THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 


PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 


CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 


NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH 


convenes 


MEETING 48 


ADVISORY BOARD ON RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 


VOL. I 


The verbatim transcript of the 48th 


Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 


Worker Health held at the Red Lion Richland Hanford 


House, Richland, Washington, on July 17, 2007. 


STEVEN RAY GREEN AND ASSOCIATES 

NATIONALLY CERTIFIED COURT REPORTING 

404/733-6070 
 

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C O N T E N T S 

July 17, 2007 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 

DR. PAUL ZIEMER, CHAIR 

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NIOSH PROGRAM UPDATE 

MR. LARRY ELLIOTT, NIOSH, OCAS 

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DOL PROGRAM UPDATE 

MS. CHRISTIE LONG, DOL 

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WORKING GROUP REPORTS 

WORKING GROUP CHAIRS 

48 

SUBCOMMITTEE REPORT 

MR. MARK GRIFFON, CHAIR 

66 

UPDATE ON SEC PETITIONS 94 

PUBLIC COMMENT 

DR. PAUL ZIEMER, CHAIR 

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COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 180 
3 

TRANSCRIPT LEGEND
 

The following transcript contains quoted material. Such 


material is reproduced as read or spoken. 


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


an unintentional or purposeful interruption of a 


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


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


word(s) when reading written material. 


-- (sic) denotes an incorrect usage or pronunciation 


of a word which is transcribed in its original form as 


reported. 


-- (phonetically) indicates a phonetic spelling of 


the word if no confirmation of the correct spelling is 


available. 


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


"uh-uh" represents a negative response. 


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


without reference available. 


-- (inaudible)/ (unintelligible) signifies speaker 


failure, usually failure to use a microphone. 

 

 

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


(By Group, in Alphabetical Order) 


BOARD MEMBERS
 

CHAIR
 

ZIEMER, Paul L., Ph.D. 


Professor Emeritus 


School of Health Sciences 


Purdue University 


Lafayette, Indiana 


EXECUTIVE SECRETARY
 

WADE, Lewis, Ph.D. 


Senior Science Advisor 


National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 


Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 


Washington, DC 


MEMBERSHIP
 

BEACH, Josie 


Nuclear Chemical Operator 


Hanford Reservation 


Richland, Washington 


CLAWSON, Bradley 


Senior Operator, Nuclear Fuel Handling 


Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Laboratory 


GIBSON, Michael H. 


President 


Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Union 


Local 5-4200 


Miamisburg, Ohio 


GRIFFON, Mark A. 


President 


Creative Pollution Solutions, Inc. 


Salem, New Hampshire 

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LOCKEY, James, M.D. 


Professor, Department of Environmental Health 


College of Medicine, University of Cincinnati 


MELIUS, James Malcom, M.D., Ph.D. 


Director 


New York State Laborers' Health and Safety Trust Fund 


Albany, New York 


MUNN, Wanda I. 


Senior Nuclear Engineer (Retired) 


Richland, Washington 


PRESLEY, Robert W. 


Special Projects Engineer 


BWXT Y12 National Security Complex 


Clinton, Tennessee 


ROESSLER, Genevieve S., Ph.D. 


Professor Emeritus 


University of Florida 


Elysian, Minnesota 


SCHOFIELD, Phillip 


Los Alamos Project on Worker Safety 


Los Alamos, New Mexico 

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IDENTIFIED PARTICIPANTS 


ADKINS, LINDA M. 


ALLEN, ED 


ANDERSEN, WARREN G. 


ANDERSON, GARY, CLAIMANT 


BISTLINE, R.W., SC&A 


BRASWELL, CHET 


BREYER, LAURIE, NIOSH 


BROEHM, JASON, CDC 


FITZGERALD, JOE, SC&A 


CARRICO, MARYANN, HANFORD SEC PETITIONER 


CARY, ANNETTE, TRI-CITY HERALD 


CHALER, LLOYD R., RETIRED 


CHANG, CHIA-CHIA, NIOSH 


COLEMAN, VERNA, RETIRED 


CROSS, DARLENE 


DOMINA, KIRK, USW 


FISHBACK, KATHLENE 


FORDHAM, EARL, DEPT. OF HEALTH 


GILBERT, BURTON, RETIRED 


GOSSEEN, SHERRY, ZENITH ADMIN. 


GUFFEY, KATHRYN M. 


HARTCORN, BETTY 


HINNEFELD, STU, NIOSH 


HOMOKI-TITUS, LIZ, HHS 


HOWELL, EMILY, HHS 


HOYT, ROSEMARY, HANFORD SEC PETITIONER 


HWANG, JON, ATL 


JANOS, CHRIS A., LEGAL REP. 


JANOS, WANDA K., SPOUSE 


KIDDER, LORENE 


KITE, MERLE A. 


LEDFORD, P.L., SEMI-RETIRED 


LEDFORD, T.C., RETIRED 


LEGGET, DONALD 


LISK, BARB. CONG. HASTINGS 


LONG, CHRISTY, DOL 


MAKHIJANI, ARJUN, SC&A 


MAURO, JOHN, SC&A 


MCDANIEL, ART 


MCDONALD, ELDEE 

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MCFEE, MATTHEW, ORAU TEAM 


MCKEEL, DAN, SINEW, VI NEWS 


MERRIL, BILL 


MILLS, PATRICIA D. 


OGLESBEE, GAE, NAT’L NUCLEAR VICTIMS FOR JUSTICE 


OLSON, CAROL A. 


RUTHERFORD, LAVON, NIOSH 


SHATELL, CHARLES W. 


SMITH, FRANKLIN 


SORENSEN, ADELE 


SORENSEN, JOEL 


TRUDEAU, JULIE 


WARE, D.C., RETIRED 


WENDLAND, JAMES A. 


ZACCHERO, MARY JO, ORAU TEAM 

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JULY 17, 2007
 

1:00 p.m.


 P R O C E E D I N G S 


WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS


 DR. ZIEMER: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm 


going to call the meeting to order. This is 


the 48th meeting of the Advisory Board on 


Radiation and Worker Health, meeting in 


Richland, Washington. We're pleased to be back 


in the Hanford area and the opportunity to 


renew acquaintances with some of the folks that 


we've come across in this area in previous 


visits. 


I'd like for the record to show that two of our 


Board members are not with us physically. That 


is Dr. Gen Roessler and Brad Clawson. I 


understand Gen Roessler is on the line, is -- 


Gen, are you there? 


DR. ROESSLER: I am here. Can you hear me? 


 DR. ZIEMER: We can hear you. Thank you. And 


Brad Clawson, Brad, are you on the line? 


 (No response) 


 Apparently not at the moment. 


 MS. MUNN: He's not going to be able to -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: He may not be able to. Dr. 


Melius, my understanding is, will be joining 

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us. I believe his plane just gets in about 


midday, so he shall be here, we -- we believe 


fairly soon. 


Today our Designated Federal Official sitting 


in for Dr. Lew Wade is Chia-Chia Chang, and 


Chia-Chia, do you have any opening comments for 


the assembly at all? 


MS. CHANG: Dr. Wade regrets not being able to 


make it because of a scheduling conflict, and I 


of course also thank the Board members and 


bring along greetings from Dr. Howard and the 


Secretary. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much. For those of 


you who may be visiting with us, as opposed to 


some of the government staff people, there are 


copies of the agenda -- as well as many of the 


handouts that will be being considered this 


week -- on the table in the back. Please feel 


free to take those. 


 Also there are copies of the CD-DVDs that are 


recently released, almost a best-seller now, 


released by NIOSH giving a capsule summary of 


the operation of this program, and I think many 


of you will find that to be very helpful as 


well. Please help yourself to those copies as 

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you may see fit. 


We have two public comment sessions scheduled 


for this meeting. One is later this afternoon 


at 5:00 o'clock. And then a second one is 


tomorrow evening at 7:30. Those of you -- 


members of the public -- who may wish to 


participate, there's a sign-up sheet in the 


entryway, so we would be pleased to have you 


sign up if you wish to make public comment at 


either of those times. 


We're going to then proceed with the agenda as 


it's given. Our opening afternoon here we have 


a number of program updates. We're going to 


begin with an update from NIOSH, and Larry 


Elliott will present that update for NIOSH -- 


oh, a question first. 


 MR. PRESLEY: Before we go on, whoever's doing 


the talking on the telephone, can we get them 


muted? 


UNIDENTIFIED: (Unintelligible) 


 MR. PRESLEY: Oh, okay, I thought it was coming 


out --


 DR. ZIEMER: There -- there isn't anything in 


this room next door. I think it's coming from 


behind, and I'm wondering if it's a radio 

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somewhere in the hotel. Maybe we can check 


with the hotel staff and see if they can mute 


that sort of background noise. Thank you. 


 Larry Elliott. 


NIOSH PROGRAM UPDATE


 MR. ELLIOTT: Thank you, Dr. Ziemer. Good 


afternoon, members of the Board and members of 


the public and colleagues. I'm pleased to be 


before you again to present the NIOSH dose 


reconstruction program statistics and where we 


are at at this point in time in the -- in the 


whole project. 


As you can see from this first slide, there 


have been 24,481 cases that have been referred 


to NIOSH from the Department of Labor for dose 


reconstruction. These numbers are as of July 


10th of this year. Of those close to 24,000 


cases, we have completed 79 percent of those 


that have required dose reconstruction. And I 


break down for you in sub-bullets here that 79 


percent, or 19,340 claims, that have been 


treated in some way, shape or form. There have 


been 17,371 that have been returned to the 


Department of Labor with a dose reconstruction 


report. There have been 614 claims that have 

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been pulled by the Department of Labor because 


they were inadvertently sent to us for dose 


reconstruction and they didn't require it. And 


then there are 1,355 claims that have been 


pulled and identified as potentially eligible, 


or eligible, for the SEC classes that have been 


put into place. 


 Twenty percent of the cases at NIOSH for dose 


reconstruction remain open and active in some 


state, and 246, or one percent of the total 


cases, have a -- have been currently 


administratively closed. And if members of the 


public don't understand what that means, once 


we have completed a dose reconstruction report 


we provide it to the claimant and ask for them 


to review it and to sign what is called an 


OCAS-1 form indicating that they have no 


further information to provide and we can move 


the claim on to the Department of Labor for a 


decision. If they don't respond to us with 


that OCAS-1 form in a specified amount of time, 


then we will administratively close the dose 


reconstruction. 


It can be reopened at any point in time when a 


claimant so indicates they'd like the claim 

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moved on to DOL for decision, or they indicate 


they have new information for us to consider, 


and we will do that. 


This is a graphic depicting those same numbers 


that -- that I presented earlier on the 


previous slide, just a pie chart to show how 


they're distributed across those categories. 


Of the 17,371 dose reconstructions that we sent 


back to DOL for a decision, we find in our 


files that 29 percent, or 5,074 cases, had a 


probability of causation greater than 50 


percent, or would be found to be compensable by 


the Department of Labor. Seventy-one percent, 


conversely -- or 12,297 claims -- were found to 


be non-compensable. 


I presented some of these kind of graphics at 


your first -- your meeting in May in Denver, 


and this is just a -- I don't have others that 


are site-specific as I presented in May. This 


is just the distribution of probability of 


causation in deciles up to the 50 percent 


level, and showing how many are greater than 50 


percent, 6,348, as compared to those that are 


distributed across zero to 49 percent POC. 


Of the 4,895 claims remaining at NIOSH for dose 

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reconstruction, we show 1,646 that are 


currently assigned to a health physicist for 


dose reconstruction. That leaves 692 claims 


that we've already provided a draft dose 


reconstruction to the claimant and we are 


awaiting an OCAS-1 form, and there are 2,557 


cases that are not assigned to a health 


physicist for dose reconstruction. 


As you know, we are monitoring our progress on 


completing the oldest claims and there's a 


bullet on this slide that speaks to the fact 


that 53 percent, or 2,589 cases, of the total 


4,895 are older than one year old. 


 Again looking at the first 5,000 claims that we 


have been assigned to reconstruct dose for, in 


monitoring our strategic goal to complete those 


first 5,000 we show that 4,192 claims have been 


completed with reports provided to the 


Department of Labor for decision. There have 


been 57 out of this first 5,000 that have been 


administratively closed in dose reconstruction; 


245 of the first 5,000 were pulled by 


Department of Labor from our dose 


reconstruction effort; 166 out of the first 


5,000 have been identified as SEC claims; 24 of 

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this first 5,000 claims are -- show to be a 


draft dose reconstruction with the claimant and 


awaiting the OCAS-1; and then 250 of the first 


5,000 claims are back in our hands from DOL for 


some type of rework. The important number 


here at the bottom of the slide is 66. That's 


66 claims that have not had at least a draft 


dose reconstruction or have not been identified 


for an SEC class. And so out of the first 


5,000, we're closely and diligently working 


with these 66 claims trying to get them 


completed. 


What I -- I can say a few more things about the 


66. There are 25 claims in this 66 that are 


NUMEC claims, and we have a NUMEC petition in 


front of us. And so once we have resolved our 


evaluation of that petition, we hope that these 


25 NUMEC claims will be addressed very rapidly. 


That's the largest category within the 66. It 


breaks down ten claims to W. R. Grace, another 


six claims to Combustion Engineering, then all 


the rest of the 60-- the remaining, whatever 


that is, are represented by numerous sites with 


four or less claims. 


I've shown this graphic many times. We've kind 

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of reworked it a little bit for your -- for 


your edification and I hope continued pleasure. 


What I would point out for you in this slide is 


that we have broken out all of the claims by 


their tracking number in 1,000 increments. And 


again, you can see what's going on with the 


first 5,000, but this slide also gives you a 


sense of what's going on with all the claims in 


our population. I'd point out for you that 


these three bars here, cases -- or two bars, 


cases pulled and cases completed, are the work 


that we feel we would lay claim to having all 


done. These other ca-- bars, cases active, 


cases pending and cases administratively 


closed, and SEC cases, there may be some other 


action going on with those. But you can read 


from this graphic that we have not 


inadvertently handled the later claims that 


have been submitted to us in a different 


fashion than trying to work off the older 


claims. 


Again a graphic that you've seen many times 


over. We're now down into providing you with a 


breakdown on the -- on the axis here of -- of 


quarters that represent two quarters in each 

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datapoint. And the point -- the thing I'd 


point out for you here in this graph of the 


cases that we have received from the Department 


of Labor in blue, we've seen a trend up lately, 


in the last quarter and a half, of new claims 


coming in. And this has been working against 


what has gone on with our reduction in -- in 


resources, our constrained resources over the 


last few -- month and a half here, two months, 


where we've had to curtail some of our efforts 


because we were short-funded. And so this is 


of major concern to me, as well as I'm sure the 


claimants, to watch another backlog start to 


get built here. We anticipate that our fiscal 


year funding will come forward in October with 


the new fiscal year, and we'll be back up to 


speed. We have received -- since we met last 


we have received notice from the Department of 


Labor that they're going to send us another $2 


million, and the Centers for Disease Control 


are going to return $1 and a half million to 


us, and then I was able to -- through adjusting 


of commitments and obligations under current 


contracts, to garner another half a million, so 


we're going to put another $4 million on top of 

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this next couple months to get ORAU -- to 


enable ORAU to -- to work as best they can with 


that additional set of monies. New fiscal year 


starts October 1 and we'll be back up to speed 


at that time. 


