking at that. They are 

15 hoping to have some responses to that by the 

16 time of the meeting. John Mauro, can you give 

17 us any update on that? 

18 MR. MAURO: Yes. Good morning, 

19 everyone. Yes, we received the document, we 

20 are reviewing it. We do plan on issuing, I 

21 guess what we've called a white paper. My 

22 guess is, that won't be done until the end of 
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1 the day tomorrow though. I try to address as 

2 many of the issues in the white paper as 

3 possible. 

4 I suspect it's going to make it 

5 very difficult to have that PA cleared. But 

6 we will try to have in the hands of the work 

7 group and NIOSH our initial response to the 

8 white paper and various issues. 

9 We're also in the process of 

10 reviewing the white paper, we're also 

11 reviewing the evaluation report. It turns 

12 out, it's very helpful -- is additional 

13 information in the evaluation report that's 

14 also very relevant to these discussions over 

15 and above the material that's in the white 

16 paper. 

17 So right now, we are prepared -- we 

18 will be prepared to discuss all these matters 

19 at our meeting on Monday. We are hoping to 

20 have some paper, white paper in the hands of 

21 NIOSH and the work group tomorrow. Whether or 

22 not that provides sufficient time for it to be 
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1 PA-cleared, that's another question. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. I'm guessing 

3 that that's going to be very difficult for 

4 that to occur. So we'll be operating under a 

5 bit of a handicap there as far as the 

6 petitioners are concerned. But at least I 

7 think we can have our initial discussions on 

8 both the white paper on the evaluation report 

9 and begin to define some of the issues. 

10 I'm personally not expecting us to 

11 be ready to make any formal recommendation to 

12 the board at the time of the December meeting 

13 as far as the evaluation report is concerned 

14 because of the status of where we are on these 

15 documents. 

16 But at least between the board and 

17 its contractor and NIOSH and the petitioners, 

18 I'm hopeful we'll be able to frame the issues 

19 sufficiently that we can move forward. So, 

20 let me ask if there's any questions on that. 

21 DR. MCKEEL: Dr. Ziemer, this is 

22 Dan McKeel. 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Sure, Dan. 

2 DR. MCKEEL: May I please mention 

3 that from the petitioner's point of view, the 

4 most urgent thing to take place, which has not 

5 taken place is to have a dispute resolution 

6 process between SC&A, which has 13 findings 

7 about Appendix BB indicating that their belief 

8 was that NIOSH had seriously underestimated 

9 the doses at GSI. 

10 And it seems to the petitioners 

11 that that matter should take precedence 

12 certainly over the evaluation of the SEC 

13 petition, which came much later. And this 

14 white paper, I sent you all an e-mail 

15 reminding everybody that I alerted the board, 

16 SC&A, NIOSH to the existence of that data more 

17 than two years ago. 

18 And so I really think the order 

19 that the documents for GSI, which are about 20 

20 actually, should at least include a discussion 

21 first of those 13 SC&A findings. 

22 CHAIR ZIEMER: Oh, yes, Dan, and 
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1 thank you for mentioning that because that 

2 certainly is going to be on the agenda. 

3 DR. MCKEEL: Okay. 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: We do have the 

5 findings, the SC&A findings and that will be 

6 on the agenda for discussion as well. 

7 DR. MCKEEL: Good. Okay, thank 

8 you. 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: I brought this other 

10 up because of the issue of getting things 

11 cleared regarding that white paper, but that 

12 will be on the agenda and I appreciate you 

13 reminding us of that. 

14 DR. MCKEEL: Thank you. 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Any other questions 

16 or comments? 

17 (No response.) 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you, 

19 next? 

20 MR. KATZ: Okay. Before I go to 

21 the next, John Mauro, if you'll talk to me 

22 offline about the Privacy Act issue with this 
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1 -- sort of your response document, just in 

2 case we can do something. 

3 MR. MAURO: Sure. 

4 MR. KATZ: Thank you. 

5 MR. MAURO: As soon as it's ready, 

6 I planned on as soon as it's prepared, we will 

7 be distributing it. And of course, 

8 immediately we can work together and try to 

9 get it cleared. 

10 MR. KATZ: Okay. Thanks, John. 

11 Now we're up to surrogate data, Dr. Melius. 

12 Jim? 

13 MEMBER MELIUS: Yes. We circulated 

14 our draft report on the evaluation surrogate 

15 data to the board around the time of the last 

16 meeting, I believe. I can't remember exactly 

17 when. I'm waiting to hear back from board 

18 members. That's where we stand. 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Any 

20 questions? Let me ask the board members and 

21 remind the board members of that document and 

22 ask that you reply to Jim and I myself, I'm 
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1 speaking not only to the choir, but to the 

2 choir director here. I owe Jim a comment, 

3 too. 

4 And Jim, I have my comments ready 

5 and Im going to transmit them here, hopefully 

6 today. But I want the other board members to 

7 be sure to look at that document. I'm trying 

8 to look for the date that you distributed it. 

9 The document itself, incidently does not have 

10 a date on it, but it's called Criteria for the 

11 Use of Surrogate Data. 

12 And I think at this point we will 

13 consider it a draft, although keep in mind 

14 that it's being used or tried already, I 

15 believe, for the -- was it for the Texas City 

16 site? 

17 MR. MAURO: Dr. Melius, this is 

18 John Mauro. Yes, we tried it out both at the 

19 Texas City and for Blockson. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Right. But the 

21 board has not officially adopted these 

22 criteria so we do need to get this in final 
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1 form and perhaps it's sort of trial use and 

2 those sites will help us see if we've 

3 addressed all the issues, but we still need to 

4 formalize it sort of independently of any 

5 particular site. So I ask you to make your 

6 comments. 

7 MEMBER ROESSLER: Hello, this is 

8 Gen. I think that e-mail came through on 

October 14th 9 . 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. That will 

11 people help locate it in their computers or in 

12 their e-mail files. So thank you. Jim, any 

13 other comments on that then? Do you want to 

14 give us a deadline? 

15 MEMBER MELIUS: Yes, no comments. 

16 I'm sorry, I had my mute on. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

18 MEMBER MELIUS: I wasn't naming 

19 names. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Well, I think 

21 probably you've gotten very few comments as I 

22 understand it. 
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1 MEMBER MELIUS: Yes. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: So, board members, 

3 if you think it's okay, also let Jim know. 

4 Silence is not that helpful. If you have 

5 comments, give him your comments, if you think 

6 it's great, let him know. And then Jim, you 

7 folks can move to a final version, I think, 

8 that the board could officially adopt. Very 

9 good. Let's proceed. 

10 DR. MCKEEL: Dr. Ziemer? 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

12 DR. MCKEEL: This is Dan McKeel. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, sir. 

14 DR. MCKEEL: May I make one 

15 comment? 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: You certainly may. 

17 DR. MCKEEL: In the evaluation of 

18 Texas City Chemical's SEC 88 where this -- the 

19 full criteria were applied as a test case, 

20 SC&A made a recommendation that actually they 

21 add a fifth criteria regarding plausibility. 

22 And I would recommend that everyone read that 
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1 SC&A report because it raises the possibility 

2 of adding the plausibility criteria, which I 

3 would endorse. I think it's a very good idea. 

4 But if you read that and then 

5 incorporated that idea into your comments back 

6 to Dr. Melius, that would be very helpful. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. And in fact 

8 that was, we thought in a sense, was one of 

9 the values of trying it out, although 

10 originally we hadn't planned that way, it kind 

11 of turned out that way that a trial usage 

12 might point out where there were either other 

13 criteria or modifications of these four 

14 criteria that might be helpful. 

15 So the fifth criteria recommended 

16 by SC&A, which they call plausibility, I 

17 believe, and that could be added as an 

18 additional one or it could in some form be 

19 incorporated into one of the others. But 

20 either way, that's an additional consideration 

21 to keep in mind as you review this. Thank you 

22 again, Dan, for that comment. 
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1 DR. MCKEEL: Thank you. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Let's 

3 proceed. 

4 MR. KATZ: The last work group is 

5 worker outreach and that's Mike. 

6 MEMBER GIBSON: Okay. On the 

7 worker outreach, we have not met. We did 

8 discuss at last full board meeting that we're 

9 going to take a little different approach 

10 instead of waiting for NIOSH to develop a 

11 policy and have SC&A review it and the back 

12 and forth matrix-type deal. 

13 We're basically trying to 

14 brainstorm and look at areas for improvement 

15 for worker outreach and worker input and we're 

16 also kind of looking at some of the worker and 

17 advocates' criticism and complaints and where 

18 we can possibly make recommendations to NIOSH 

19 to address those and better help the program 

20 if possible. 

21 So we're still plugging along at 

22 it, and should have a meeting here, you know, 
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1 hopefully soon. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

3 Is that all the work groups Ted? 

4 MR. KATZ: That is, Dr. Ziemer. 

5 That concludes. 

6 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Last chance 

7 for any questions or comment. 

8 (No response.) 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. If not, let's 

10 move on to update on the board's technical 

11 report contractor or no, update -- well, it's 

12 actually update from the board's technical 

13 support contractor first, then we'll get an 

14 update on the selection process. 

15 So, John Mauro, you're going to 

16 give us an update on where you folks are as 

17 you are closing out the five-year contract. 

18 MR. MAURO: Yes, Dr. Ziemer. Our 

contract will end on December 1st 19 and I tried 

20 to assemble some notes to send out to 

21 everyone. I hope everyone received the e-mail 

22 where I, in a, I guess the 30-second sound 
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1 bite regarding the status of each of our major 

2 tasks and where we are, what we've 

3 accomplished and what will not be 

4 accomplished. 

5 I think that's also important to 

6 point out when this contract comes to an end 

on December 1st 7 . Did everyone receive that e8 mail that it says Update on SC&A activities by 

9 me dated 11/3/06? The `06 of course is an 

10 error, but I emailed that out. I thought it 

11 might be a little easier to just get that out 

12 to everyone. 

13 In a nutshell, all of our work 

14 products that we have been requested to 

15 deliver on all tasks will have been delivered 

16 to NIOSH and the work group by the end of this 

17 contract. Right now, I'm sort of stepping 

18 back from the write-up and giving you the real 

19 big picture. 

20 Right now, we owe a number of 

21 items. Everything's been delivered except for 

22 a few number of items which will be delivered 
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1 over the next couple of weeks. And these are 

2 what we are calling -- there's some work 

3 related to site profile reviews on Santa 

4 Susanna, Pantex and Savannah River 

5 Construction. 

6 As you recall, you folks had 

7 requested that. We put together what we would 

8 call a paper study of the evaluation report 

9 and site profiles as best we could to move 

10 those programs along. And we will be 

11 delivering those work products into your hands 

12 before the end of the contract. 

13 One of the things I would like to 

14 ask is, our work on the Savannah River 

15 Construction is based on the SEC petition. Of 

16 course, the evaluation report has not been 

17 reviewed because we haven't seen it yet, but 

18 we are actually able to put together a report 

19 based on the petition itself and looking at 

20 the database. 

21 So, we do plan on delivering a work 

22 product so that you have something prior to 
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1 the end of our contract. So you will be 

2 receiving -- that's in progress. 

3 The other item that we owe you, a 

4 big item is the ninth set of 40 cases dose 

5 reconstruction reviews. Right now, many of 

6 you are aware that we are scheduling our one7 on-one discussions. In fact, I believe, we 

8 have one scheduled for tomorrow, we had one 

9 earlier this week. 

10 But the plan is to deliver that 

11 large document, you've seen them before -- 

12 before the end of the contract. So, those are 

13 the major deliverables that we still owe you 

14 that we will be getting to you. 

15 Now, but beside the delivery of 

16 these work products that you have, what's not 

17 done that's important is -- and that's what's 

18 really detailed in this handout that I sent is 

19 that for all intents and purposes we're, I 

20 would say -- if you wanted to say that in the 

21 grand scheme of things, we're about half way 

22 through the close-out process. 
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1 You know, if you look at the issues 

2 resolution process regarding site profiles, 

3 SEC petitions, procedure reviews, dose 

4 reconstruction reviews, all of those work 

5 products and all of the matrices, the 

6 databases, information, for all intents and 

7 purposes, when I look at it and as I summarize 

8 the information and the material I e-mailed to 

9 everyone, we're really about half-way home and 

10 there's a lot more work to do to close them 

11 out. 

12 I would say the good news is that 

13 with regard to the site profiles, in the 

14 handout you may have noticed that we actually 

15 have 23 site profile reviews that are in 

16 various stages of close-out and we only 

17 actually closed out five and I've identified 

18 the five that we've closed out, but leaving 

19 what would appear to be quite a bit of work on 

20 site profiles. 

21 But, it's a little misleading. 

22 Many of those site profile reviews are 
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1 currently undergoing review within the context 

2 of the SEC petitions that accompany those 

3 documents. And I believe that -- and those 

4 are really moving along aggressively. 

5 And I believe that when we resolve 

6 the issues related to the SEC petition, we 

7 will have accomplished a great deal in also 

8 resolving the issues that still remain on the 

9 site profile. 

10 So on first blush it would appear 

11 that we really haven't put much of a dent in 

12 the site profile review close-out process, but 

13 in reality, I think we have. And that's why I 

14 feel as if we're half-way home. 

15 I think it may appear that, you 

16 know, we have out of the 28 that we -- bottom 

17 line is we did a formal large review of 28 

18 site profiles and we delivered these large19 volume documents to the board. We've only 

20 closed out the issues on five of them; 

21 Bethlehem Steel, Mallinckrodt, Iowa Army 

22 Ammunition Plant, Linde and Nevada Test Site, 
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1 which would appear there are 23 remaining. 

2 But the fact is, many of those 23 

3 are really undergoing active review as part of 

4 the SEC process. So from that prospective I 

5 think we're doing very well, but there are 

6 going to be many issues still that will 

7 require part of the close-out, which will not 

8 be completed under the current contract and 

9 will have to go to the next contract, whoever 

10 is awarded. 

11 There's also -- I'm still on the 

12 subject of site profile. Sandia, when I say 

13 we've delivered them all, reality is one of 

14 them is quasi-delivered. I believe Joe 

15 Fitzgerald could confirm this, I believe you 

16 have not actually received the Sandia site 

17 profile review because it is currently in the 

18 hands of DOE. 

19 But, Joe Fitzgerald, if you're on 

20 the line, perhaps you can clarify the status 

21 of that one particular site profile review? 

22 MR. FITZGERALD: No. We did 
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1 receive Sandia back from DOE, I think early 

2 last week. So that should be forthcoming any 

3 day. 

4 MR. MAURO: Okay. So we will be 

5 delivering that before -- 

6 MR. FITZGERALD: Yes. 

7 MR. MAURO: -- the end of the 

8 contract? 

9 MR. FITZGERALD: Yes. 

10 MR. MAURO: Great. Thank you. One 

11 other item that we owe you, during the, I 

12 believe it was the meeting we held in Redondo 

13 Beach to activate the INL process, close-out 

14 process. One of the things you have asked us 

15 to do was to sort of refresh the site profile 

16 review and it was actually three years old as 

17 of September sitting on the shelf. 

18 And we will be delivering to you, 

19 what I would call a refresher document, which 

20 would allow the site, the work group, the 

21 newly formed INL work group to move forward. 