 This slide graphic on reworks shows that we 


have received from the Department of Labor 


3,539 claims for rework. And I'd remind the 


Board that many of these -- the majority of 


these claims that we're asked to rework deal 


with new information, demographic information 


about the claim -- another cancer, another 


additional employment period or something has 


gone on in that way -- or a new survivor has 


been established and we have to provide a 


rework. 


The spike that you see in the third quarter of 


'07, this 1,130 claims, this is due primarily 


to the PERs that we're talking about of late, 


and especially the super S PER. That touched a 


large number of claims across many sites, and 


so Department of Labor has sent that many back 


to us in that particular quarter. 


As you know, we turn to the Department of 


Energy and request information on exposure for 

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these claims, and we have a very good response 


rate right now with the Department of Energy. 


The number of outstanding requests -- that's 


what we track, how many requests do we have out 


there, and we follow up on these outstanding 


requests every 30 days -- and you see 479 as of 


July 10th were in Department of Energy's hands 


to respond to us. Of those 479, there are 91 


that are greater than 60 days old, and we're 


monitoring the progress on responding to those 


very closely. 


Oops, I'm sorry. I went too far. 


With regard to our Technical Basis Documents, 


Technical Information Bulletins, I just wanted 


to briefly touch upon where we stand with a 


number of AWE sites that we'd asked Battelle to 


work up Technical Basis Documents for. As you 


-- as you might recall, they produced for us 


two Technical Basis Documents, a uranium metal 


TBD and a uranium refining TBD. And then that 


-- those noted that there would be an 


appendices required for certain sites where 


additional unique exposure scenarios existed, 


and you see eight of those TBDs are approved 


now -- appendices are approved for these TBDs, 

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and they're listed here. I won't read them, 


but you can look at these on our web site if 


you're so interested in these particular 


appendices. 


There are eight other appendices for these 


Technical Basis Documents on AWEs that are 


currently in review, and they're listed here, 


and we hope to see them resolved in the review 


process very shortly. 


I might note that the largest number of claims 


associated in this set of eight AWEs are found 


in Electro Metallurgical Company, 73 claims. 


The rest are much smaller numbers. 


I mentioned briefly the Program Evaluation 


Reports. We've completed 11 of these so far. 


They are all on our web site and I encourage 


the Board and the members of the public to read 


them and read them very closely, because from 


them you can understand how we go about doing a 


screening process to determine if a claim might 


be affected. And if a claim is not affected, 


then it wouldn't be picked up and re-evaluated. 


But affected -- potentially affected claims are 


-- are re-examined against a particular change 


that has been made in one of these Program 

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Evaluation Reviews. 


So we've completed the Hanford bias factor. 


We've completed misinterpreted dosimetry 


records resulting in an underestimate of missed 


dose at the Savannah River Site. We've 


completed the error in surrogate organ 


assignment resulting in an underestimate of X-


ray dose at the Savannah River Site. We've 


completed the review of photofluorography at 


Pinellas. We've completed the external 


dosimetry target organ for prostate cancer -- 


oops, I need to move on for you -- and the 


evaluation of the effect of Revision 2 of the 


Bethlehem Steel site profile. And also 


completed the effect of adding ingestion 


intakes to Bethlehem Steel cases. 


As far as these last two bullets go, I know 


that Bethlehem Steel is on your agenda, and 


again I'll relate to you what the outcome of 


that Program Evaluation Review was. There are 


two cases that will go over the 50 percent bar 


after having been examined against these 


changes. There's possibly a third claim that 


may go over that 50 percent probability of 


causation bar; it'll depend upon how Labor 

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handles that claim in the appeal process. And 


there were seven claims that will drop below 


the 50 percent bar based upon the changes made 


to the Bethlehem Steel documents. We report 


these to the Department of Labor and Department 


of Labor decides how to handle these claims 


that have been already compensated and -- and 


are now found by dose reconstruction, based 


upon the changes that were made to the 


Bethlehem Steel TBD, were found to be noncompensable. 


 We've also completed a Program Evaluation 


Report for target organ issues around lymphoma. 


We've completed one for the -- our modification 


of the NIOSH-IREP lung cancer risk model. 


We've completed the effect of the Rocky Flats 


Neutron Dose Reconstruction Project data, and 


also a Program Evaluation Review on the effect 


of additional neutron dose data at the Savannah 


River Site. 


There have been six Program Evaluation Plans 


that have been issued, and we have told you 


that -- in the past that we thought the 


preparation of these plans would enable us to 


move quicker and farther and faster on these 

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PERs -- I'm sorry, I'm not keeping up with the 


slides; thank you, Board member Presley -- and 


as we have worked through the Program 


Evaluation Reviews and started working on these 


Program Evaluation Plans and -- and coordinate 


our efforts with DOL, we've come to realize 


that a plan is not going to suffice. We're 


going to have to put together Program 


Evaluation Reviews in a timely manner and put 


them out there. We can't just put a plan out 


and -- and let that stand there as we are doing 


this work. It just hasn't worked out. But 


we're monitoring the progress on these -- these 


six Program Evaluation Plans and we'll come out 


with a Program Evaluation Report at their 


conclusion. You won't see any more plans from 


us, but you will see in the future additional 


Program Evaluation Reviews. 


I'd like to go through a series of achievements 


that we feel we've made at NIOSH in the 


program, and these are very general and broadscoping achievements. We have completed nearly 


80 percent of all dose reconstructions. I know 


the first slide that I showed you said 79, but 


if we add in the -- the draft dose 

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reconstructions that are awaiting the OCAS-1, 


it's 82 percent. But nearly 80 percent of all 


dose reconstructions that have been forwarded 


to us have been completed. 


The -- we -- we work against strategic goals in 


our project plan at NIOSH in OCAS, and our 


first strategic goal was to look at the -- how 


well we're doing against the first 5,000 claims 


and trying to complete those. I've reported 


that -- where we're at on that to you. 


The second strategic goal that we set for 


ourselves was to achieve what we call steady 


state, and we defined that as having no claim 


in our system older than one year. And you see 


here there are now 2,306 active claims that are 


less than a year old our of that 4,000 number I 


gave you earlier, or 47 percent of that number. 


I think what's important to note here is that 


44 percent of that -- of that total active 


claims are six months are younger. 


If we look at our efforts across the sites, the 


covered facilities, there are -- for your 


information, there are 316 covered facilities 


as of today. This number changes somewhat. It 


fluctuates. It was 319, I think -- or 318, and 

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DOE has dropped a few sites from the covered 


list just recently. But if we look at those, 


we only have claims that -- that come from 208 


of these sites. And of 171 of those sites, you 


see that the -- the breakdown here where it's 


reported that 25 sites have 100 percent of the 


DRs completed. In other words, we have no open 


-- active claim for those 25 sites. We have 


completed every dose reconstruction for which ­

- claim given to us under that site. 


 Forty-three sites have between 80 and 99 


percent of the DRs completed, or 20 -- that's 


25 percent of the 171. Forty-nine sites have 


shown to be a situation where 50 to 79 percent 


of the claims have been reconstructed. And 


together those numbers equate to 69 percent of 


the total 171. 


There are 35 sites where -- and are -- there 


are 35 sites where 20 to 49 percent of the DRs 


are completed; and 19 sites where less than 20 


percent -- or 11 percent of the total -- are 


not completed. 


Only 37 sites remain with at least one claim at 


NIOSH and no DR completed. This represents 148 


active claims, or .03 percent of active claims. 

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 We've reviewed 93 SEC petitions that have been 


sent to us. 


We have added 17 classes representing 14 


facilities. 


The Conflict or Bias Policy has been revised 


and implemented. 


We have also revised our acknowledgement packet 


-- this is the information that is sent to a 


claimant upon our receiving the claim from DOL 


the first time, telling the claimant that we 


have now -- we are now the holders of their 


claim and we're about to start dose 


reconstruction. We've changed that 


acknowledgement packet. You've helped us with 


that, and we appreciate it. 


We've also, as mentioned earlier, completed a 


dose reconstruction video that will, we hope, 


inform claimants and can be used in resource 


centers and elsewhere to educate people on what 


we do. 


 We've implemented and maintained an external 


mailing list for the OCAS Web updates, and this 


is a constant, constant effort to make sure 


that we're reaching all the people that want to 


be reached to be notified of our -- of any 

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changes to our web site, any new information 


that we load up. 


We have held five dose reconstruction 


workshops, and this is where we invite 


organized labor, we -- representatives, 


activists, advocates. We've had a few 


Congressional staff involved. And we provide 


them a dose reconstruction workshop and explain 


how we go about doing the business of dose 


reconstruction. 


 We've completed a new set of Frequently Asked 


Question sheets for the public and have 


distributed those. 


 The NIOSH ombudsman has been hired and has been 


very active. 


There have been five Special Exposure Cohort 


outreach meetings and six Special Exposure 


Cohort worker outreach meetings. 


 There've been 75 worker outreach meetings where 


we take a dose reconstruction tool to them and 


ask them for their input. I'd note for you at 


this time in the presentation that we have 


moved the worker outreach program that was 


being administered under the ORAU team's effort 


through a subcontractor, ATL -- we now have a 

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task directly with ATL and we are dealing with 


them on worker outreach directly. 


 There have been four town hall meetings, and 


there's also been four public meetings to 


obtain public on the new SEC procedures. 


We've had over 4,000 Congressional requests 


that we've responded to for information. 


We've provided over 100 Congressional briefings 


during the life of the program. 


And we've had one Congressional delegation come 


to Cincinnati and visit us and go through one 


of these workshops that I mentioned. 


We've had over 9,000 e-mails that have been 


received in the OCAS in-box, and we strive to 


respond to those e-mails as -- as quickly as we 


can. 


There have been close to 50,000 phone calls 


received by OCAS, and we've also seen our prime 


technical support contractor, ORAU, receive and 


respond to over 240,000 phone calls. 


We have provided support and have participated 


to -- at Advisory Board meetings, those 52 that 


are reported here include the committee, 


subcommittee and teleconference meetings. 


And finally, we have participated and supported 

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43 different workgroup meetings. 


And I'd be happy to take any questions that you 


might have. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much, Larry, for 


that concise overview. Let's see who has 


questions or comments on this report. 


 Yeah, Mark. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Larry, that -- that one -- I 


think you explained it pretty well, but that 


one graph with the spike on the reworks, that 


was mostly due to super S -- the majority of it 


 MR. ELLIOTT: The majority of them were super 


S-related, yes. 


 MR. GRIFFON: And these were cases that -- that 


you have self-identified or they were already 


through... 


 MR. ELLIOTT: The process in the Program 


Evaluation Review is to screen all cases and 


identify those that are potentially affected, 


and we give Department of Labor a list of 


those. And then we -- they match that against 


what they think would be affected, and then 


they send us back those claims. That's how 


that's working. 

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 MR. GRIFFON: Is there -- is there another big 


item that affected that spike, or super S was 


the only one really --


 MR. ELLIOTT: Super S was overwhelming. There 


are a few other PERs in this, but not to the 


degree that super S contributes. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Larry, you mentioned a recent sort 


of upsurge in cases coming from Labor. Can you 


identify the reason for that? Is this an 


outcome of the worker outreach meetings or -- 


suddenly getting more claims in from that, or 


do we know? 


 MR. ELLIOTT: I can't lay my finger on a 


specific reason or cause. We do know that our 


friends at DOL are out in -- out and about, 


recruiting claims. They're holding town hall 


meetings, they're holding meetings that they 


call SEM meetings, which are the -- I can't 


remember the acronym for SEM, but it -- it goes 


to --


UNIDENTIFIED: (Off microphone) Site exposure. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- site exposure matrix, yes, for 


the -- for the toxic chemicals, and I think 


when they interact with people in those 


sessions, they -- they are also recruiting 

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claims. 


I also think we need to take stock -- I don't 


know how much this contributes, but we need to 


take stock of the fact that there's been these 


17 classes added and people start applying 


again. Once they see a class, they think well, 


okay, maybe now's my time to get my claim in. 


And in, you know, many cases, some of those 


don't find their way through the presumptive 


process and so they come to us for dose 


reconstruction as a non-presumptive claim 


against that class. I don't know how many we 


would look at there, but I think those are the 


two contributing factors. 


 MR. PRESLEY: Question. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Mr. Presley. 


 MR. PRESLEY: Larry, you said that there were 


seven claims that had -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Use the mike. 


 MR. PRESLEY: I'm sorry. You said there were 


seven claims that we had gone back on the -- I 


guess one of these missed dose things that -- 


that were going to be reviewed. Have -- have ­

- have those been paid, this -- those seven 


been paid and we have to go back on them, or 

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what... 


 MR. ELLIOTT: This -- this -- you're referring 


to these last two bullets here about Bethlehem 


Steel --


 MR. PRESLEY: Yeah. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- and I was just pointing out 


for the Board -- for its discussion on 


Bethlehem Steel later in this meeting that, if 


you read this Program Evaluation Review, you 


will find that there were some claims -- three 


claims potentially that would move over into 


the compensable region and seven that would 


move out of that region into non-compensable. 


I assume that some of those have already been 


paid. I have no idea what DOL's going to do 


about that and it's not my business, so... 


 MR. PRESLEY: Thank you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Josie, you had the same question 


then? Yeah, okay. 


Other questions or comments on the report? 


Yes, Dr. Lockey. 


 DR. LOCKEY: Larry, do you have any -- is there 


any relationship to how --


 DR. ZIEMER: Use the mike, Jim. 


 DR. LOCKEY: -- how the out-- how the output 

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programs are working? I mean survey your 


audience --


 MR. ELLIOTT: You mean the outreach? 


 DR. LOCKEY: Yes. Would it be helpful to have 


the ombudsman make a presentation at one of our 


meetings to bring the Board up to date about 


how that program's --


 MR. ELLIOTT: Okay, I hear two questions in 


there: How are the outreach meetings; that 


takes me to our worker outreach effort. If 


you're asking about the SEC ombudsman's efforts 


to reach out to people that -- I haven't talked 


about that in these slides. I've only talked 


about our worker outreach effort for dose 


reconstruction/Technical Basis Document 


purposes. 