22 So we will have delivered that also before the 
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1 end of the contract. 

2 During the meeting, I believe also 

3 in Redondo Beach, you had requested that we 

4 review two procedures, OCAS IG 4 and 3. Four, 

5 we will be -- and that has -- by the way 

6 that's a, I think, very important part of the 

7 surrogate issue that we talked about earlier. 

8 OCAS IG-004 deals with NIOSH's 

9 protocol with dealing with surrogate data and 

10 we are preparing our review. We will be 

11 delivering that report before the end of our 

12 contract, and I think that will be very 

13 helpful to the surrogate working group because 

14 it deals explicitly with that subject. 

15 Last item on the handout that I 

16 sent, if you have that in front of you, is 

17 OTIB-0066. That is, as Joe pointed out 

18 earlier, a very important OTIB in our review 

19 of that document. It deals with a subject 

20 that is of great interest to many of the SEC 

21 petitions and site profiles: metal tritides. 

22 I think that once that -- our 
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1 review is cleared by DOE, and that could 

2 happen any day, it sounds like Joe had 

3 indicated perhaps within a week, you will have 

4 that in your hands. That will, I think, allow 

5 certainly, for example, Pinellas, I know you 

6 folks are eager to move forward with the 

7 Pinellas work group meeting and I think this 

8 is one of the more important issues. And once 

9 that document is cleared, we'll be able to 

10 engage that issue. 

11 So bottom-line on the site profile 

12 review is really we will have delivered just 

13 about everything, but there's still quite a 

14 bit of work on the close-out process that will 

15 have to carry over into the next contract. 

16 Procedure reviews, in the handout 

17 that I forwarded to you folks, one of the 

18 conveniences of having everything automated 

19 now is I got in touch with Steve Marschke and 

20 I said, Steve, could you give me a quick 

21 printout of where we are, and he sent me this, 

22 you know, 10 minutes later. 
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1 Bottom-line is we have 101 

2 procedures in the system, there are a total of 

3 485 commentaries or issues associated with 

4 those 101 procedures. Half of them, about 215 

5 have been closed, which means that we made 

6 quite a bit of progress on issues, resolution 

7 under the procedures work group. 

8 But the other half, and another 

9 chunk of them, 63 are in what we call in 

10 abeyance. That's good news. In abeyance 

11 really means that the work group agrees that 

12 by-and-large the technical issue has been 

13 resolved, but the procedure itself is yet to 

14 be revised and so it sort of sits in limbo 

15 until that, in fact, happens. 

16 So the reality is we have 282 

17 procedures out of the 405, for all intents and 

18 purposes have been resolved and I think that's 

19 a lot of progress. But the bottom line is, 

20 the remaining approximate, let's say 170, 160, 

21 whatever the number comes to, 180, whatever 

22 the number comes to, still require issues 
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1 resolution and of course, that won't occur 

2 until the next contract period. 

3 Dose reconstruction reviews, as I 

4 mentioned earlier, you know, we will have 

5 delivered our ninth set of 40 cases before the 

6 end of this contract. We will have delivered 

7 the two blind dose reconstruction reports 

8 before the end of this contract, so over the 

9 next couple of weeks. 

10 What we will not be able to do, 

11 unfortunately, is we did receive on October 

8th, the 10th 12 set of 20 cases and we are 

13 reviewing them as we speak, but clearly, we 

14 will not have a report delivered before the 

15 end of this contract. 

16 That deliverable of the review of 

17 those 20 cases will not occur until the 

18 subsequent -- it will occur under the 

19 subsequent contract. And of course, as I 

20 mentioned earlier, the closeout process. As 

21 Mark had pointed out, for all intents and 

22 purposes, the first set of about 100 dose 
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1 reconstructions, the issues resolution has 

2 been resolved, but there are a large number of 

3 cases and issues that remain to be closed out 

4 as part of subcommittee activities. 

5 SEC petitions, bottom-line is 16 

6 SEC -- over the course of the last five years 

7 there have been 16 SEC petition reviews. The 

8 draft reports have been completed and 

9 delivered to the board for 13 of those. 

10 We still owe you, as I mentioned 

11 earlier these what I call white paper, they've 

12 not white paper, they are paper studies for 

13 Santa Susanna, Pantex, Savannah River, we will 

14 be delivering them before the end of this 

15 contract. They're in production as we speak. 

16 Of the 13 reviews that have been 

17 completed, the issues resolution process has 

18 actually only been closed on Rocky Flats, IAAP 

19 and Mallinckrodt. The remainder are very much 

20 in active review, the issues resolution 

21 process. So there's a great -- that work of 

22 course will not be completed during this 
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1 contract and will carry over to the next 

2 contract. 

3 And the last item on this page, if 

4 you have it in front of you, is number 16 and 

5 that's the 250-workday issue. And on November 

17th 6 , we will be meeting with the work group to 

7 engage that particular issue. 

8 As far as -- so, I mean, the way I 

9 look at it, as I mentioned earlier, and I 

10 think we've delivered the work, the draft work 

11 products and the few remaining ones that we 

12 still owe, we will be getting into your hands. 

13 What has been, you know, when you 

14 step back and look at the past five years 

15 where we were helping out, what has been part 

16 of the process that has been the most 

17 challenging is the issues resolution process 

18 and that is of course taking more time and 

19 resources than I guess anyone's really 

20 anticipated. Although I guess, we probably 

21 should have realized that that was going to be 

22 the tough part of this. 
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1 Finally, as far as the budget goes, 

2 we have, certainly more than sufficient 

3 resources to allow us to finish up everything 

4 we have to finish up by the end of December. 

5 We will have, perhaps $600,000, $700,000 left 

over on December 1st 6 when we stop work. 

7 That doesn't mean we're coming 

8 under budget because there's still lots of 

9 work to do, but that $700,000 is in effect 

10 there as resources that in principle is 

11 available to keep the issues resolution 

12 process going into the next contract. 

13 That summarizes what -- I believe 

14 that captures the essence of what we've 

15 accomplished and where we are on all the work 

16 we've been doing to support the board. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you very much, 

18 John. Board members, do you have any 

19 questions for John? 

20 (No response.) 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: And let me ask David 

22 Staudt a question, David, if you're still on 
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1 the line. 

2 MR. STAUDT: Yes, sir. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: If there were a 

4 different contractor, could this contract 

5 still be extended to assist in resolving 

6 issues based on the money still left? 

7 MR. STAUDT: Yes, sir. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you, 

9 that's helpful. If the contractor remains the 

10 same, does this money carry forward in 

11 addition to a new contract? 

12 MR. STAUDT: A couple things could 

13 happen. We could just utilize the funding 

14 that's on there and/or else that money could 

15 be just deobligated and put towards a new 

16 contract. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

18 Board members, other questions? 

19 (No response.) 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: If not, Ted Katz, 

21 could you comment on OCAS IG-003, which is a 

22 sub-topic on this activity? 
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1 MR. KATZ: Yes, sure. And I don't 

2 know whether John had managed -- I had a 

3 slight disruption, I don't know whether John 

4 managed to mention anything about this. 

5 But as he said at the Redondo Beach 

6 meeting, SC&A was tasked with reviewing IG-003 

7 and 4. 003, which is titled radiation 

8 exposures covered for radiation -- dose 

9 reconstructions in the part B of EEOICPA. 

10 John called me a couple weeks ago 

11 regarding that review with concern because he 

12 had sort of read it over and realized that 

13 this OCAS procedure is really essentially an 

14 interpretation provided, you know, with legal 

15 counsel for OCAS' use so they know what 

16 radiation doses are covered under EEOICPA. 