But -- and I did mention in one of these slides 


that the SEC counselor, Laurie, and the SEC 


ombudsman have -- have put on the number of 


meetings that were in that slide. She could --


you want to talk about your -- Denise is not 


here, but Laurie's here. She could talk about 


what's happened at these meetings. 


 MS. BREYER: We did have -- I think the slide 


reported that there've been five SEC outreach 

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meetings. Two of those were formal meetings 


that Denise and I put together. One was in 


Calabasas, California and one was in Idaho 


Falls, and they were people who had reached out 


to Denise and asked for more information on how 


to file an SEC petition, and so that's how we 


chose those locations. 


And the turnout was small at both of those, but 


the information that I believe that people were 


able to get at those meetings I think was 


outstanding. A lot of people thanked us for 


those meetings and came up to us afterwards who 


had no idea what a Special Exposure Cohort was 


and were able to walk away understanding. 


And we did receive an actual petition at one of 


these meetings where a petitioner handed us one 


of their petitions and spoke to at least three 


or four other people who were interested in 


filing petitions as a result of those meetings. 


So I think those are going fabulously. 


And then Denise and I, on our own, have also 


been invited out to different things. Like I 


went to a Steelworkers' meeting in DC and 


explained the SEC process, and out to Los 


Alamos before -- kind of while you all were 

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discussing the Los Alamos petition because 


people were interested in filing a follow-up to 


that class that was originally petitioned for 


in the first Los Alamos petition. And then 


Denise has also gone up to NUMEC on her own and 


worked with petitioners. 


So I think that the process is working, you 


know, as far as people who are requesting 


information and us being able to be available 


to provide that to them. 


Denise and I have also held two conference 


calls with people over the phone explaining the 


process, so I think that if she were here she 


would probably indicate that she thinks that 


her job is -- is working, as far as being able 


to provide people with information about SEC 


processes. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much. Phil 


Schofield. 


 MR. SCHOFIELD: Yeah, Laurie, just a little bit 


of feedback on your meeting you had in Los 


Alamos. Even though it was a small group 


attended, I was able to go to this. The 


feedback from claimants and people there is 


very positive, so I really believe these 

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meetings are worthwhile. 


 MS. BREYER: Thank you. 


 MR. SCHOFIELD: Thank you all. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Phil. Other comments 


or questions? 


 (No responses) 


Okay. Thank you again, Larry, very much. 


DOL PROGRAM UPDATE
 

For our next program update on Department of 


Labor, we're going to have someone who's 


actually new to our podium. It's Christie 


Long. Christie is out of the Seattle office of 


Department of Labor, and we welcome her to the 


podium to give us the DOL -- DOL program 


update. 


 MS. LONG: Good afternoon, members of the Board 


and members of the public. I am here today, as 


Mr. Zimmer (sic) -- Dr. Zimmer said, I am in 


Seattle. I am the district director in that 


office, and I am here representing Pete Turcic 


today. 


I'd like to start with the first chart is our 


activities under Part B that was effective in 


July, 2001. We have received 57,987 cases, and 


of that, 83,727 claimants; 37,538 were for 

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cancer cases and 24,524 cases have been 


referred to NIOSH. 


On the Part E side, it was enacted in October 


of '04 and we have 47,349 cases and 64,894 


claims. Almost 26,000 cases came to us from 


Department of Energy, and that was effective 


June, 2005. 


Our compensation we have paid as of July 10 


$2.7 billion in compensation, $2 billion for 


Part B, $1.5 billion for cancer and $242 


million for RECA; $725 million for Part E, and 


$154 million in medical expenses. 


 The next slide talks about our payees, and we 


have 31,581; under Part B 25,395 and of those 


almost -- well, 10,390 cancer case payees, 


4,520 NIOSH case payees and almost 5,000 RECA 


payees. Under Part E, 6,186. 


A case status for the Part B claims, 37,538 


cases with 57,226 claims; we have 28,264 cases 


that have had a final decision, 2,215 cases 


where there's a recommended decision but no 


final decision has been issued; 4,330 cases are 


currently at NIOSH. And the last bullet, I ask 


you to please make a correction. It should 


actually read 2,730 cases pending DOL 

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decisions. Initial actions is not correct. 


 The next slide talks about the final decisions. 


And if you look at the bar chart on the left, 


it's the final decisions approved. We have 


10,634. The bar to the right are final 


decisions that were denied, 17,630, and the 


breakdown for that: 2,925 were for non-covered 


employment; the next bar, 10,782 were because 


the probability of causation was less than 50 


percent; the next bar is 2,494 for insufficient 


medical evidence; the next category, 1,119 for 


non-covered; and the last 330 for ineligible 


survivors. 


 The next slide covers NIOSH referrals. We have 


made, as of July 10, 24,527 referrals to NIOSH; 


18,744 of those have been returned and 1,653 


have been withdrawn. We have had 17,091 dose 


reconstructions, and we have sent back to NIOSH 


1,508 cases where they required a rework; 4,076 


initial referrals at NIOSH. 


 The dose reconstruction case status: 17,236 


cases with a dose reconstruction, 15,230 final 


decisions, 1,592 recommended decisions but with 


no final decision, and 406 that are pending a 


recommended decision. 

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On the new SEC-related cases, 1,314 were 


withdrawn for SEC review; 958 final decisions, 


and of those 891 were approvals and 67 were 


denials; 94 recommended decisions with no final 


decision and 167 that are pending. 


 NIOSH case-related compensation -- this data is 


as of July 5 -- $811 million in compensation 


for 8,242 payees and 5,437 cases; $675 million 


on dose reconstruction cases that affected 


6,331 payees and 4,520 cases; and $136 million 


on added SEC cases with 1,911 payees and 917 


cases 


 The next slide covers the SEC petition site 


discussions, and I'm going to go down by 


facility. So starting with Hanford, the number 


of cases, 7,634; under E, 10,752. Dose 


reconstructions, 2,112; final decisions -- and 


this is B only -- 3,030. Part B approvals, 


801; Part E approvals, 807, for a total 


compensation of $135 million. 


Move next to Ames Lab. Cases, we had 283; 


under B, 390 under E. Fourteen NIOSH dose 


reconstructions, 76 final decisions for Part B. 


Part B approvals, 48; Part E approvals, 34, for 


a total compensation of $8 million. 

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The last facility, Blockson Chemical, cases, 


200; claims, 307 -- and this is Part B only. 


NIOSH dose reconstruction is 105; final 


decisions, 176. Approvals, 14; apparently we 


don't have the data or there is no data for 


Part E approvals, and total compensation is $1 


million. 


The next three are Chapman Valve, Sandia and 


Bethlehem Steel. And starting with Chapman 


Valve, 215 cases, 406 claims -- again, this is 


the Part B only. NIOSH dose reconstructions, 


73; final decisions on the B -- Part B, 175; 


Part B approvals, 34; Part E, not applicable; 


and total compensation, $5 million. 


Sandia, 220 cases, 259 claims, 35 NIOSH dose 


reconstructions, 63 final decisions, 14 Part B 


approvals, 9 E approvals, and $1 million in 


compensation. 


 And lastly, Bethlehem Steel, 1,341 Part B; Part 


E, 2,175 -- I'm sorry, no E, claims. NIOSH 


dose reconstructions, 710; final decisions Part 


B, 1,244; Part B approvals, 320; again, no Part 


E; and total compensation, $47 million. 


 That concludes my presentation. Do you have 


any questions? 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you very much, 


Christie. I'd just remind everyone that 


there's always a little discrepancy between the 


-- the NIOSH numbers and the DOL numbers, 


partially because you're using slightly 


different dates, and what goes in and out of 


the door varies a little bit from -- 


 MS. LONG: Correct. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- when you see it and when they 


see it. 


I was trying to resolve in my mind some of the 


numbers on the actual total compensations. For 


example, on one slide where you said you paid 


out $811 million on six -- 8,242 payees. And 


if -- if I take the simple $150K times that, 


those numbers don't seem to match up. Am I 


missing something on that, or can either NIOSH 


or DOL explain that to me? Stu is approaching 


the mike, so maybe he has the -- 


 MR. HINNEFELD: There -- there can be multiple 


payees on an individual claim. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, so that --


 MR. HINNEFELD: So you have multiple survivors. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, so --


 MR. HINNEFELD: I think if you --

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 DR. ZIEMER: -- the 150 may not be to each of 


the persons --


 MR. HINNEFELD: If you -- I think the numbers 


work out better if you do that total cost times 


the cases rather than the payees. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Ah, that -- that would account for 


it 'cause it looks like it should be a bigger 


number, so that's -- okay. Thank you. 


Other questions or comments? Yes, Mark. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, just a question on the 


reworks. I think you said 1,508 reworks. I'm 


trying to compare that to the recent spike on 


the NIOSH graph, and I don't think -- I'm -- 


I'm -- I'm just trying to understand if -- if ­

- if those are the same reworks. Are they --


are they -- a lot of those due to super S? 


 MS. LONG: Correct. 


 MR. GRIFFON: If so, it looks like if you look 


at NIOSH's graph over time, there's a lot more 


than 1,500 reworks. There's -- you know, you 


have one spike that was 1,300, then you add up 


all the others, 100 apiece there. 


 MR. HINNEFELD: Well, I suspect there's a 


terminology difference here -- 


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 MR. HINNEFELD: -- and things --


 MR. GRIFFON: -- that's what I'm trying to 


understand. 


 MR. HINNEFELD: -- things that we call reworks, 


DOL doesn't necessarily. Because there are 


many things that we call rework that are 


reopening, for instance. A case would be done 


and new evidence would come to light, and DOL 


would call that case a reopening. They all 


look the same to us. We call them all DOL 


reworks, so I -- I'm really confident that 


that's a terminology difference -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay, okay. 


 MR. HINNEFELD: -- and there are a number of 


different categories that either fall in or out 


of rework, depending on whether you work for 


DOL or you work for us. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. So what -- what -- I think 


we've asked -- asked this of DOL before, but 


what -- what is in that category of reworks, 


from your standpoint? What kinds of trends, 


and I think -- I think we did get at one point 


a breakdown by one of the presenters from DOL 


of what sort -- is there any trend -- you know, 


what -- are you seeing any trends in the types 

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of things that are being sent back to NIOSH to 


be reworked? 


 MS. LONG: I have not seen a trend. 


 MR. GRIFFON: No -- no trend at all, no -- 


 MS. LONG: No. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- all are very unique cases, 


no... I thought at one point we did have a 


report that there were some kind of different 


categories of things. Anyway... 


 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, I think you heard Jeff 


Kotsch --


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- last time talk to you about 


this and indicating that, again, the same as I 


had stated earlier, many of these reworks deal 


with a change in the demographic information 


around the claim -- additional cancer, 


additional employment, a new survivor, that 


kind of thing. There was -- before the PERs 


came on line, there were a small category of 


truly technical issues that we were being asked 


to rework. Now that we've got this number of 


PERs being worked, we're seeing more -- we're 


seeing the demographic -- we're seeing the 


population of reworks change in that way. 

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 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. I guess -- I guess I would 


ask for -- for the next DOL presentation maybe 


to have that same -- I know that Jeff presented 


it before, and maybe if you can continually 


update us on that breakdown as it evolves, it 


might be useful to see. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Christie, I want to pose a 


question that's basically the same one I asked 


Larry, and you may not have an answer for it, 


but nonetheless I'll pose it. NIOSH indicated 


they've seen a somewhat marked increase in the 


number of cases coming over. From Labor's 


point of view, can you identify why we are 


suddenly seeing more cases again? Do we know 


what the -- the reason for this is? Is it --


again, I thought perhaps the outreach meetings 


were stimulating more people, but can you put 


your finger on anything there? 


 MS. LONG: Well, I -- I'm not sure that I can 


put my finger on it. I would have to agree 


with Larry's assessment that I do think the SEM 


round table meetings and the outreach that the 


Department's been doing has increased the 


effort and has gotten the word out more to the 


claimant population. Our Resource Centers are 

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very active getting the word out about our 


program, and it's the only thing that I can at 


this point attribute that to. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Ask for other questions or 


comments, Board members? I didn't ask Dr. 


Roessler if she had any, or -- Gen, are you 


still on the phone? 


DR. ROESSLER: I'm still here. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Well, I assume if you have 


a question, you'll pipe up. 


DR. ROESSLER: I will. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Mark? 


 MR. GRIFFON: Just a follow-up to -- to Paul's 


question. I wonder if -- you -- you probably 


don't have this available now, but it might be 


interesting to look at those cases and whether 


they actually trended with those outreach 


sessions that you did, if you got an up-tick in 


the Idaho ones and -- you know, did they 


correspond to those meetings that you recently 


had, that might be interesting to see. It 


shouldn't take long to kind of -- do that kind 


of assessment. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: That would be interesting to do, 


but it's -- it wouldn't be fruitful at this 

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time to do it because it typically takes -- I 


don't know, Christie can speak to this better 


than I -- there's an average time that they 


know of that it takes to develop a claim before 


it's sent to us. And it's -- it's longer than 


the time frame that -- that we see from when we 


did these outreach efforts, if you're talking 


our -- our SEC outreach efforts, our worker -- 


so -- but it's something to -- it's a good 


comment, something to look into. 


 DR. ZIEMER: That -- that's right, a claim 


coming in now would have perhaps been 


initiated, as far as gathering information, 


quite some number of months ago 'cause you 


don't get it until --


 MR. ELLIOTT: We don't -- we don't get it until 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- the medical information's in, 


the --


 MR. ELLIOTT: Right. 


 MS. LONG: Correct. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: Employment history's verified. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- employment history's verified, 


so that --


 MR. ELLIOTT: That's correct. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: -- could be an extended period of 


time. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: It -- it depends. 


 DR. ZIEMER: So it would be hard to -- to 


correlate that directly. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: It can -- I -- correct me if I'm 


wrong, Christie, but it depends upon the 


circumstances of the claim. It can take 


anywhere from a week to process it and make it 


eligible to send to us, it can take months. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Mmm. Thank you. Okay, any other 

comments? 

 (No responses) 

Thank you very much. 


 MS. LONG: Thank you for your time. 


WORKING GROUP REPORTS


 DR. ZIEMER: We're a bit ahead of schedule so I 


propose that we proceed on some of our working 


group reports and just continue till -- till 


break time, and at which point we'll take the 


break and see where we are. 


(Pause) 


We'll -- we'll just go through the list of 


working groups and get the reports. I was 


checking with Mark Griffon to see whether we 

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had the Subcommittee on Dose Reconstruction 


broken out separately; but if we don't, we can 


get your report yet today and then go to the 


workgroups -- or we can do the workgroups first 


and then catch you after the break. 


One -- before we do the workgroups, I want to 


make the Board aware of one minor change in the 


alignments of assignments, and that is that 


Mike Gibson, who was recently appointed as 


chair of the work-- the workgroup -- or the 


worker outreach workgroup, workgroup on worker 


outreach, was also chairing the Savannah River 


workgroup. And in order to spend more time on 


the worker outreach program and also to attend 


some of those meetings, Mike asked if he could 


be relieved of chairing the Savannah River 


workgroup, with the understanding he would 


remain on the workgroup but not have the 


responsibility of the chair. And after 


contacting the other members of the workgroup 


to see who would volunteer or be available to 


do that, I have now appointed Mark Griffon, who 


is a member of that workgroup, to serve as 


chair. So that change has not been promulgated 


on the web site yet. I actually made that 

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appointment just a couple days ago, so it's 


very new, but you might make a note in your own 


records that Mark will be chairing that 


workgroup. 


Let -- let's go through these workgroups in 


order. You may or may not have any -- any 


actual changes to report. I have -- I'm -- let 


me take them in the order they're on the web 


site 'cause I just have to have -- have that 


open, so -- and Blockson, we're going to have a 


report from Blockson anyway, Wanda -- Wanda 


Munn is the chair -- later in the meeting or... 


Tho-- those -- those workgroups that will be -- 


for example, Chapman Valve, that will be -- 


actually have action items, we can take those 


reports at that time. I think -- I think -- I 


think Blockson is one of those, so we'll delay 


one, likewise Chapman Valve. 


Conflict of interest policy, Dr. Lockey. 


 DR. LOCKEY: Perhaps our legal counsel would 


comment on the conflict of interest workgroup. 


I -- we're on hold until we get further 


clarification about the direction we need to 


take on that. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, we -- we're awaiting 

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something. 


 MS. HOWELL: Right, we're awaiting further 


instructions from HHS regarding how we should 


proceed with that, but I've spoken with Dr. 


Lockey and Dr. Wade and we'll be proceeding 


within the next few weeks and certainly have 


something more to give you and hopefully some 


progress by the October meeting. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. The Fernald 


site profile, the chairman of that is Brad 


Clawson, who's not with us today, and other 


members of that group -- I -- the group has not 


met. They have been receiving some materials 


by e-mail that the group has been looking at, 


but -- and I'll -- I'll look to Mark and Bob, 


but my understanding is that there is no -- 


there has been no meeting since our last 


meeting of this workgroup, and none is 


currently scheduled. 


 MR. PRESLEY: That's correct, sir. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 MR. PRESLEY: We're in the process of trying to 


set up some working groups on that in 


conjunction with one that Wanda's got, one that 


I'm trying to get ready for the Test Site, so 

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we're trying to --


 DR. ZIEMER: Trying to find a time -- 


 MR. PRESLEY: Right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- to schedule the meeting. Yes, 


okay. 


The Hanford site workgroup, Hanford's on the 


agenda so we'll get that report later. 


Los Alamos is Mark Griffon. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Los Alamos workgroup meeting 


hasn't met, either. I think one thing we, as 


the workgroup, want to und-- want to understand 


a little better is where NIOSH stands on the 


site profile modifications. I think they -- my 


understanding is from '75 on they're -- they're 


doing some research and further modifications 


and I guess -- we -- we've kind of been on hold 


with this and -- and -- and I -- I didn't want 


to push for a workgroup meeting until we had 


something that SC&A could actually respond to. 


And if things are still evolving, I don't think 


it's a good time for SC&A to dig in and do a 


lot of legwork or -- or for the workgroup to 


meet until we know a little better what the 


status is on the LANL site profile and the -- 


maybe Jim... 

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DR. NETON: We'd be in a better position to 


answer that question tomorrow when Sam -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 


DR. NETON: -- Glover arrives. He's intimately 


involved with the site profile revisions, so if 


we could defer the answer till tomorrow, that 


would be good. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. So I think we-- we're 


anxious to move it along, but we don't want to 


-- we -- we don't want to get ahead of 


something that we know is being modified by 


NIOSH. It doesn't make a lot of sense to -- to 


spend energy now when -- when something's 


evolving -- and maybe Joe can help me out here, 


too. 


 MR. FITZGERALD: Just -- just to clarify -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 MR. FITZGERALD: -- I think the -- the question 


that we had was the additional work that was 


being done on the post-'75 SEC evaluation, 


understanding of course that there's further 


work that's going to be underway and we had an 


action from the workgroup to look at that SEC. 


But clearly with the SEC being decided through 


'75, the question now is what do we do post­
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'75, and I think we're in that holding pattern, 


seeing perhaps what NIOSH is doing. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. John Mauro, did you have an 


additional comment on that? 


DR. MAURO: I think we have a recurring theme 


of that nature. This is also true for Fernald. 


It's also true for Hanford. So what we have, 


and -- and -- that -- that's I guess worth -- 


worthy of keeping note of that, there are a 


number of site profile reviews that were in the 


closeout process when the SEC stepped in. So I 


think that is probably -- has eclipsed, in 


effect, the -- the site profile's been more or 


less eclipsed by the SEC. And in effect, you 


really -- in the process of addressing I would 


say the SEC issue, we're also simultaneously of 


course addressing many of the site profile 


issues. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. Right. Thank you. The 


next one on the list is Linde Ceramics. Dr. 


Roessler, do you have anything there to report? 


DR. ROESSLER: Yes, Paul? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


DR. ROESSLER: Can you hear me okay? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Very well. 

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DR. ROESSLER: Oh, good. There's a lot of 


noise on the line. 


The Linde workgroup has not met recently. We 


met on March 26th and at that time we turned 


over some work to ORAU. We had hoped to have a 


response by June 29th. On July 9th I got a 


note from Chris Crawford at OCAS saying that 


there will be a delay in completing the work -- 


and this work involved the urinalysis data that 


we need for the Linde review. He said when I 


have an update, I'll let you know. 


So that's all I know at this point. I don't 


know if anybody's there from ORAU who can give 


us any more information. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Well, no, there isn't, but 


that -- that's similar to some of the others. 


There's pieces of information that we're 


awaiting, again, in this particular case before 


we can move forward. 


 Nevada Test Site, Robert Presley. 


 MR. PRESLEY: I talked to Mark Rollefor-- Mark 


Rollefus (sic) week before last, and Mark said 


that we are waiting still for some of the 


technical data basis documents to be completed 


so that we can go back as a working group and 

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make our final decision. The holdup has been 


the amount of work that NIOSH has had. 


Hopefully we'll have something on this before 


our next meeting -- full Board meeting and we 


can put it to a vote. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. The workgroup on 


procedure reviews headed by Wanda Munn, and 


they have had a meeting and another one 


planned. Wanda, give us an update. 


 MS. MUNN: Yes, we have had -- as most of the 


Board members are aware, our workgroup has not 


met for almost a year, primarily because there 


was so much activity going on with respect to 


the material that we needed to cover. A large 


number of procedures were in the process of 


review and a great many new technical documents 


of one sort or another were being generated in 


response to some earlier work that had been 


done. SC&A, who's done an excellent job in 


recent months of pulling together the current 


matrix of the procedures that we're going to be 


having to address during this second go-round 


and during the workgroup meeting, which we had 


by teleconference on the 26th of June, we 


identified several items that were of major 

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interest to us, one being the lack of clarity 


that many of our working group members had with 


respect to outstanding issues from the first 


batch of procedures we had gone through. 


 Since that time Kathy Behling and other members 


of SC&A have provided for us an updated list of 


that matrix from the first group of procedures 


so that we are very clear on which issues need 


to be addressed at our upcoming meeting. And 


we have received one piece of information from 


our NIOSH components with respect to the second 


outstanding item that we had in the current 


group of procedures that we have under review. 


So we're scheduled for a meeting -- face-toface meeting in Cincinnati on the 29th of 


August, with the expectation that at that time 


NIOSH will have had an opportunity to address 


more fully the outstanding issues on matrix 


number two. And we anticipate being able to 


close out, with any luck at all, virtually all 


of the remaining items on number one -- with 


luck. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Our workgroup on Rocky 


Flats has been very active over the last couple 


of months leading up to our last meeting, and 

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now they're catching their breath. Mark, 


anything else that we need to report on -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, no --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- on Rocky? 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- no report at this time on 


Rocky. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


DR. MAURO: Excuse me, Dr. Ziemer, I'm sorry to 


interrupt --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah --


DR. MAURO: -- regarding --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- John --


DR. MAURO: -- regarding the procedures, this 


is John Mauro. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


DR. MAURO: One -- one of the procedures that 


are amongst the set of 45 that we're in the 


home stretch of completing, but one very 


important one has been delivered and that is 


the OTIB-52 procedure regarding construction 


workers. So that's a real special one and I 


know lots of folks are very interested. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


DR. MAURO: You do have that in front of you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. That was just recently 

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distributed, the review of OTIB-51 on -- or is 


it 52 -- 52 on the construction workers. Did 


all the Board members get that, or just the 


workgroup? Everybody got it? Okay, thank you. 


Workgroup on SEC issues, and that's a group 


that's looking particularly at the 250-day 


issue and the interpretation of that. Dr. 


Melius is chairing that. I can report to you 


that they have not met since our last full 


Board meeting, so there's nothing at the moment 


to report on that. 


Workgroup on SEC petitions that did not qualify 


for evaluation. I think Dr. Lockey gave us the 


closeout report of that last time. 


 DR. LOCKEY: That's correct. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And so for all practical purposes, 


much as we like to keep -- institutionalize 


things, that workgroup should disappear from -- 


or should be shown as workgroup emeritus or 


something like that. 


 DR. LOCKEY: It has disappeared. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And then workgroup on worker 


outreach, and Mike Gibson. 


 MR. GIBSON: We have not met yet, but hopefully 


now that Rocky's done, we can have maybe a 

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teleconference call in the next few weeks and, 


before the September meeting, have some of the 


workgroup members attend some of these outreach 


meetings and have something more to report 


then. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. It appears that 


I skipped the Savannah River Site, and I 


already announced that the leadership of that 


has transitioned to Mark, but I think in 


Savannah River also there's information being 


gathered by -- who's our contact on that, the ­

- the --


MS. CHANG: Sam and Joe. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- Sam and Joe, Joe Fitzgerald, 


and either Mark or Joe -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- any comments on Savannah River 


 MR. GRIFFON: I can --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- you... 


 MR. GRIFFON: I can give a small -- I mean I 


just took this over, and Joe can chime in if I 


get this incorrect, but yeah, I think site -- 


Savannah River is only a site profile review, 


and we have a -- a status report or a interim 

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report, I guess, from SC&A at this point. We ­

- we did have a classified meeting down at the 


Savannah River Site to look at a database, and 


we -- out -- out of that meeting -- I mean it ­

- it's actually quite interesting 'cause the 


database we were looking at wasn't the database 


we thought we were going to look at, so that's 


one of the things we have to resolve is this 


sort of database pedigree question. And out of 


that meeting arose several actions and I've -- 


I've -- I volunteered to take the task of 


getting some action items out of that workgroup 


meeting and circulating them to the workgroup 


and to NIOSH as a reminder. I think we all 


understood when we left the meeting that 


certain parties had certain actions, but I 


think we need a reminder, a memo, of these 


actions. And I'm just getting around to 


finalizing that so I'm going to circulate that 


soon. But I think otherwise, the interim 


report is out there and I think we need a faceto-face workgroup probably to work through some 


of the-- these questions. But we -- my first 


preference would be to get a sort of status 


report on some of these actions that were 

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arranged for in the February meeting in 


Savannah and maybe Joe can add on if... 


 MR. FITZGERALD: Yeah, this is Joe Fitzgerald. 


I think the only thing I would say is that this 


is the first of a kind. This is a follow-up to 


a site profile, which we haven't done before, 


and it's becoming clear that as we've gone 


through this process that, you know, we can 


close some of these issues out -- and we have, 


in fact. Sam Glover, the workgroup and 


ourselves have closed out a number of issues. 


But there are some issues that require data, 


information from DOE, and so this is going to 


sort of have a continuum that will take a 


little bit of time. And what we're proposing 


is to go ahead and take this so-called status 


summary, this -- you know, work progress 


report, and go ahead and put that together -- 


not do too much more work with it but, you 


know, make it available to the Board as here is 


the progress of the follow-up to this review 


that the Board assigned us, and we're going to 


continue chasing some of these remaining 


issues. But here's where we are now, here's 


what's been settled, here's what's remains, 

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here's some of the issues that we've looked at, 


and make that available and -- but then move on 


and work some of these other issues. So that's 


what we're planning to do in terms of issuing a 


sort of a interim report or progress report 


that we could make available to the Board. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 MR. FITZGERALD: And that current draft right 


now is with Sam. He's looking at it from the 


standpoint of just looking at the status and 


the -- you know, ascertaining whether or not he 


-- he agrees and whether the workgroup's on 


board. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. Let the record 


show that Dr. Melius has joined us. Welcome, 


Jim. Jim, we're just doing the updates on our 


working groups. One that we sort of reported 


for you, but I'll give you an opportunity to 


update further if you wish, it's on the SEC 


issues, the 250-day issues and related items. 


I -- I reported that that workgroup has not met 


since our last meeting, and I don't think 


there's any other material that -- or is there 


some more material --


 DR. MELIUS: What -- there -- there -- 

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 DR. ZIEMER: -- that you want to report on? 


 DR. MELIUS: There -- there is some more 


material. Jim Neton -- we had that one meeting 


that we had agreed to try to identify some of 


the information, some particular cases and 


exposure situations fro-- at the Test -- Nevada 


Test Site, and I believe that relatively 


recently has been provided to SC&A. I got an 


e-mail I believe from Arjun about that. I 


don't know, Arjun, if you want to add a little 


bit to that. 


 DR. MAKHIJANI: No, we -- we're -- we've sort 


of begun looking at it, but we don't have 


anything substantive to report. Jim --


 DR. ZIEMER: But you have received the document 


from -- from NIOSH and so on. 


 DR. MAKHIJANI: We did -- we did receive the 


document --


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 DR. MAKHIJANI: -- from NIOSH, so --


 DR. ZIEMER: And then -- so the -- the 


workgroup will be awaiting SC&A response -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- for that. All right. Thank 


you for that update. 

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 MR. PRESLEY: Hey, Paul? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes --


 MR. PRESLEY: I just received --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- Bob Presley. 


 MR. PRESLEY: I just received an e-mail from 


Gen, and she asked that everybody please try to 


speak into the mikes. She's having a hard time 


hearing. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. Gen, we'll try 


to speak up, but we had trouble this morning 


with people at the -- on the phones hearing us, 


as well. It may have something to do with the 


equipment here, we don't know really. 


DR. ROESSLER: It is a lot of clicking every 


now and then. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, I -- I think that's some 


background on the line. We're not hearing at 


this end at all. 