17 And it really does not provide any, 

18 you know, technical HP type guidance about how 

19 to go about doing dose reconstructions. And 

20 John, I think, properly felt this was really -

21 - does not fall under the scope of work for 

22 what SC&A does in its technical and scientific 
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1 reviews. 

2 You know, I've reviewed the 

3 document and concurred, I believe he's right 

4 about this. And I sent, I think, all of the 

5 board members, you know, a summary of this 

6 consideration that I've given. 

7 What I wanted to do now, of course, 

8 is if there are any issues with this, 

9 certainly, we should discuss them, but 

10 otherwise, I certainly wanted to make this a 

11 matter of record since they were tasked at 

12 Redondo with reviewing this that we would have 

13 a clear detasking of them with respect to this 

14 review, if everybody's in agreement with this. 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: And Ted's e-mail to 

the board members was dated November 3rd 16 , I 

17 believe, if board members you need to track 

18 that back. The subject was -- what was the 

19 subject of the e-mail -- 

20 MEMBER MUNN: It was annotated 

21 ABRWH meeting agenda under that list. 

22 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. I guess it 
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1 had carried a topic from an earlier couple of 

2 e-mails where initially an annotated agenda 

3 had been sent out and then John Mauro had 

4 replied to that and then Ted had replied to 

5 John and copied all of us on that and that was 

6 this particular issue. 

7 What we need is an agreement on the 

8 part of the board that review of that 

9 procedure, OCAS IG-003, which was tasked to 

10 SC&A should be rescinded that the tasking is 

11 inappropriate since it's actually not a 

12 technical procedure per se, it really gives 

13 what was indicated legal statutory and 

14 regulatory interpretations necessary for dose 

15 reconstructions. 

16 Really defines how OCAS is going to 

17 carry out some things legally, but it doesn't 

18 provide technical or scientific guidance and 

19 therefore it's recommended that that not be 

20 subject to our procedures review by SC&A. And 

21 I think we can do this by a formal motion, 

22 Ted, if necessary to get it on the record. 
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1 The Chair would ask for a motion to 

2 rescind the tasking of SC&A for procedure -- 

3 or for OCAS IG-003. 

4 MEMBER MUNN: This is Wanda. I'll 

5 be glad to make a motion to the effect that we 

6 rescind the direction to our contractor to 

7 review IG-003 based on the fact that it is not 

8 in effect a true technical document, it is 

9 more an administrative document and therefore, 

10 not in the purview of what we prefer to task. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. The Chair's 

12 going to interpret the first part of the 

13 sentence as the motion and the rest as 

14 discussion for the motion. 

15 MEMBER MUNN: Fine. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: The motion is to 

17 rescind the tasking of 003. Is there a 

18 second? 

19 MEMBER BEACH: There is a second. 

20 This is Josie. 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you Josie. 

22 Any discussion? 
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1 (No response.) 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Let's, for the 

3 record, do a roll call vote, Ted. 

4 MR. KATZ: Okay. Are we ready for 

5 that? 

6 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

7 MR. KATZ: Yes, okay. And I will 

8 just run it alphabetically. 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

10 MR. KATZ: Ms. Beach? 

11 MEMBER BEACH: Yes. 

12 MR. KATZ: Mr. Clawson? 

13 MEMBER CLAWSON: Yes. 

14 MR. KATZ: Mr. Gibson? 

15 MEMBER GIBSON: Yes. 

16 MR. KATZ: Mr. Griffon? 

17 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes. 

18 MR. KATZ: Dr. Lockey? 

19 MEMBER LOCKEY: Yes. 

20 MR. KATZ: Dr. Melius? 

21 MEMBER MELIUS: I'll abstain. 

22 MR. KATZ: Okay. Ms. Munn? 
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1 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. 

2 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Poston is not 

3 present for the record. Mr. Presley? 

4 MEMBER PRESLEY: Yes. 

5 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Roessler? 

6 MEMBER ROESSLER: Yes. 

7 MR. KATZ: And Mr. Schofield? 

8 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: Yes. 

9 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Ziemer? 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. Motion carries 

11 and that tasking is thereby rescinded. Are 

12 there any other questions for SC&A for John 

13 Mauro or his staff? 

14 DR. MCKEEL: Dr. Ziemer? 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

16 DR. MCKEEL: This is Dan McKeel. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, Dan. 

18 DR. MCKEEL: This is just a 

19 clarification. I believe SC&A was reviewing 

20 the site profile for Weldon Spring and I know 

21 I gave a site expert interview about that, but 

22 at least I haven't seen that review. Was that 
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1 released? 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: John, can you speak 

3 to that? 

4 MR. MAURO: This is John. Yes, we 

5 completed that and Joe, is that being held up 

6 at DOE or has that moved through the system? 

7 MR. STAUDT: No, that has moved 

8 through the system and we did get notification 

9 again, I think it was late last week. So a 

10 lot of these are coming out. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: I have not seen this 

12 myself. 

13 MR. STAUDT: No. All the site 

14 profile reviews go to DOE before they go on 

15 the public website. 

16 DR. MCKEEL: Thank you. 

17 MR. MAURO: Yes. This is John 

18 Mauro. Let me just add, one of the things we 

19 don't have control over, of course, if this 

20 new step in the process by going through the 

21 DOE cycle that I do believe that all of our 

22 work products, such as the Weldon Springs you 
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1 just mentioned, will -- once we get them back 

2 from DOE, we do move them very quickly. 

3 Usually there's very little for us 

4 to do to polish them up, get them through PA 

5 clearance, but when I said earlier that we 

6 will have delivered, I guess, we will have 

7 delivered to the extent that some of them 

8 might still be held up in DOE or in the 

9 process of working their way through the final 

10 DOE process where we go through PA clearance 

11 then it goes through another DOE review. 

12 So there is some procedural steps 

13 to actually have them finally in the hands of 

14 the board and the public and on the website 

15 that I guess in reality, will in fact carry 

16 over into the next contract. Even though from 

17 SC&A's perspective, all technical work is done 

18 and we actually completed our work products, 

19 there are certain administrative steps that 

20 need to be taken that will result in some of 

21 our work products might actually have to carry 

22 over into the next contract. 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, thank you for 

2 that clarification John. Okay, I think we're 

3 ready to move on. Next we have an update on 

4 the selection of the board's contractor and 

5 Ted Katz will update us on that and David 

6 Staudt, contracting official is also on the 

7 line. 

8 MR. KATZ: Yes, this will be very 

9 brief just to tell you the proposals that 

10 we've received have been reviewed by the 

11 valuation panel and we're on track to awarding 

12 a new contract. We expect to do that still 

13 before Thanksgiving. 

14 CHAIR ZIEMER: So if that occurs 

15 before Thanksgiving, is there a likelihood an 

16 announcement could be made by the time of our 

17 next board meeting? 

18 MR. STAUDT: Yes, this is David 

19 Staudt. Yes, we should be able to make that 

20 announcement by then. 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: Thank you. 

22 Questions board members? 
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1 (No response.) 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

3 Board response to congressional letter from 

4 Senators Schumer, Clinton and Representative 

5 Slaughter. I distributed a draft and then a 

6 second draft or a revised draft because of the 

7 fact that I had omitted mentioning the 

8 residual period in the first draft, so I had 

9 added that. 

10 Let me ask, are there any board 

11 members that do not have a copy of the 

12 proposed draft letter to the congressional 

13 people? 

14 (No response.) 

15 CHAIR ZIEMER: I'm taking that by 

16 the silence that everyone has a copy. I would 

17 like to propose a motion to accept the letter 

18 and then we can amend it as needed. 