DR. ROESSLER: Yeah, I think if people on the 


line could mute their phones, that would help. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


DR. ROESSLER: Thanks. 


 DR. ZIEMER: If you are listening by phone, if 


you're not speaking, mute your phone so that we 


don't pick up the background noises. Thank 

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you. 


 Any other comments on the workgroup? We're 


going to pick up the dose reconstruction 


subcommittee report right after the break. So 


let's take our break now and then we'll pick up 


at that point. 


 (Whereupon, a recess was taken from 2:30 p.m. 


to 3:00 p.m.) 


 DR. ZIEMER: We're now ready to reconvene, if 


you would take your seats, please. 


(Pause) 


SUBCOMMITTEE REPORT
 

We're going to continue with the agenda item 


which is called Working Group Reports, and 


under that category, Working Group Reports, we 


also include the report of our subcommittee. 


We have one subcommittee, which is the 


Subcommittee on Dose Reconstruction. That 


subcommittee met this morning under the 


direction of its chair, Mark Griffon, and so 


we're -- we're going to ask Mark to give us an 


update on the activities of the dose 


reconstruction subcommittee. And also I 


believe they have some recommendations for us 


today, so Mark, let -- let's hear from you on 

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the dose reconstruction subcommittee. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. Yeah, a lot of -- a lot of 


the folks in the room now were here for the 


earlier subcommittee, but I will go through -- 


a fairly brief subcommittee meeting this 


morning. We did talk about mainly three 


topics. One was the blind reviews for the dose 


reconstruction process. The second was the 


advanced versus basic reviews that we wanted to 


-- to see going forward, whether we needed to 


further look at the original scope of the 


advanced reviews and see if we needed to 


integrate more of that into the future advanced 


reviews. And finally just a status update on 


the -- all the sets of reviews that we've been 


doing and where they stand and where they're -- 


where -- where we're going in the near future. 


On the first topic with the blind reviews, we 


had -- we had discussed this at previous 


meetings and I think we sort of had some 


general discussions on how to -- how we want -- 


wanted to conduct the blind reviews. It -- it 


is in our original contract with SC&A to have 


SC&A conduct blind reviews. We haven't done 


any to this point, so we -- we had discussed 

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sort of the -- the need to do them, how we 


would go about them and the process for a sort 


of case selection. And out of this -- out of 


this morning's subcommittee meeting we came up 


with a recommendation from the subcommittee to 


the Board to consider, and I guess I can just 


read that -- that recommendation out and then 


we can -- we can discuss it from there. 


 The subcommittee recommends that the Board 


should task SC&A with conducting two blind 


reviews, both being done with two different 


approaches. The first approach would be a dose 


reconstruction using available NIOSH tools, and 


the second approach would be a dose 


reconstruction using best health physics 


practices without the use of NIOSH tools but in 


accordance with the letter and intent of the 


statute and the regulations. And we were -- we 


also mentioned that -- or I guess part of the 


motion was that this be conducted as part of 


the '07 -- FY '07 activities, at least 


initiated in '07. It may not be completed in 


'07 -- probably won't be completed in '07. 


 DR. ZIEMER: So that is the motion? 


 MR. GRIFFON: That's the motion, yes. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: And for clarity, by '07 activities 


you're referring to the tasking of our 


contractor, SC&A, in terms of -- of that 


activity. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Correct, yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. That motion doesn't require 


a second since it comes from a subcommittee. 


It's on the floor for discussion. 


Wanda? 


 MS. MUNN: Further clarification, perhaps I 


missed it, but our discussion was indicating 


that these blind reviews were going to take 


place from raw data, specifically -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 MS. MUNN: -- and that was -- I did not hear 


that incorporated in the motion. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I -- I should -- I was 


trying to be brief with the motion, but when I 


-- I can expand that the -- these two 


approaches, the first approach would be a DR -- 


dose reconstruction using available NIOSH 


tools, but -- but the initial data that -- that 


we give or that -- that SC&A gets in this blind 


review process would be the exact same data 


that a dose reconstructor at NIOSH would 

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receive. In other words, it would be the raw 


DOE records, along with the interview and other 


correspondence, but it would not include any of 


the analysis that NIOSH did in reconstructing 


dose. So it was just -- just be the raw data 


and the interview and other -- other sort of 


administrative information and -- and that 


would be -- you know, that would be what they 


were provided up front. 


In option -- in option B, they would be given 


that same set of information, but then they -- 


instead of using the NIOSH workbooks and 


procedures and tools, they would just use 


basically the -- good health physics practices. 


And part of the -- part of the rationale for 


that is we want to -- this is to sort of test 


the -- one of our charters, which is the 


scientific validity of the dose reconstruction 


program, so you know, if it -- it could work 


very well and be consistent with NIOSH's output 


if they use the same tools, but what if they 


just went back to basics and said okay, we're 


not going to use some of the -- some of the 


spreadsheets that NIOSH uses, for instance, 


have fairly sophisticated approaches for 

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calculating uncertainties and incorporating 


them into the dose estimates. If you just -- 


if you're going to do a best -- best estimate 


using best health physics practices, sort of 


going back to the basics and using a calculator 


to run your numbers, you know, you might not 


have all the sophistication in the uncertainty 


analysis, but -- but you -- you know, you might 


-- you'll get a reasonable comparison with 


these other methods, as well. And -- and then 


it's sort of -- you know, it's another way to 


validate is NIOSH's method scientifically 


robust. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Does that answer your 


question, Wanda? 


 MS. MUNN: Yes, it does. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. And Dr. Melius? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, my concern would be why only 


a sample of two? That seems awfully small to 


make a comparison or to reach any -- if we're 


trying to understand either the validity or 


which approach is -- is better or more 


appropriate to do, I'm not sure what we're 


going to conclude with a, you know, cell size 


of one on each side. And it seems to me we've 

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postponed doing those -- doing these for quite 


some time. I think the blind reviews have, you 


know, potentially significant value and I think 


they're -- is, as we had originally discussed, 


a significant part of -- of us as a Board 


meeting our charge in the legislation to 


evaluate the dose reconstruction process. So I 


guess I'm a little puzzled why only -- are we 


starting with two, and particularly why are 


starting with two and splitting them into, you 


know, two different approaches and what are we 


-- where do we go from there? I mean... 


 DR. ZIEMER: Let me respond in part, and I'm 


not on the subcommittee but I did listen to 


their deliberations. I would look on this as a 


pilot study. They wanted to try a couple and ­

- and -- and then see if thi-- is this the 


approach we want to use for blind review. 


We've not done blind reviews, and there's some 


question as to how they should be done. I 


think, as I understood it, they were going to 


evaluate this immediately after so they could 


determine what additional number might be 


needed and if indeed this is the approach that 


should be used. But --

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 DR. MELIUS: But -- but --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- perhaps Mark should -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, that -- that was the only ­

- the justification was -- you know, this -- 


let's try this out and see how this works. I 


understand your concern of two is not a very -- 


very large sample to try something and see if 


it works. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, 'cause -- if I can just -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- I mean if it -- the desire is 


to compare the -- get some estimate of the 


amount of work time that would be required and 


sort of the budget and how much -- well, budget 


and time we need to commit on the part of SC&A, 


I also don't think that a -- you know, a sample 


of, you know, one from each method is going to 


-- or approach is going to be adequate because 


it really is -- lot's going to depend on your 


selection of the cases, how, you know, 


complicated their -- their exposure history is 


and what they were exposed to and so forth, so 


I guess --


 MR. GRIFFON: Well --


 DR. MELIUS: -- I -- I -- I'm -- I'm puzzled 

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why we're only committing at this point to 


doing two, I guess is the thing. It seems to 


me we need to -- we've delayed this long enough 


and we ought to be thinking about -- 'bout 


doing more. If it's a budget issue, then let's 


talk about it in terms of budget. If it -- if 


it's an issue of method, I guess I'm a little 


concerned at the end of it how -- how are we 


going to know which one is better, or more 


appropriate? 


 MR. GRIFFON: We -- we do -- just for 


clarification, we were saying two cases and use 


both methods on both cases, but -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, even so --


 MR. GRIFFON: -- still -- still, the numbers 


are small, yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. LOCKEY: Mark, let me ask you a question. 


If -- if the two cases were done in a blind 


fashion and they come out similar, does that 


answer a question; or if they come out 


dissimilar, does that answer a question? 


What's -- will be the next step in either of 


those outcomes? 

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 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I -- I think -- I think -- 


I'm not sure that -- that -- that -- I guess 


that's part of why we wanted to keep a small 


number as we're not sure what outcome we're 


going to get out of this. But I think part of 


what we're going to find out is -- is 


information of -- of not just the final result, 


but information so-- you know, along the way of 


-- of how -- what we found out in doing the 


dose reconstructions each way, so... 


 DR. LOCKEY: So perhaps the process is -- is -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah --


 DR. LOCKEY: -- as important as the outcome 


here, and then take next steps? 


 MR. GRIFFON: That's at least what I think -- 


 DR. LOCKEY: Okay. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- at this point, but -- you 


know, and then maybe we -- you know, we do need 


a larger sample eventually. I think we 


budgeted for two blind reviews for each year, 


didn't we, initially? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, the budget -- we're budgeted 


this fiscal year for two blind reviews, and 


we're budgeted next year I think for two, 


although we haven't approved next year's budget 

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and that could certainly change. But John 


described for the group how they would approach 


this in terms of internally making sure the two 


things were done completely separate, and you 


may want to describe that. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I think we know. 


 DR. MELIUS: I guess my concern is not hearing 


the methods or -- or about the particular 


methods involved. It's -- I'm trying to get a 


sense is the subcommittee -- are we committed 


to continuing to do blind reviews or -- or are 


we --


 MS. MUNN: Yes. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- going to do two and just stop 


and say -- and we're trying to evaluate whether 


they're worth doing because -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: No, I --


 DR. MELIUS: -- then I have a real concern that 


the -- the sample size just isn't big enough 


and that we're fooling ourselves if we think we 


can reach conclusions. If we're trying to 


reach out -- you know, work out what's the best 


approach to use --


 MR. GRIFFON: That's what I think. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- then -- then, you know, I guess 

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I can understand a little bit better and I'm a 


little bit more comfortable with sort of this 


pilot test and then moving -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I'm not sure I'm -- I'm not 


sure I'm speaking for the whole subcommittee, 


but -- but I -- my intent was that we'd choose 


a small sample size to work out how we want to 


do these blind reviews, and we are committed -- 


I mean the original scope says these blind 


reviews and we estimated two per year -- 


 DR. LOCKEY: Yeah. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- and I think we're still 


committed to doing more of these, but we just 


don't want to assign ten and then find out, you 


know, we went about this all wrong. We wasted 


a lot of -- so we want to -- we want to try to 


refine it after these first -- this pilot sort 


of --


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- test. 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. That helps. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Sorry. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Other comments or questions? Yes, 


Larry Elliott has a comment. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: I've -- I've listened to the 

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deliberation on blind reviews from the start of 


the program, if you'll recall. I'm really 


interested in what you do with this and have -- 


it's been, you know, my advice to you all to 


get on with it and do it because I think 


there's a lot to be gained from -- from this 


examination. 


I -- I would like to challenge the Board here 


to -- to come to grips with what are the 


questions that you're trying to answer in a 


blind review, because I think there's two 


obvious ones. One obvious one that you've been 


thinking of all along, you know, how well did 


NIOSH do in reconstructing the dose for a given 


claim using their approaches, their -- their -- 


their tools. And I -- I think there's many 


more questions that could be asked. If you put 


your questions down, maybe then you can reflect 


upon what you see in your review process and 


maybe we can see some answers. 


To me it's very interesting because NIOSH -- 


when you talk about basic health physics 


principles, Mark, that's what we feel we have 


based this whole program on, and that's what we 


have done in the development of our tools. 

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We've used basic health physics principles, 


good industrial hygiene practices and 


understanding of exposure scenarios. And where 


we needed to draw assumptions, we've tried to 


make those assumptions reasonable and claimant 


favorable in the context of a compensation 


program that requires us to do -- do all of 


this in as timely a manner as we possibly can 


to treat all the claims. 


And so, you know, one of the questions could be 


is there another approach that gets the job 


done with more accuracy and in a quicker time 


frame. I'm all ears. 


So I'm -- I'm just -- I don't want to be 


belligerent here, but I really think that I 


don't want to see this opportunity missed in 


blind reviews. I think they are important. It 


is, to me, one of the ultimate external peer 


reviews that we could ask for. Can some other 


health physicist pick up a claim, with the 


claim information that's been developed as a 


case file, and come out with a dose 


reconstruction in a timely manner that gives a 


compensation decision that is accurate. That's 


what we've been asked to do in this law and 

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that's what we've been striving to do from day 


one. 


So I -- you know, sorry to be preaching here, 


but that's what I would say to you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Good comment. Jim, 


you have an additional comment? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. Let me -- since we're 


talking about the philosophy of why we're doing 


these and so forth, and I appreciate Larry's 


comments, but another reason to do blind 


reviews was to -- to assure that NIOSH is 


obtaining all the necessary and available 


information for doing a -- a dose 


reconstruction. And those of us who are 


original members of the Board remember that we 


spent a lot of time arguing and -- and -- about 


whether or not we would include independent 


interviews of the claimants as -- as part of 


this process. And I'm not necessarily bringing 


that issue up again, but -- but I do think that 


that's the -- the other aspect of the need for 


doing blind reviews, and I think, you know, 


that that is also very important that we 


provide some sort of verification that all the 


information that was appropriate and relevant 

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to a dose reconstruction was -- was obtained, 


to the extent that we are capable of doing that 


in our audit. And again another reason for I 


think the need to go on with this process and 


to move it along. 


 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I -- that's a very 


interesting comment 'cause we had the same 


comment during the subcommittee from Arjun -- 


or John. And I think what is very clear to me 


now is that the subcommi-- I think I would 


offer that the subcommittee draft a set of 


goals for -- I -- I don't think it should slow 


this motion, necessarily, 'cause I think we 


could start the process of -- of -- of doing 


this work. But in the meantime, I think the 


subcommittee, parallel to this, should draft 


goals. And before SC&A gets the assignment, 


obviously we would have these -- these goals 


discussed and finalized, but goals for this 


blind review process. I think that is 


important. 


The -- the one thing I want to say, I -- Jim, I 


think the point you just made is a very 


important goal of our dose review program, but 


I think earlier this morning I said that I 

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didn't think it was part of our blind review 


process that that -- that item that you just 


mentioned, I tried to capture in the advanced 


review section and -- and what I would see as 


something that we haven't covered in our 


advanced reviews in the past. My concern on 


doing that with a blind review is -- you know ­

- well, I just don't think we can capture in 


the blind review -- we -- we want to compare 


apples and apples, I think, and we want to have 


-- have the same information being used by the 


dose reconstructor from -- I guess it's 


answering different questions, so I think we 


should -- should set out what we want to 


answer, but you know, in that case we're saying 


give the NIOSH dose reconstructor all the same 


information as you're giving SC&A and see what 


kind of answers we get as far as -- as dose 


estimates. I -- I -- but I do want to say that 


that goal that you just mentioned I think is -- 


is one major one that I mentioned in our 


advanced review that I don't think we've fully 


captured, that -- that question of -- and 


people that were in the subcommittee meeting 


earl-- earlier this morning know that I 

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mentioned the data gathering section. I'll --


I'll hand out our original scope, I have extra 


copies here. Data gathering, part of it was 


did -- did NIOSH include all relevant 


information from all sources, and I don't think 


SC&A in their audits thus far have sort of 


drilled down to examine that question. But I 


was capturing that in sort of the advanced 


review questions, not in the blind review 


questions. But, you know, that -- that's sort 

of my fo--

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, Jim, you -- additional 

comment? 

 DR. MELIUS: I would just argue that it should 

be part of both 'cause I -- and I think just 


even to address the issue that Larry raised, is 


there a more efficient way of conducting a -- 


the dose reconstruction process, and I don't 


think you can consider that without considering 


the totality information that was available or 


should have been available for a particular 


dose -- dose reconstruction. And if someone 


missed the availability of certain types of 


information, that could very well mean that the 


process was, you know, less efficient or -- as 

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well as less accurate. So I would just argue 


they're part of both. I don't think one can do 


a full evaluation of -- of whether all the 


informa-- you know, NIOSH is obtaining all the 


information necessary and available for doing 


dose reconstructions as part of the blind 


reviews. I think that takes something more and 


that's what I think you were getting at when 


you were talking about the advanced reviews -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- but either way, I think it 


needs to go forward. I would just argue that 


you've included as part -- I think it's 


inevitable as part of a blind review that you ­

- you look into that. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, one part of a blind review 


might be that the -- the dose reconstructor in 


this case, whether it's using NIOSH method or ­

- or basic health physics principles might, as 


part of their findings, say there's 


insufficient information in the file to address 


some particular question. Not that they 


necessarily would have to pursue it at that 


point, but it could be a type of finding that 


might emerge. 

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 DR. MELIUS: Uh-huh. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Additional comments? 

 (No responses) 

Okay. We have before us the motion, which is 


to approve, as part of this year's tasking of 


SC&A, to get underway with two blind reviews. 


One to be -- well, both to be done in two ways, 


one using the -- basically what we'll call the 


NIOSH methodology, the other using basic health 


physics principles. Is that the -- the thrust 


of the motion? I -- make sure we all --


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- understand what the motion is. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, and -- and I just --


 DR. ZIEMER: So two reviews, each done two 


ways. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And -- and John Mauro described 


for the subcommittee how they would do that and 


make sure internally that the two groups doing 


these weren't talking to each other to give 


each other clues. They would truly be blind 


from each other, as well. 


Board, are you ready to then vote on this 


motion? 

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All in favor, aye? 


 (Affirmative responses) 


Those opposed, no? 


 (No responses) 


Abstentions? 


 (No responses) 


Gen Roessler, are you on the line? 


DR. ROESSLER: I'm on the line and I voted aye. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. Then --


UNIDENTIFIED: Aye. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Was that Gen twice? Did you --


DR. ROESSLER: No. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- vote twice, Gen? 


DR. ROESSLER: No, that was somebody else. 


 DR. ZIEMER: It sounded like a female voice. 


only recognized --


DR. ROESSLER: It did, but it wasn't me. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- Gen as being on the phone. 


Then the motion passes and we will so charge 


SC&A with proceeding with that. 


 And David Staudt, are you -- Staudt, still on 


the line from this morning, our contractor 


(sic)? 


 (No responses) 


Apparently not, but I think he's aware of the 


I 
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recommendation that was going to be made. 


Mark, do you have any other comments or -- on 


the other issues and -- 


 MR. GRIFFON: (Unintelligible) items I do, 


yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Go ahead. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Just going to hand around -- I 


think some people got this this morning. It's 


the same thing I handed around the 


subcommittee, but I -- for people who didn't 


see it, this is the -- there's a four-page 


document coming around and it's got -- the 


first two pa-- first two and a half pages are 


the original --


 DR. ZIEMER: Are these -- are these available 


for the public, as well, do we know? 


 MR. GRIFFON: Do we --


 DR. ZIEMER: Did we make extra copies? 


 MR. GRIFFON: We made some extras. We have 


some extras here. We can make --


 DR. ZIEMER: If anyone didn't get one and needs 


one, we'll provide them. 


 MR. GRIFFON: We can make them available, yeah. 


The first two and a half pages are the original 


scope of -- the original scope for the dose 

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reconstruction reviews, and first item says 


basic review, and it gives the subheadings. 


Then advanced review is on page two, and then 


half-way down page two I have added this in -- 


this discussion below, and that's probably 


where -- where I'll focus you right now, just 


for purposes of discussion, the scope which 


needs to be covered in future advanced reviews. 


And this certainly was just a discussion 


document in the subcommittee. We didn't come 


to any formal motion at -- at this point, but ­

- and I developed this for discussion from the 


subcommittee, so we're -- we're just beginning 


to discuss this. But these items A, and then 


on page three, B and C, you'll see are part of 


that original scope for the advanced reviews. 


And I added the underlined sections to sort of 


highlight what I felt were some -- you know, 


some key phrases that I don't think thus far in 


our dose reconstruction reviews that we really 


focused on these things. We've probably been 


doing, I think, what -- what John Mauro has 


characterized as realistic reviews, probably 


more than the basic but missing some of these 


components of the advanced review. 

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And this morning we just sort of kicked in -- 


kicked off this topic, but I -- I -- I asked 


the other subcommittee members, and we'll come 


back to the Board with a proposal on this, but 


I asked the other subcommittee members to look 


at this and consider which items we want to add 


for future advanced reviews. And I think 


there's a couple of considerations, and at the 


bottom of page four I sort of outline some of 


those considerations because if you look at 


item A, when we drafted this we didn't really 


have a lot of site profiles. I don't even 


think we had a methodology for reviewing the 


site profiles at that point. Some of the 


things in site (sic) A I think it -- it could 


be easily argued that if we're doing a robust 


site profile review, some of -- of items A-1, 2 


and 3 may not be as important in a dose 


reconstruction review. 


On the other hand, there's a lot of sites for 


which there are no site profiles or the Board 


is not doing a site profile review. And so for 


some of those cases it may be relevant to say 


let's tag this one as an advanced review and 


let's make sure we capture some of these 

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advanced scopes that I've underlined here and 


highlighted. So we haven't come to any 


conclusions on this, but I thought that -- we ­

- we haven't sort -- we -- the subcommittee's 


not offering any recommendation at this point, 


but we are planning to draft language to better 


define what the FY '08 advanced reviews will be 


for SC&A. And also sort of the -- the 


mechanics of how we go about this, how -- for 


example, we -- we may have sort of an iterative 


step where we -- we -- we may define something 


in -- in -- initially as an advanced review. 


SC&A may open up the full case file and say, 


you know what, I know you wanted an advanced 


review on this but it really doesn't make sense 


for the following reason and, you know, it 


would be better off just to treat this one as a 


basic review. Or vice versa. So sometimes 


when you open up these case files and look at 


the case, all the facts of the case, you have a 


different sort of view of it than when you just 


look at the case statistics. You know, was it 


a best estimate versus an over or 


underestimate, or things like that are 


sometimes not -- don't fully capture the -- the 

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essence of the cases. So we -- we may have an 


iterative process, and that's sort of the 


mechanics of how -- how we put this in place. 


So we've -- we -- we on the subcommittee are -- 


are planning on meeting in September -- late -- 


late August or early September and drafting -- 


or refining this scope or -- and also outlining 


the mechanics of how we will put this into 


place for FY '08 advanced reviews, and that's 


sort of where we stand on that at this point, 


no -- no real recommendations to the Board. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, so no action required, this 


is for information. Are there -- are there 


questions for Mark or discussion on this? 


 MR. PRESLEY: Well --


 DR. ZIEMER: Mr. Presley. 


 MR. PRESLEY: From the meeting this morning, 


Mark's going to go ahead and e-mail this to the 


-- to the working group (sic) members for a 


comment, and then we'll -- I presume -- get 


back together as a -- a working group (sic) on 


that. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yes. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. And at some point will 


come with a formal recommendation to the Board. 

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 MR. GRIFFON: Ho-- not at some point. 


Hopefully in the Aug-- in the October meeting. 


We want to move this along, so -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: I consider that at some point in 


the -- okay, very good. Thank you. Other 


comments or questions? 


 (No responses) 


 Okay, thank you very much. 


 MR. GRIFFON: I would -- I would -- if you want 


me to give a quick update on the case status, 


it --


 DR. ZIEMER: Sure, yeah, do that. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- very quick, just to run down ­

- the only other thing we did in the 


subcommittee was status of the case reviews, 


and we are still working on the fourth set of 


cases. We have some outstanding issues on the 


fourth set. A sort of reanalysis was done by 


NIOSH on -- on some cases, and SC&A now has 


that, but -- but needs a little more time 


before we're ready to come back to our -- our 


comment resolution process. 


We -- we are close to clos-- closing out the 


fifth set of -- of cases, sort of at the same 


stage, although not as many difficult issues 

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left on the table. But we went through the 


resolution process and we're at sort of final 


closeout. Our hope is that in the next -- in 


this September -- late August/early September 


meeting we can also sort of finalize the fourth 


and fifth set of cases. 


The sixth set of cases is -- a matrix has been 


finalized by SC&A and we're ready to bring that 


into the workgroup process, and hopefully -- 


that may even be on the agenda for -- for that 


meeting, if we have time. 


The seventh set of cases SC&A is -- is now 


completing the review and they're planning 


within the next two, three weeks to contact the 


Board teams and have the conference calls with 


the Board members on individual cases. And 


then subsequent to that, a matrix would -- 


would be brought forward to the subcommittee 


the same way. 


 And finally the eighth set of cases, we just 


selected these cases. NIOSH is -- is putting 


together the cases to send to -- to SC&A. They 


haven't received those yet, but they will begin 


work on that and that'll be the -- that's the 


final set for your FY '07 budget. Right? 

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Yeah, John is nodding yes, so... 


And I guess that's it unless you -- you said 


you had the teams for the eighth set, are you ­

-


 DR. ZIEMER: For the eighth set, there are 30 


cases that NI-- or that will be reviewed in 


that group, and I have assigned the -- the 


teams are -- these are teams of two so there 


are six review teams of two people. Each team 


will have five cases to review. I'll 


distribute those assignments at our workgroup 


meeting Thursday, so those are ready to go. 


UPDATE ON SEC PETITIONS
 

Okay. Now we're a little bit ahead of schedule 


and, as usual, we try to be flexible and we 


have an item from -- if we look ahead, an item 


that we can pick up at this point. It's --


it's from Thursday afternoon's schedule. It's 


just a review of SEC petitions upcoming -- wait 


a minute, status of SEC petitions, where is 


that? 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: It's actually scheduled for 


Thursday afternoon at 2:30 or something, 3:30? 


 DR. ZIEMER: 2:45 -- 2:45 is -- is the item, 


status of upcoming SEC petitions. LaVon 

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Rutherford is prepared to present that as 


simply a report, an update on where we stand on 


the petition process, numbers and so on, so 


LaVon has agreed to present that now, so -- 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Thank you --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- proceed. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: -- Dr. Ziemer, and Board and 


public. Some of the slides will be -- look 


funny because they'll say we talked about 


something at this Board meeting, but we haven't 


really talked about it -- you'll notice that. 


Again, this is the status of upcoming SEC 


petitions. We do this -- we've done this 


periodically, and we try to do it every Board 


meeting but sometimes there's too much on 


plate. We do this to provide the Board an 


update of existing SEC petitions and also to 


identify some 83.14s we're working on. We do 


this -- this is ho-- this is done to help the 


Board in preparations for upcoming working 


group meetings and upcoming Board meetings. 


To date, since the Rule was approved in May of 


2004, we have had 93 SEC petitions. We have 


nine petitions that are in the qualification 


phase at this time. We have 40 petitions that 

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have qualified for evaluation, and of those 40, 


32 NIOSH has completed evaluations. We have 


eight that are in the evaluation process and we 


have 39 that did not qualify. 


Let me restate something. I said petitions in 


the qualification process is nine, meaning they 


haven't qualified yet at this time, and we have 


eight that we are actually working on at this 


time. And the numbers may seem weird to you 


because it doesn't seem like we've had that 


many, but if you remember, we do merge 


petitions at times. If you remember back on 


the Iowa evaluation, we actually merged four 


petitions, so one evaluation may have covered 


four petitions -- or three or four petitions. 


I want to talk about existing evaluations that 


we've completed our evaluation report and those 


-- that report is with the Board awaiting 


recommendation. 


We have Chapman Valve, the Chapman Valve 


evaluation report was approved in August of 


2006, and NIOSH presented our evaluation in 


September of 2006. The Advisory Board 


established a working group and the working 


group met and presented their findings at the 

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May, 2007 Board meeting and a decision was made 


to hold off their recommendation until after 


the petitioner had received the SC&A report 


from -- from their review of our evaluation. 


We plan to discuss that -- I believe it's on 


the schedule to be discussed at this Board 


meeting. 


We have Blockson Chemical. Blockson Chemical ­

- NIOSH completed their evaluation in September 


of 2006, their initial evaluation. We 


presented our evaluation at the December, 2006 


Board meeting. At that Board meeting it was 


recognized that the evaluation did not cover 


all of the actual covered exposures for the 


Blockson Chemical site, so we pulled back that 


evaluation, revised it, looked at the 


additional exposure scenarios. We reissued the 


evaluation report in July, earlier this month, 


and we plan to provide an update at this Board 


meeting. A working group was established at 


that December meeting. 


We have the Fernald or Feed Materials 


Production Center site petition. NIOSH 


completed our evaluation in November of 2006. 


We presented that evaluation at the February 

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Board meeting in Cincinnati, the February, 2007 


Board meeting. The Advisory Board established 


a workgroup to review the evaluation report and 


in May of 2007 SC&A issued a draft review of 


that evaluation report to the Board. That 


review by that working group is still ongoing. 


Bethlehem Steel, the evaluation report for the 


Bethlehem Steel was approved and issued to the 


petitioners and the Board on February of 2007. 


NIOSH presented their evaluation at the May, 


2007 Advisory Board meeting. A decision was 


made by the Advisory Board to hold off until 


some additional information could be provided 


by NIOSH, to hold off till the next Board 


meeting. I believe that's planned to be 


discussed at this Board meeting. 