19 MEMBER CLAWSON: Second. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Did somebody move to 

21 -- 

22 MEMBER CLAWSON: Yes, Paul I did. 
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1 I'll second that motion. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. So we have a 

3 motion with a second to transmit the proposed 

4 letter to these two senators and the 

5 congresswoman. I'd like to now ask for any 

6 suggested revisions or amendments to the 

7 letter. 

8 (No response.) 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: I, myself, was 

10 thinking that it might be important to mention 

11 something further on the period, the `47 to 

12 `53 period which LaVon discussed a little bit. 

13 That is a period for which the petition did 

14 not qualify. 

15 And I was going to add this 

16 sentence and let me give you the sentence I'm 

17 suggesting because although the third 

18 paragraph says basically the board is aware of 

19 the concerns about that period, and then we 

20 mention that the earlier period `42 to `47 

21 already is in the special exposure cohort and 

22 we mention here that the period from `54 to 
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1 2006, the so-called residual period, that 

2 petition now has qualified, nothing further is 

3 said on the `47 to `53 period. 

4 Now, I guess LaVon, we should add 

5 that it not only now is -- the residual period 

6 not only qualified, but we now have an 

7 evaluation report? 

8 MR. RUTHERFORD: That's correct. 

9 Yes, the evaluation report was approved 

10 yesterday and you will have your electronic 

11 copy later this afternoon. 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. The last 

13 sentence before the closing brief phrase says 

14 this, at the present time, further action by 

15 the board concerning employees for the later 

16 time period will await the official evaluation 

17 report from NIOSH. 

18 Now, see we basically, that is 

19 going to be issued or has it been issued? 

20 MR. RUTHERFORD: It has been 

21 approved and the actual -- it will be FedExed 

22 out later today and the petitioner already has 
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1 an electronic copy we sent her this morning. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: What will the date 

3 on that be? Today's date? 

4 MR. RUTHERFORD: The actual report 

5 will say -- it was approved yesterday and it 

6 will have yesterday's date. The letter that 

7 will go out today will have today's date. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Well, there's 

9 two things. One is the last sentence I think 

10 needs to say, on October -- today's date -- or 

November 5th 11 the evaluation report was issued 

12 and further action by the board concerning 

13 employees related time period will await the 

14 board's review of the evaluation report from 

15 NIOSH. 

16 Would that modification be 

17 agreeable? Any objection? 

18 MEMBER MUNN: That's agreeable and 

19 appropriate. 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Unless I hear 

21 an objection, I'm going to take it that, 

22 that's basically a friendly amendment to make 
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1 sure we're up to date on what actually 

2 happens. 

3 The other thing I'm proposing to 

4 insert would be right after the first sentence 

5 in that third paragraph, the first sentence 

6 says, as a follow-up to that information, I 

7 want to assure you that the advisory board 

8 members are aware of your concerns about the 

9 petition submitted on behalf of Linde 

10 employees who worked during the 1947 through 

11 `53 time period. 

12 I was going to suggest inserting 

13 after that sentence, inserting the following 

14 comment, since there is currently no qualified 

15 petition for the period from 1947 to 1953, the 

16 board is not in a position to make a 

17 recommendation concerning special exposure 

18 cohort status for that time span. 

19 Shall I read that again? 

20 MEMBER MUNN: It's adequate for me 

21 and appropriate. 

22 CHAIR ZIEMER: Let me read it again 
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1 and make sure that -- this would become the 

2 second sentence of the third paragraph. Since 

3 there is currently no qualified petition for 

4 the period from 1947 to 1953, the board is not 

5 in a position to make a recommendation 

6 concerning special exposure cohort status for 

7 that time period. 

8 MEMBER ROESSLER: This is Gen, I 

9 think that clarifies things and I think it's a 

10 good idea. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Any other comments 

12 pro or con? Both of these changes, I think 

13 are friendly amendments just to clarify. 

14 There's the earlier period for which the SEC 

15 status has already been recommended, there is 

16 this `47 to `53 period for which there is no 

17 qualified petition and then there is the 

18 residual period which now has qualified and 

19 for which an evaluation report has just been 

20 issued. 

21 So I think with that, this should 

22 clarify things. And of course the original 
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1 issues that were raised, which were procedural 

2 issues on handling the various documents and 

3 some concerns from the petitioner were 

4 addressed by Christine Branche in her 

5 response, early response to the letter from 

6 the congressional group. 

7 So with those changes, are you 

8 prepared to, as you recall, you have to 

9 approve an official response on behalf of the 

10 board. So, are you prepared to vote on this 

11 response? 

12 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Let's do a roll call 

14 vote again. 

15 MR. KATZ: Okay. Ms. Beach? 

16 MEMBER BEACH: Yes. 

17 MR. KATZ: Mr. Clawson? 

18 MEMBER CLAWSON: Yes. 

19 MR. KATZ: Mr. Gibson? 

20 MEMBER GIBSON: Yes. 

21 MR. KATZ: Mr. Griffon? 

22 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes. 
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1 MR. KATZ: Dr. Lockey? 

2 MEMBER LOCKEY: Yes. 

3 MR. KATZ: Dr. Melius? 

4 (No response.) 

5 MR. KATZ: Maybe he's on mute. 

6 Dr. Melius? 

7 (No response.) 

8 MR. KATZ: Okay. Let me carry on. 

9 Ms. Munn? 

10 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. 

11 MR. KATZ: Dr. Poston, for the 

12 record, is not available. Mr. Presley? 

13 MEMBER PRESLEY: Yes. 

14 MR. KATZ: Dr. Roessler? 

15 MEMBER ROESSLER: Yes. 

16 MR. KATZ: Mr. Schofield? 

17 MEMBER SCHOFIELD: Yes. 

18 MR. KATZ: And Dr. Ziemer? 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. 

20 MR. KATZ: Jim Melius, Dr. Melius 

21 are you still with us? 

22 (No response.) 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Maybe he lost him, 

2 but the vote carries in any event. 

3 MR. KATZ: Right. 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: So, board members I 

5 will send you a final copy of this before we 

6 actually distribute it so you'll have a chance 

7 to look at the actual words before it goes out 

8 and actually, Larry Elliot if you'll make sure 

9 that we have everything correct on dates and 

10 so on as well, I'd appreciate it. 

11 MR. ELLIOT: I'd be happy to. 

12 Thank you. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Let's go on then. 

14 We received notice recently that there will be 

15 a GAO evaluation of the program and I've asked 

16 Liz Homoki-Titus if she could give us a quick 

17 update on that and what board members should 

18 or should not do. You may be contacted by GAO 

19 and what are the ground rules for responses 

20 and so on. 

21 MS. HOWELL: Dr. Ziemer, this is 

22 Emily. 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, Emily Howell 

2 will speak from General Counsel. 

3 MS. HOWELL: Right. Regarding the 

4 GAO report, if a board member is contacted by 

5 GAO, the policy that we follow is similar to 

6 the policy with respect to board members 

7 speaking with members of the press. 

8 You are always able to speak with 

9 GAO in your personal capacity, but you need to 

10 be very clear about the fact that you're 

11 speaking in your personal capacity and not in 

12 your board capacity. 

13 If you do wish to speak with GAO as 

14 a board member in your official capacity, then 

15 you need to coordinate those discussions 

16 through Ted as the DFO and he will help you 

17 coordinate them through HHS. So that's a 

18 short and simple policy for any conversations 

19 you may have with GAO. 

20 The other item that we were on the 

21 agenda for was just to offer a gentle reminder 

22 regarding the Privacy Act and some of the 
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1 documents that the board members receive 

2 through working groups from Nancy Johnson with 

3 SC&A. 

4 We had an issue about a month or so 

5 ago where a document that had not been privacy 

6 act reviewed and cleared was forwarded on and 

7 released to a member of the public even though 

8 it had privacy act restricted information in 

9 it. 