 Sandia National Lab Livermore, we completed our 


evaluation in March of 2007. We iss-- or 


actually we presented our evaluation at the -- 


at the May Advisory Board meeting. However, 


just before that Advisory Board meeting we 


received new information from the petitioner 


which that new information brought into 


question some of the evaluation we had done at 


that time, and so the Board asked NIOSH to go 

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back and review that new information and 


provide an update to -- to the Board. And we 


plan on actually revi-- actually doing a 


supplement to the evaluation report and issuing 


that supplement in the very near future. We 


will prese-- present that supplement at the 


October Board meeting. 


 Hanford early years, we actually discussed this 


at -- back in the -- the February Board meeting 


in Cincinnati. The Hanford petition was a very 


large petition, number of years. We determined 


the best way to handle the Hanford petition was 


to break that down into more of a manageable 


approach of evaluating the early years at 


Hanford where there were significant questions 


that were brought up that -- that were somewhat 


different than the later years. So we -- we 


broke that into two separate evaluations. 


The Hanford early years, we completed that 


evaluation on May 18th and -- 2007, and we plan 


to present that evaluation at this Board 


meeting. 


Y-12 is actually a petition that was an -- it 


was initially not qualified by NIOSH and we 


went through the qualification phase -- or went 

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through the phase to be qualified and we -- we 


closed the petition, they didn't meet the 


basis. The Administrative Review Panel 


reviewed that one. This is one of the ones 


that the actual working group looked at 


earlier. This -- and the work-- the 


Administrative Review Panel recommended that we 


qualify this petition because they felt that we 


had not provided enough information back to the 


petitioner. 


We went through the evaluation of this 


petition. We've issued the evaluation report 


on June of -- June of 2007. We plan to present 


that evaluation at the October, 2007 Board 


meeting. 


There is one I -- I've left off here, and it's 


kind of funny because I'm the one presenting 


this one tomorrow, the Ames petition. We have 


a -- a second Ames petition that qualified a 


while back and we've completed the evaluation 


on that. This is a petition for 1955 through 


1970. It's a very specific class, focusing on 


maintenance workers, sheet metal workers. We 


completed that evaluation in June -- or 


May/June time frame and we plan on presenting 

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that evaluation tomorrow. 


We have a couple of sites that are still in the 


evaluation process. 


Hanford, as I discussed earlier, we completed 


the early years’ portion of the Hanford 


evaluation. The other years, 1947 on to 1990, 


we're on the pace to complete that evaluation 


in September, and we plan on presenting that 


second evaluation at the October, 2007 Board 


meeting. 


We have a petition for NUMEC that we are -- 


it's currently in review processes, and we -- 


we plan on presen-- or completing that and 


approving that evaluation in the near future, 


and presenting at the October, 2007 Board 


meeting. 


We had a Nevada Test Site petition that we're 


evaluating that was for the actual years 1963 


to '92. It was -- it was the underground 


testing -- was one of the key elements. We 


actually are on schedule to complete that 


evaluation in August of 2007 and we will 


present that evaluation at the October Board 


meeting. 


Lawrence Livermore National Lab, this is 

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actually an 83-- 83.14 that we're working on. 


We're on schedule right now to complete the 


evaluation in early October. However, if we 


can get that done earlier, we will -- we will 


present it at the October Board meeting. 


There -- there is -- since I've prepared this, 


we had two petitions that we're working on from 


the Mound facil-- Mound site. They are 


actually 91 and 92, if I remember correctly. 


Those petitions are qual-- will qualify. 


That's for a pretty large period. The actual 


letter should go out this week for qualifying 


those petitions, so that'll be another actual 


petition we will be evaluating. 


SEC sites, potential 83.14s that -- that we are 


considering, there are a number of 83.14 sites 


that we'd actually identified and we started 


through the process. However, resource 


constraints have -- have slowed the 83.14 


process down. We have -- you know, with the 


resource constraints that we have, we focused 


our efforts on the 83.13s to ensure that we -- 


you know, in hopes we can meet the 180-day 


requirement for those. 


And that's it. Questions? 

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103

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you, LaVon. Robert, 


do you have a question? No. 


 Mark Griffon. 


 MR. GRIFFON: On -- on this -- on the table 


there, your next-to-last slide, I guess, LaVon 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yeah. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- for the Hanford one, qualified 


11/08/06 and you're expecting a report by 


September '07. This -- this says '47 through 


'90. Was -- was this like for the later years 


separated or for the... 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: What we did was we broke down 


the 19-- early -- 1942 to 1946 because of the 


specific issue focusing on DuPont records. We 


removed that from the -- and separated out into 


two evaluations. So we completed that Hanford 


early years, and now the '47 to '90 will be 


completed in a second evaluation. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay, '47 through '90 is the -- 


is the later years. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 MR. GRIFFON: And in the September '07 -- I 


guess I'm reflecting on the time -- total time 


period for --

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 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- review. Is that meeting your 


cri--


 MR. RUTHERFORD: No, it's not, and actually if 


you remember back in the February Board meeting 


of 2007 at Cincinnati, I identified at that 


time that we would not meet the 180-day 


requirement for the Hanford petition because of 


the -- the enormous amount of information and ­

- and documentation that we would have to 


review and the large class period. We 


recognized early on when we developed the -- 


our -- our schedule and approach for that 


evaluation that we would not make it. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Other questions or 


comments? 


 MR. GRIFFON: On the -- one -- one -- one other 


item. On the Y-12 --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: '58 and '59? 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, '59 to '59 statisticians, 


you mentioned that the workgroup's discussed 


this already. I don't think the workgroup 


discussed this pet--


 MR. RUTHERFORD: No, no --


 MR. GRIFFON: Oh, I thought --

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105

 MR. RUTHERFORD: I -- did I say that? 


 MR. GRIFFON: I thought you did. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: No, actually if -- this 


petition was a -- a -- again, it was under 


Administrative Review. It went through our 


Administrative --


 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: -- Review Panel and they 


recommended that the petition be qualified and 


we moved forward after that in the evaluation 


phase. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: But you did say the working group 


-- this is Dr. Lockey's working group -- 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Oh, yes. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Oh. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- read through --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Oh. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- read through this particular ­

-


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- petition and the -- the 


documentation that was developed on it at that 


time. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Right, actually we -- this -- 

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 MR. GRIFFON: Not -- not the Y-12 working 


group, the --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: No, no, this was actually 


pointed out -- this went to Administrative 


Review before Dr. Lockey's group met, and we 


identified to Dr. Lockey's group -- working 


group that it was in Admin Review, and the 


recommendations that came out of the working 


group were actually consistent with the -- the 


findings by the Admin Review Panel, as well, 


so... 


 DR. ZIEMER: All right. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: That -- the Y-12 one is -- you 


know, we'll bring it up just because of the 


fact that it's unique. This is the first time 


that we are going to actually discuss a 


petition that's qualified based on a discrete 


incident versus a -- it -- it -- it was a -- 


the petitioner identified that a discrete inci­

- or acute exposure occurred and the Admin 


Review Panel qualified the petition based on 


that. So I recommend you read that one really 


close. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Other comments, questions? 


 MR. GRIFFON: I got... 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, Mark, go ahead. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Just -- just a -- a follow-up on 


this -- this time frame question with Hanford. 


I mean since we are in Hanford here, I -- I 


expect that there's going to be some concern 


that we didn't meet -- or NIOSH didn't meet the 


180-day --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Sure. 


 MR. GRIFFON: -- and -- and you're -- I don't 


hear much of a justification other than that it 


was a hard, complicated site. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: You know, I think --


 MR. ELLIOTT: We're not offering -- we're not 


offering any --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: No. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- justification. In February in 


Mason -- the Mason, Ohio meeting -- we 


identified the issue for you all and told you ­

-


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- how we were going to manage it 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Right. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- that we were going to evaluate 

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that petition in -- in two separate pieces, and 


we would make -- our intention was clearly 


stated; we would bring forward one of those 


evaluation reports within the 180-day mark -- 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yeah. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- and we're going to do the 


second one within another 180 days. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yeah. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: I think one of the things I'd 


like to point out is, you know, just with the 


process of the 180 days. And you know, you've 


got to recognize the fact that different sites, 


time periods -- I mean the -- the schedule for 


completion of these evaluations, you know, is ­

- is affected by that, so... 


 DR. ZIEMER: The -- the legislation -- or not 


the legislation, but the 180-day issue, there ­

- there actually is not a penalty, per se, 


associated with that, I don't think. It's a --


other than --


 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, I guess I would offer that 


those who are penalized are the people waiting 


on, you know, this to be developed --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 

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 MR. ELLIOTT: -- and answered, and so we take 


it seriously --


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- that Congress has given us a 


180-day deadline and we're trying to make it. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: And we're -- we're trying to be 


very clear and transparent in how we're 


managing this. If we recognize at an early 


event that we're not going to make 180 days, we 


tell you about that and we try to inform you as 


to how we --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Right. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- propose to manage through 


this. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: And you know, I would point 


out that, you know, we've operated on the -- on 


the 180-day time limit well -- well before the 


Rule became final. We've -- we've kept that 


approach and we've tried and -- and really this 


is only -- you know, the other ones, if we 


missed any, would be by a day or two, so... 


 MR. GRIFFON: Have you -- have you -- I mean I 


don't know -- I think Jim chairs the workgroup, 


but have you -- have you communicated this with 

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the petitioner and everythi-- I'm sure you 


have, but --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Yes. 


 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, okay. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: Yes. Yeah, the petitioner's been 


consulted on this and they understand what's 


going on -- I hope they do. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) We weren't consulted. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: No? 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) We were informed in a meeting and 


never consulted. 


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Oh, okay. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, you were --


 MR. RUTHERFORD: Informed. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: That's what I mean by consulted; 


you were informed. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. Any other 

comments? 

 (No responses) 

Okay. Thank you very much, LaVon. We 


appreciate -- and it's helpful to look ahead 


and see what's coming down the pike for the 


Board for planning purposes, as well. 

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 We're -- 


 MR. ELLIOTT: There's one thing I want to add ­

- I would like to add one thing -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, Larry, yeah. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: -- on this. One thing we should 


tell you that -- he mentioned NUMEC, and 


NUMEC's 180 days was up this past week, and we 


did call the petitioners and talk to them and 


explain to them that the status of this 


evaluation report on NUMEC -- it's been 


developed and it is in review. There's a 


concern about classified information that may 


have found its way to our -- to us, and so 


we're dealing with that. I probably have gone 


more -- farther than I should on that, but 


there's some other issues that we're resolving 


as well and we've informed that set -- that set 


of petitioners about that. 


PUBLIC COMMENT


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. We're -- we're 


going to recess for roughly an hour, because on 


the public comment portion we need to stick 


with the -- the publicized schedule. There may 


be people who are coming here for the purpose 


of the public comment, so it's -- it would not 

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be fair to move that up. So we will recess 


till -- oh, a comment first. I'm sorry, Jim. 


 DR. MELIUS: The only question I would have, if 


there are people who are here who would like to 


comment -- I mean rather than making them wait. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, we -- we could certainly do 


that. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think that's --


 DR. ZIEMER: I actually don't have the list. 


wonder if --


 DR. MELIUS: And I don't have a problem coming 


back, but I think we should -- I think we 


should, you know... There may not be, but I... 


 DR. ZIEMER: I might also, while they're 


getting that list, ask if there are any members 


of the public on the telephone lines that were 


wishing to make comments this afternoon. If 


so, you could identify yourselves. 


 (No responses) 


I know that Terrie Barrie planned to call in 


from Denver, but I'm not sure I know what the 


timetable is on that. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (Off microphone) 


(Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Tomorrow? Okay. And some of 


I 
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these, again, may call in during that period. 


Kay Barker, are you on the line? 


 (No responses) 


Okay, I have several here. Let me ask if any 


of these are here and if they wish to speak now 


rather than wait. Let's see, is -- it looks 


like Oglesbee, I'm not sure of the first name. 


Is there an Oglesbee here? 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) She's here, she's not in the room 


right now. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, but perhaps in the corridor, 


you mean? Okay. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) There she is. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Ms. Oglesbee, do you wish to speak 


now or would you prefer to wait till the 5:00 


o'clock period? 


MS. OGLESBEE: No, I'll do it now. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. You can approach the mike 


there, and then let me also check -- is -- is 


Mary Ann -- is it Carrico -- Carrico? Okay. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) (Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Later, okay. And Rosemary Hoyt? 

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 UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) (Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, good. Thank you. 


MS. OGLESBEE: Could I sit down? 


 DR. ZIEMER: You certainly can. Uh-huh. 


MS. OGLESBEE: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. 


So, I've lived here 48 years in Richland and 


I'm a suit -- a stakeholder, definitely, and 


three of my family members are cancer survivors 


and they worked at Hanford and Rocky Flats. 


So I prepared this presentation, this public 


comment, because I'm recovering from an ailment 


and it's better for me if I read it so I don't 


get stressed out, so here we go. And most of 


you aren't going to like it because it is about 


what I know. 


As it turns out, by year 2007 obviously the 


Executive Branch impedes on the Legislative 


Branch, and the Executive Branch and the 


Legislative Branch impedes on the Judicial 


Branch's obligations and fiduciary duties for 


this EEOIC purpose. The Congress continues to 


fund any and all of the current United States 


President's men -- men and women's contrary and 


adverse involvement. 

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Then I appear before you today to enlighten 


current U.S. Pres-- President George W. Bush 


and his assigned Advisory Board on Radiation 


and Workers Health members to -- in regard to 


abuse of discretion acts that are perpetrated 


by the U.S. Health and Human Services, 


caretakers, emphasis added. The Office of 


Compensation Analysis and Support Director 


Larry Elliott did willfully and deliberately 


censor an official record that was released in 


good faith for consideration by the assigned 


caretakers. It appears that in that -- in 2004 


Elliott's subordinate David Sundin did assign 


the Special Exposure Cohort petition in 


question an identification number, number 


00011. I have had no notification of that. 


And this was based on inaccurate, false and 


contrived application. On September 10th, 2002 


OCAS director Elliott had informed the 


originator, writer and distributor of the SEC 


petition, me, that his fiduciary duties cannot 


be completed because he and his 


supervisors/subordinates were not prepared to 


abide by the federal law by the end of the year 


2002. The EEOICPA of 2000 stipulates which -- 

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stipulations, which includes the SEC provisions 


were overwhelmingly approved by Congress and 


active since October 30th, 2000. Reasonable 


man would likely not allow their original and 


applicable content of the law to be vacated to 


suit the needs of a few federal caretakers such 


as this. 