10 And I realize you all get many e11 mails from SC&A and it can be confusing 

12 sometimes to tell which documents have been 

13 reviewed and which have not and the same 

14 person documents from NIOSH. 

15 We're trying to be more clear. The 

16 e-mail, the cover e-mails usually always state 

17 that the materials are Privacy Act restricted, 

18 but sometimes, I think what happened in this 

19 instance is that the e-mail that went out did 

20 not necessarily say that and the document 

21 itself did have a Privacy Act restriction 

22 notice on each page, but I think it was 
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1 forwarded without being opened. 

2 So, we just wanted to, you know, 

3 offer our standard reminder that, you know, if 

4 you ever feel like there's a petitioner, 

5 claimant, a member of the public or someone 

6 else who has requested or should be privy to a 

7 working group document to work with Ted to 

8 ensure that you have the right versions of 

9 those documents and not to just forward things 

10 without being certain that they've been 

11 cleared first. 

12 Ted, did you have any follow-up on 

13 either of those two items? 

14 MR. KATZ: No. No, I have nothing 

15 else, but thank you Emily. 

16 MS. HOWELL: Thanks. 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: Emily, let me pose a 

18 question. This is Ziemer again. I want to 

19 clarify when board members speak as members of 

20 the public versus board members. 

21 My experience with GAO is that they 

22 may ask questions about your opinion on either 
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1 board or NIOSH operations. Now clearly, you 

2 can't answer those questions in a sense of the 

3 member of the public because it requires a 

4 knowledge of the board's activities, but they 

5 often want individual opinions. 

6 Like the GAO may say something 

7 like, do you think the size of the board is 

8 adequate? Now, I think, if I'm not mistaken, 

9 we can still answer that as an individual. 

10 You would not be representing, for example, if 

11 I said, I think the board should have 17 

12 members or something like that, that still is 

13 your personal opinion. It does not represent 

14 a position of the board. 

15 And as long as we stick to 

16 something like that, because I think the GAO 

17 questions often ask about sort of the 

18 operational things, what could be done to make 

19 the operation more efficient or they may ask 

20 your opinion of whether or not the contractor 

21 is carrying out its task and so on. 

22 We're still allowed to give our 
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1 individual opinions, which come out of our 

2 work on the board. Is that not correct? 

3 MS. HOWELL: Right. I mean, we 

4 would just ask that you be very clear with the 

5 person that you're speaking to that you are 

6 stating your individual opinion. And if you 

7 ever are in a situation where you have 

8 questions about it or you're concerned, then 

9 we would just ask that you get in touch with 

10 Ted as he can help facilitate that. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Right. Board 

12 members, any other questions or clarity 

13 needed? 

14 MEMBER MUNN: This is Wanda. You 

15 asked the question that was foremost in my 

16 mind already, Paul, that's how one can clarify 

17 that is still a bit of a mystery, I think. 

18 It's obvious GAO would not be contacting us if 

19 we were not board members, they know that. 

20 Surely they must also know that we cannot 

21 speak as a representative of the board without 

22 prior board authorization to do so. 
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1 It seems obvious to me that any 

2 response that we give would have to be 

3 considered a personal response and not a board 

4 approved response. Am I missing something? 

5 Emily? 

6 MS. HOWELL: No. You know, I don't 

7 think you are, I just think that, you know, it 

8 is always helpful, especially if you're asked 

9 questions, I mean, this probably comes up with 

10 Dr. Ziemer more than anyone else, but if you 

11 are asked questions because of your role as a 

12 working group chair or whatnot and you feel 

13 like the questions are being asked of you 

14 because of that, you know, to reiterate the 

15 fact that you're speaking in your personal 

16 capacity and if they want a board opinion on 

17 something then they're going to have to work 

18 through Dr. Ziemer and Ted and HHS. 

19 MEMBER MUNN: Hopefully one could 

20 make that statement up front in any context 

21 that occurs and not have to keep repeating it. 

22 MEMBER ROESSLER: This is Gen. I 
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1 am hesitant to answer any questions because 

2 I'm not sure on the spur of the moment I can 

3 come up with something and be confident that 

4 I'm answering appropriately. Is it just okay 

5 to say I prefer not to answer it? 

6 MEMBER MUNN: I mean certainly you 

7 have that ability if you're concerned about 

8 wanting to, you know, if the concern is just 

9 that you're being asked stuff and you haven't 

10 had proper time to prepare or a meeting to be 

11 set up and I'm sure that Ted could assist 

12 individual board members to make sure that, 

13 you know, you're not being blindsided, I 

14 guess, with questions. 

15 I mean, you know, like I said, you 

16 don't have to go to Ted only if you think that 

17 they're asking you in your official capacity 

18 if you have individual conversations or you're 

19 approached for kind of an interview, you know, 

20 and you would just like to let Ted know that 

21 might be helpful for everyone. 

22 But, I mean, I don't think that, I 
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1 mean, Ted, do you have any response to this? 

2 I don't know that, you know, there's any 

3 problem with you, you know, saying that you'd 

4 prefer not to give responses. It just maybe 

5 interpreted perhaps in a way you don't intend 

6 for it to be. 

7 MEMBER ROESSLER: Okay. Thank you. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: And I think you just 

9 have to use good judgment on many of these and 

10 we don't know in advance who we're -- how many 

11 board members may or may not be contacted in 

12 any event. 

13 So, just to give you a heads-up to 

14 remind you that if you are contacted, you're 

15 certainly welcome to give your individual 

16 opinions on any issues that they raise. 

17 The only thing that you can -- if 

18 the board has taken an official action on 

19 something and they ask you what that position 

20 is, you can certainly refer to it, you know, 

21 what is the board's position on whatever it 

22 may be. But, if it's not an official board 
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1 position, if it's your opinion, then you have 

2 to make that very clear. 

3 Any other comments or questions? 

4 (No response.) 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Let's move to 

6 future plans. Ted, we need to talk about 

7 meeting date issues and also some issues 

8 relating to upcoming IT security issues. 

9 MR. KATZ: Right. And I've sent 

10 around, I think, I hope everybody got it. I 

11 know it was just yesterday I believe, so I 

12 know it's sort of late coming. I mean, one 

13 issue where we have a date set, but the date's 

a problem now and that is the October 27th 14 

through 29th 15 full board meeting. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: That's in 2009 

17 though. 

18 MR. KATZ: Of course, 2009. That 

19 is in conflict with NIOSH meeting and won't 

20 work. And so I've suggested the weeks on 

21 either side of that whether, I don't know if 

22 anybody's has had a chance to review that 
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1 calendar to see whether one or the other would 

2 work for them. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Well, let's find 

4 out. So what are our options? Would it be 

the 20th through the 22nd 5 ? 

6 MR. KATZ: No. There's one option 

is October 19th through the 23rd 7 , that week. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: Or? 

 MR. KATZ: Or November 2nd 9 through 

6th 10 . 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes. And what would 

12 you like at this time Ted? To know if there 

13 are conflicts? 

14 MR. KATZ: Yes, absolutely. A 

15 sense if one or the other works. 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Let's start 

with October 19th through 23rd 17 . Any board 

18 members have significant conflicts that week? 

19 (No response.) 

20 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. I'm hearing 

21 none. Let's look at the other week, November 

2nd through 6th 22 , any conflicts that week? 
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1 MEMBER MUNN: No. This is Wanda. 

Isn't the 19th to the 23rd 2 very close to the 

3 Thanksgiving date? 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: No. We're in 

5 October, not -- oh, yes, October right. 

6 Thanksgiving is -- 

7 MEMBER MUNN: In November. 

8 CHAIR ZIEMER: -- in November. 

9 MEMBER MUNN: No, now forget what I 

10 said. I was looking at the wrong month. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. There appear 

12 to be no conflicts of the group on the phone. 

13 Ted, I would also ask you to check with John 

14 Poston separately and did Dr. Melius come back 

15 on the line? 

16 (No response.) 

17 CHAIR ZIEMER: If you would double 

18 check their schedules and can we give Ted the 

19 freedom to make the choice depending on the 

20 outcome of those contacts? 

21 MEMBER MUNN: Yes, fine with me. 

22 My personal preference would be the October 
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dates, the 19th through 23rd 1 . 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Any other comments 

3 pro or con? 

4 (No response.) 

5 CHAIR ZIEMER: It sounds like the 

6 rest are fairly neutral Ted. 

7 MEMBER LOCKEY: Well, it's Jim 

8 Lockey. It would be great if they could do 

9 that as soon as possible. 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: To finalize it? 

11 Yes. Okay. 

12 MR. KATZ: Absolutely Jim. I mean, 

13 that's why I'm raising this now, I'd like to 

14 settle this, you know, within the week. So, I 

15 will check with John Poston and Jim Melius 

16 before I decide this and then send out a 

17 notice to everybody. 

18 And if anybody, you know, discovers 

19 in going back to their calendars after, you 

20 know, in the next few days that they actually 

21 have a problem, of course let me know. 

22 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. 
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1 MR. KATZ: That's great. That was 

2 easier than I expected. Thanks. We're just 

3 trying to push out the planning for a couple 

4 more meetings to keep that decent cushion for 

5 those members that tend to have issues, even 

6 pretty far out. 

7 And so I hoped we could schedule, 

8 this would be the next call, you know, at the 

9 end of the list here for 2010, around March 

30th 10 is the right timing, but I don't know 

which day that week of March 30th 11 is best for 

the crew or if March 30th 12 is fine, that's 

13 great. 

14 MEMBER LOCKEY: Jim Lockey, March 

30th 15 is not good for me. 

16 MEMBER MUNN: Ted, your note says 

March 20th 17 I think if I'm reading it right. 

18 CHAIR ZIEMER: Yes, your note said 

March 20th 19 of 2010. 

20 MEMBER ROESSLER: Which is a 

21 Saturday. 

22 MEMBER LOCKEY: Is a Saturday, yes. 
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1 MR. KATZ: Okay. I mean, must have 

2 -- I'm sorry. I must have mistyped, because 

note in front of me says the 30th 3 , but that's 

what I was meaning the March 30th 4 . 

5 MEMBER LOCKEY: That date's not 

6 good for me. It's Jim Lockey. 

7 MR. KATZ: Right. Right. But I 

8 guess on either side of it is the question 

9 too. That whole week whether, I mean, that 

10 week is the right timing if that works. 

 MEMBER LOCKEY: The 31st 11 is good 

for me. March 31st 12 . 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Anyone else have 

14 conflicts? 

15 (No response.) 

16 CHAIR ZIEMER: What works then Ted? 

 Is the 31st 17 okay? 

18 MR. KATZ: I think so. I think 

19 that will be fine. It might be a -- I haven't 

20 looked at my calendar to see the day of the 

21 week, but -- 

22 MEMBER LOCKEY: It's a Wednesday. 
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1 MR. KATZ: Yes, so that should be 

2 great. 

3 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay, this is a 

4 conference call. 

5 MR. KATZ: Right. 

6 CHAIR ZIEMER: So, put that down 

then, the 31st 7 . 

8 MR. KATZ: I've got it. 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. And then 

10 finally, we're into May of 2010? 

11 MR. KATZ: That's correct. And the 

right timing again is the 10th through the 14th 12 

or the 17th through the 21st 13 if one of those 

14 weeks would work. That's a face-to-face. And 

15 we generally shoot for the middle of the week, 

16 but of course if we have a problem we can push 

17 it to one end or the other end of the week as 

18 well. 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Any 

20 preferences? 

21 MEMBER MUNN: I'm sorry, Ted. I'm 

22 flying blind here because I don't have your e-
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1 mail, I don't have anybody's e-mail. What 

2 were the dates you said again? 

3 MR. KATZ: I'm sorry. So the -- 

4 MEMBER MUNN: In May? 

 MR. KATZ: Yes, May 10th 5 through 

the 14th 6 of 2010. 

7 MEMBER LOCKEY: That week's good 

8 for me. Jim Lockey. 

9 MEMBER MUNN: I prefer to avoid 

10 that particular week if possible. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: The other option was 

12 the following week. 

13 MR. KATZ: The following week May 

17th through the 21st 14 , that week. 

15 MEMBER MUNN: Seventeen through 21 

16 would be much better for me. 

17 MEMBER LOCKEY: It's not good for 

18 me. 

19 CHAIR ZIEMER: It's not good for 

20 Jim. 

21 MEMBER MUNN: Oh, sorry. 

22 CHAIR ZIEMER: Any others pro or 
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1 con? 

2 MEMBER LOCKEY: The following week 

3 is fine. 

4 CHAIR ZIEMER: Any others? 

 MR. KATZ: That would be May 24th 5 , 

beginning May 24th 6 ? 

7 MEMBER LOCKEY: Right. 

8 MR. KATZ: How does that work for 

9 everybody? 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: Is that getting in 

11 to Memorial Day? 

12 MR. KATZ: Yes, it's -- I don't 

13 have that up right now to see that, but it 

14 sounds like it's close. 

15 MEMBER LOCKEY: The week of May 

16th 16 is alright with me, but not that Tuesday. 

 So if it's the 19th, 20th 17 , that's okay with me, 

18 but I can't do it that Tuesday. 

19 MR. KATZ: Okay. So then you're 

20 saying it would have to be Wednesday, 

21 Thursday, Friday? 

22 MEMBER LOCKEY: Right. 
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1 MS. ADAMS: Memorial Day is 

actually on 2010 is May 31st 2 . 

3 MR. KATZ: Okay, so that's not a 

4 problem. Thank you Nancy. So we have a 

5 possibility of the last half of the week 

6 beginning May -- 

7 MEMBER LOCKEY: Nineteenth. 

 CHAIR ZIEMER: May 19th 8 through 21 

9 would work for Jim, for Wanda. 

10 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Anyone else? 

12 (No response.) 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Why don't we go for 

14 that Ted? 

 MR. KATZ: Okay. May 19th 15 through 

21st 16 . Okay. And then that actually -- I mean 

17 given that we have the front-end of the week, 

18 you know, it might leave room then for some 

19 work groups as well. 

20 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. 

21 MR. KATZ: Which that might be nice 

22 actually. 
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1 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. 

2 MR. KATZ: Okay. That's great. 

3 That does it. That's as far out really I 

4 think as we need to plan at this point. We 

5 can push it out a couple more dates -- another 

6 date, you know, in the turn of the year. 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: Sure. Okay. Let's 

8 go ahead with those then you'll confirm it 

9 with an e-mail or something, Ted? 

10 MR. KATZ: Absolutely. 

11 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Then what are 

12 the issues on IT security we need to be 

13 looking for? 

14 MR. KATZ: Right. So, Ed Dacey 

15 spoke with you at the California board meeting 

16 to let you know there's sort of cause on the 

17 horizon in terms of having to make changes of 

18 procedures for access to information so that 

19 NIOSH can be compliant with IT security 

20 requirements of the department. 

21 This is now -- and it was at that 

22 meeting, I think, you know, everybody felt it 
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1 was fairly unclear when things would come to a 

2 head, but they're coming to that pretty 

3 quickly now. 

4 OCAS will be having a new contract, 

5 a dose reconstruction contract, which should 

6 be awarded soon towards the end of the year, 

7 which means -- and as sort of part of that 

8 process, it will then have to implement this 

9 IT security step to sort of straighten out our 

10 situation with respect to being compliant with 

11 HHS requirements, policies. 

12 That will mean bringing the O: 

13 drive, which everybody, you know, up until now 

14 can go to, which exists outside of the NIOSH 

15 firewall or the CDC firewall, computer 

16 firewall, that O: drive will be brought inside 

17 the firewall. 

18 So, all of our board members, to 

19 access information, they won't be able to do 

20 it the way they have up until now. This won't 

21 change anything for all the information that 

22 OCAS posts, you know, on its website of 
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1 course. 

2 So everything that's been through 

3 PA review, Privacy Act review and all of the 

4 OCAS technical documents and so on and all of 

5 the SC&A, you know, response documents that 

6 have been through all that process, they'll 

7 all get posted and they'll all be available 

8 just as they are now. There's no change for 

9 those. 

10 What it is going to impact is, you 

11 know, documents that haven't been Privacy Act 

12 reviewed, it will -- and that's not just 

13 things that are posted necessarily on the O: 

14 drive, but also documents that get sent 

15 around, you know, particularly prior to work 

16 group meetings in the hurry to get prepared 

17 for work group meetings. 

18 Now, I'm giving you this as 

19 basically just a heads-up and I'll want to 

20 talk with all of you individually to see what 

21 your personal preferences are. There are a 

22 number of ways we can work this to give you 
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1 the level of access that you individually 

2 would want as a board member to continue doing 

3 the work, you know, as you've been doing it. 

4 So there's three options. I mean, 

5 the third will take some discussion, because 

6 it would require some change in, you know, 

7 board procedures, work group procedures and 

8 all to make it work. 

9 I mean, the first option is for 

10 those of you who want to be able to download 

11 data onto a computer, want to be able to 

12 crunch data, want to be able to download 

13 reports that are not Privacy Act reviewed and 

14 so on, to be able to do that, you're going to 

15 have to have a government personal computer -- 

16 a government computer rather than a personal 

17 computer. 

18 And that will entail not just 

19 having that computer, but you'll have to go 

20 through, you know, just as the rest of us 

21 government employees do, an annual IT security 

22 training, which is an online training, it 
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1 doesn't take a lot of time, but that's an 

2 element of it. 

3 You would be assigned a key fob, 

4 which, you know, is a device that random 

5 number generated help you with security to get 

6 you into the firewall in effect and you would 

7 come through a service called SCITGO, which 

8 all of us government employees use. 

9 But you would come right inside the 

10 firewall and then you would have access to, 

11 you know, all the information as you have so 

12 far and you would be able to download it onto 

13 your personal computer -- I mean, your 

14 government computer that you would be 

15 assigned. 

16 And we'd have to get cracking here 

17 to get these computers purchased and out to 

18 you and get the IT training done and so on and 

19 the assignments of key fobs and all that 

20 business. So there's, you know, there's work 

21 to be done, which is why I'll need to talk to 

22 you very quickly, you know, I think in the 
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1 next week to get this all going so that 

2 there's no disruption for any of you in what 

3 you're able to do as board members. 

4 A second option, for those of you 

5 who, you know, feel less need perhaps to 

6 download stuff onto a computer, but want to be 

7 able to read and review these things, that, if 

8 you wanted that option you wouldn't need a 

9 computer from the government. 

10 We could assign you a key fob, 

11 which is again, access to use your personal 

12 computer and we could set things up so that 

13 you would have in effect a view only mode. 

14 You'd be able to view all documents, you just 

15 simply wouldn't be able to download them. 

16 And that would still require that 

17 you have, you know, this annual IT security 

18 training, again that's not really a big deal, 

19 but you would have that annually just as 

20 government employees do. So we still have to 

21 get to work to put that in place. But that's 

22 an option which would allow you not to have to 
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1 bother with a government computer, which, you 

2 know, is obviously a responsibility. 

3 The third option, as I mentioned, 

4 you know, if it's feasible would be -- I mean, 

5 we'd have to do things differently with our 

6 work groups and so on in terms of pushing out 

7 scheduling and so on to ensure that all the 

8 board members, that all the materials could be 

9 Privacy Act reviewed before their distributed 

10 and so on to make those work groups 

11 functional. 

12 There's still some limitations if 

13 we try to go that route though, because as you 

14 all know, some of these documents, you know, 

15 are replete with Privacy Act information and 

16 would be in effect meaningless without it, not 

17 useful to your work groups. 

18 And so those documents, of course, 

19 you know this would be a problem for that. 

20 There would be no fix for that. But if, you 

21 know, I'm not sure how common those are. They 

22 are, but they do -- I've seen a number of them 
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1 recently where really the Privacy Act 

2 information was essential and couldn't be 

3 meaningfully redacted. So that's a caveat. 

4 But if we want to talk about that, 

5 we could talk about how, you know, we might 

6 try to deal with that situation. If you don't 

7 want to deal with a key fob, you don't want to 

8 deal with a government computer, any of it. 

9 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Is that it 

10 then Ted? 

11 MR. KATZ: And that's it. That's 

12 it. 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Maybe take a 

14 few questions if there are any, otherwise 

15 you'll contact each board member individually 

16 and see what their needs are? 

17 MR. KATZ: That's exactly right. 

18 MR. OSTROW: This is Steve Ostrow 

19 from SC&A listening in. This also effects the 

20 board's contractor SC&A or successor because 

21 we use the O: drive extensively also. So 

22 whatever solution comes up, we would have to 
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1 be included too. 

2 MR. KATZ: Steve, that's absolutely 

3 correct. This will effect the board's 

4 contractor equally. Absolutely. 

5 MR. OSTROW: And I don't know, John 

6 are you listening in? Do you have any idea of 

7 how many of us actually access the -- have 

8 access to the O: drive? 

9 MR. MAURO: I would say on the 

10 order of about eight. 

11 MR. OSTROW: Okay. 

12 CHAIR ZIEMER: And in that case, 

13 those folks probably would have to have 

14 government computers then too right? If 

15 they're downloading things. 

16 MR. KATZ: That's absolutely 

17 correct. And it would be the same situation 

18 as applies for the people who do the dose 

19 reconstruction work for OCAS and SEC work, 

20 that contractor as well. 

21 CHAIR ZIEMER: Well, I assume then 

22 Ted that you'll proceed and we'll individually 
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1 have the opportunity to decide what level of 

2 access we need and determine what the 

3 appropriate equipment and training measures 

4 are on an individual persona-by-person basis. 

5 MR. KATZ: That's exactly right. 

6 If you don't want to discuss the -- I mean, 

7 again, if you don't feel like it's feasible to 

8 go the third route, then yes and that's all 

9 we'll do here. 

10 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

11 Any additional questions? 

12 (No response.) 

13 CHAIR ZIEMER: So that's going to 

14 begin almost immediately right? 

15 MR. KATZ: That's correct. Over 

16 the next week I'd like to be able to talk with 

17 each of you and get your wishes. And if you, 

18 you know, listened and you think you 

19 understand it all well enough and want to pop 

20 me an e-mail saying I already know what I 

21 need, feel free. Feel free to do that. That 

22 will be one less phone call we'll need to 
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1 have. 

2 CHAIR ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you 

3 very much. Let me ask if there are any other 

4 items that need to come before us this morning 

5 or this afternoon. 

6 (No response.) 

7 CHAIR ZIEMER: It appears that 

8 there aren't. If there are none, then I will 

9 declare the meeting adjourned and we will see 

10 all of you in December or sooner in the case 

11 of the work groups. Thanks everybody. 

12 (Whereupon, the above-entitled 

13 matter was concluded at 1:14 p.m.) 

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