I believe thousands of Special Exposure Cohort 


petitioners have waited long enough to hear 


from those who were legally required to render 


a yea or nay response within a specified time 


frame according to the original EEOIC 


stipulations. Advocate and claimant Gai 


Oglesbee collaborated and submitted the SEC 


petition in good faith by September 18th, 2002. 


The SEC petitioners covered a wide range of the 


meritorious classes across the nation who 


were/are prohibited by the assigned government 


caretakers from defending the causation. The 


petitions represent over 7,600 petitioners. 


Too many of those meritorious petitioners have 


passed. Those who have passed expected and 


deserved a response according to binding 


federal law, the deceased never received a 


response from any of the officials since year 

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2002. By now certain existing workers and 


survivor petitioners may have received paltry 


sums of compensation for their decades of pain 


and suffering. However, the point of this 


disclosure is that the majority of the 


petitioners have not received any recognition 


whatsoever. 


The legal and binding default stipulation is 


ignored by the current U.S. President, his 


advisors, that would include the Advisory Board 


members, his USHHS Secretary, both Tommy 


Thompson and Mike Leavitt and their 


subordinates and the Congress. 


I don't believe certain members of Congress had 


the intent to force EEOICP claimants to file 


federal lawsuits in order to assure their civil 


due process rights are recognized. However, it 


is evident that many claimants recognize that 


they are being forced to consider filing 


(unintelligible) federal lawsuits to assure 


that that authentic trier of fact adjudicators 


weigh all the evidence. For instance, it is 


doubtful that the SEC or the 22 qualifying 


cancers interim rule be recognized as the only 


aspect to consider by any authentic trier of 

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fact judge or jury, especially skin cancers. 


And certain prostate cancers have been 


recognized and compensated. The claimants have 


been authorized by Congress to act as pro se 


parties since October 30th, 2000. The current 


U.S. President will likely claim sovereign 


immunity and executive privilege, especially 


regarding his EEOIC signing statement of 


October 28th, 2004. However, many legal 


scholars have challenged the President's 


premise. The claimants are not obligated to 


observe the Price Anderson Industrial Amendment 


Act for this EEOIC purpose. 


After an independent auditor's many clashes 


with the USHHS-NIOSH federal employees 


regarding the Special -- Special Exposure 


Cohort convers-- controversy, the NIOSH federal 


employees still insist they can accurately 


reconstruct doth -- dose with little to no 


exposure information. The NIOSH premise would 


be impossible to defend because the dose 


estimates would be unreliable. The details 


regard why the current U.S. President's 


Advisory Board consultant, Sanford Cohen & 


Associates, once again disagree with the NIOSH 

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findings. Then there's a reference to where 


you find that. 


USDOE (sic) agents seem to believe that they 


function under the Executive Branch control and 


are delegated to interpret the law, which is a 


false premise. The primary USDOL 


administrators may argue that one of their 


subordinates, John Vance, Employment Standards 


Administration, who I believe reports to Peter 


Turcic, was mistaken when he promulgated the 


following statements before the sick 


worker/survivor audience, and I quote: We hear 


your concerns and we want to help you, but 


we're merely an agent of the government, he 


said. It's important that you provide us with 


the information we request. That was at Oak 


Ridge town hall meeting. 


And then at Richland town hall meeting he said 


we come under the Executive Branch and can -- 


can do nothing to change the intent of the law 


after we are delegated to interpret the law. 


You aren't delegated to interpret the law. The 


Judicial Branch is delegated to do that. 


Director Vance feels that the majority of the 


members of Congress feel that the DOL is doing 

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a good job. 


 Several federal court judges have already ruled 


that the U.S. President has no judicial power, 


neither express nor denied -- or implied, 


neither Constitutional nor statutory. And 


since it is designated by the Judicial Branch 


that the President has no judicial power, then 


it is for sure that the so -- so-deemed federal 


caretakers are not granted judicial power, 


neither express nor imply, either 


Constitutional or statutory for this purpose. 


And I must say at this point I have no 


intention of giving up my civil due process 


rights for this issue, but I will fight you. 


Title 28, United States Code 2072, rules of 


procedure and evidence, power to prescribe. 


The Supreme Court shall have the power to 


prescribe general rules of practice and 


procedure and rules of evidence for cases in 


the United States district courts, including 


proceedings before magistrates thereof and 


courts of appeal. Such rules shall not 


abridge, enlarge or modify any substanding 


(sic) right. All laws in conflict with such 


rules shall be of no further force or effect 

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after such rules have taken effect. 


The U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary 


and subordinates knew the violations of the 


EEOIC claimants substantive and procedural 


rights would soon be questioned. The USHHS 


agent wanted to wait to deny cancer claims for 


whatever intent or purpose they conjured. See 


-- this is a -- a -- a Geneva, Switzerland 


presentation by NIOSH on August 26th through 


30th, 2002. Here's a -- here's a -- an excerpt 


from that: We expect at some point that 


regulations may face legal challenge based on 


procedural understanding -- standing -- 


substantive grounds. Legal challenges are 


unlikely to occur before DOL renders final 


decisions denying cancer claims for which dose 


reconstructions were conducted. This -- this 


will likely be late summer or early fall 2002. 


I don't know whether I need to read this to you 


or not, but I'll read it anyway, definition of 


substantive, in case some of you don't know, 


apply to essential legal principles and rules 


of right, substantive law. Apply to meth-- 


procedural applies to methods of enforcement 


and rules of procedure. What does the rule of 

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law mean? The rule of law which applies to us 


now, the claimants, simply means that the 


government should rule in accordance with the 


law and not in accordance with the decision of 


man. 


The OCAS director, Larry Elliott, was ousted 


from the Advisory Board because of his 


conflicts of interest. Larry Elliott has 


conflicts of interest with me and my daughter 


and my ex-husband. Then who among the 


thousands of claimants are compelled to pay any 


attention whatsoever to a recused USHHS 


representative with conflicts of interest. The 


answer would be none. 


Long ago the United States Department of Energy 


dose reconstruction contractor from the Oak 


Ridge Associated -- Associated Universities, 


which we call ORAU, or whatever we call it, and 


-- contacted me to inform me that there was a ­

- was conflicts of interest with my claims. 


was informed by the ORAU executive that my 


claims had been turned back to NIOSH. 


Elliott and his supervisors/subordinates have 


definitely demonstrated that they have 


conflicts of interest with the organizer, 


I 
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writer and distributor of the September 18th, 


2002 SEC petitions, thus obviously each and 


every one of them was -- schemed to retaliate, 


intimidate and threaten and harass. I don't 


get that part of it, never will. 


Attached to this presentation are -- are 


pertinent exhibits that's include evidence that 


Larry Elliott had the intent to hide the 


September 18th, 2002 SEC petitions out of sight 


and mind of those who are mandated to manage 


the application papers. Subsequently I am 


hand-delivering a copy of the original SEC 


petitions to the Advisory Board Chair, Paul 


Zimmer (sic), before this assembly of 


witnesses. Included in the presentation are 


certain exhibits that were confiscated by the 


U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary in regard 


to certain details of the ousting of the 


conflicting Larry Elliott from his -- from this 


Advisory Board. Also included are certain 


conversations from a sign-on manager of several 


petition groups and her declaration regarding 


her confrontations with Larry Elliott and his 


subordinate, David Sundin. Her name's Vina 


Colley. Vina is the P.R.E.S.S. and Nuclear 

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Workers for Justice co-chair who agreed to sign 


on to the petitions and contributed supporting 


evidence. Sundin is the USH representative 


Larry Elliott's subordinate who officially 


documented his characteration (sic) of -- 


characterization of EEOIC claimants before the 


Advisory Board on Radiation and Workers Health 


May 19th, 2003 in a disgusting manner. He 


called us pigs who move through the python, and 


his cohort BNFL person called it schemes, at 


which -- that's got to be a slow and painful 


death. I hope I never have to -- to meet with 


a python who swallows me, so -- but I guess I 


am. To review these details -- and this is 


followed with the URL location of this 


documentation where he said this in front of 


you, the Board. 


For -- by consensus, the Advisory Board attempt 


to censor public records by destruction mensods 


(sic) should be viewed as brazen and deliberate 


acts. The Advisory Board members can no longer 


guise their destruction of public and official 


records as their Privacy Act-protected 


business-sensitive and/or housekeeping records. 


Talking about one in particular, December 13th, 

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2004. It was supposed to be verbatim meeting 


minutes. I happened to record those meeting 


minutes, and then they were taken off the 


network and put elsewhere and -- and it was 


supposed to be public meeting records then. 


And I've disclosed this intent to many of my 


Congress-people. 


Commentary: December 13, 2004, the President's 


Advisory Board members claim a crucial summary 


report redacted data is their product. The 


Advisory Board's housekeeping issues are 


displayed verbatim as a reason to 


censor/destroy public records. The legal 


status is aired by the USHHS solicitor of 


record. Then two of the most brazen statements 


made in those verbatim meeting minutes was 


member -- by -- was by member Mr. Griffon and 


clerk Cori Homer, the Advisory Board's 


assistant. Apparently Homer was given the 


authority by the President's Advisory members 


to -- to gather and destroy public records that 


were wrongfully labeled Privacy Act-protected, 


business sensitive or housekeeping -- or a 


housekeeping issue. 


Advisory Board Chair Dr. Zimmer's (sic) topic 

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for deliberation during the meeting regards 


individual case dose reconstruction reviews. 


Chair Zimmer (sic) filed his mandated waiver of 


authenticity that declares that the meeting 


minutes are accurate. The December 14th, 2004 


public session verbatim meeting minutes are 


listed here as a URL location so you can check 


it out. 


 Here's what was said. Excerpt, December 13th, 


2004 meeting minutes. Mr. Griffon: The one 


thing that he said also that I want to 


emphasize is that the final summary report is ­

- to the public is a Board report, it's our 


product. 


 Dr. Mathias (sic) states how is the Board going 


to report on this at our public meeting 


tomorrow; what are we going to say? 


Dr. DeHart: This is a housekeeping issue. We 


have documents that we may not want to retain. 


What -- what should we do that they can be 


properly destroyed. 


Ms. -- Ms. Homer: Give them to me; I'll take 


care of it. 


As indicated by the members, the original 


verbatim meeting minutes were altered according 

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to the record notations. Then to this day by 


consensus of the members of the Advisory Board, 


the original December 13th, 2004 verbatim 


meeting minutes are hidden from public 


scrutiny. The date reflected regarding the 


December 14th, 2004 verbatim meeting minutes is 


also dated December 13th, 2004. 


And like I say, I've noted that with my 


Senators and Congressmen and presented evidence 


of that, and I'm doing many projects on this 


right now as I'm recovering from my illness and 


so -- anyway, I'll -- I'll give Mr. Zimmer 


(sic) the copy of the SEC and the records that 


go with it, and I would appreciate that you -- 


somebody answers those 7,600 people because a 


lot of them are Hanford people that I work with 


every day, and we deserve better recognition 


than just paying a few of our people, our 


cases, and just paying a lot of survivors -- 


which they're deserving, but we need to pay 


some more cases, and one of them's my 


daughter's and mine, so -- anyway, I'll -- I'll 


bring --


 DR. ZIEMER: Can we have a -- is this a full 


copy of your comments? 'Cause I want to 

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provide these also to Ray so that they show up 


in the transcript correctly. 


MS. OGLESBEE: (Off microphone) 


(Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 


MS. OGLESBEE: (Off microphone) 


(Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Your presentation's in the 


envelope, okay. Thank you very much. 


Now let me ask if -- if there are any folks on 


the phone lines that had comments? 


 (No responses) 


 Okay, apparently not. Then we'll take a 45­

minute recess and reassemble at 5:00 o'clock 


for the additional public comments. Thank you 


very much. 


 (Whereupon, a recess was taken from 4:15 p.m. 


to 5:00 p.m.) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Good evening, everyone. Thank you 


for coming this evening for this public comment 


session of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 


Worker Health. My name is Paul Ziemer. 
I 


serve as Chairman of this Board. I want to 


take a minute or two and tell you a little bit 


about what this Board does and what it doesn't 

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do 'cause you may -- may not know why we're 


here. Well, you sort of do, but this Board is 


not part of the federal government, per se. We 


are independent. We've been appointed to look 


over the shoulders of some federal agencies; 


more specifically, NIOSH and the Health and 


Human Services part of the compensation 


program. 


The people you see before you come from a 


variety of backgrounds. Most of them are not 


with the federal government, or at least not 


directly. For example, I'm a retired faculty 


member from Purdue University. My area of 


interest and training is in health physics. 


And usually when I tell people I'm in health 


physics, they don't know what that is, but I 


know that people in Hanford do, so I'll leave 


it at that. 


Let -- let me -- and the list of the Board 


members is on the back table if you want to get 


one later, but let me introduce Josie Beach is 


here. Josie is local. She works for CH2M Hill 


Hanford group, so she's very much at home here 


in Richland area. 


Mike Gibson over here is a retired electrician 

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from the Mound facility. He also at Mound 


served as president of the PACE Local -- or 


vice president of the Pace atomic workers 


council. 


Mark Griffon -- where's Mark? Okay, he'll -- 


he'll be back in a minute. I'll tell you who 


he is. Mark Griffon is also a health physicist 


and he's an independent consultant. 


 Dr. Jim Lockey -- we've lost Dr. Lockey. Okay, 


well, these -- these guys'll have a demerit for 


coming in late, but Dr. Lockey is an 


environmental health physician and is located 


at the University of Cincinnati. 


 Robert Presley, right here, from Oak Ridge, 


Tennessee -- or at least he worked there a lot. 


He's -- he's now with a group called Pro 2 


Serve Professional Projects Services, and 


that's in Oak Ridge, but a long-time Y-12 


worker. 


 Dr. Jim Melius is right here behind me. He's 


both -- he's a double doctor, M.D./Ph.D., so -- 


but Jim is a director of the New York State 


Labor Health and Safety Trust Fund. 


Wanda Munn is a local person, retired from 


Hanford, a nuclear engineer. 

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Who have I left out? Dr. John Poston, 


professor, also of health physics, at Texas 


A&M. 


 And Phillip Schofield is right here, and 


Phillip is from the Los Alamos area. He's 


basically worked in the Los Alamos facilities 


for a number of years and now is on medical 


leave. 


We have a couple of our members who could not 


be here tonight. Dr. Gen Roessler, who's a 


retired faculty member from the University of 


Florida, although she may be on the phone; she 


was earlier. Dr. Roessler, are you on the 

phone? 

 (No response) 

Okay, perhaps not. Okay, and Dr. Lockey, who 


we introduced, has now arrived. Jim, I --


embarrass you a little bit, but there he is, 


from Cincinnati. 


This Board is trying to assist the operation of 


the compensation program, which for many people 


is a frustrating program. We know that a lot 


of folks have waited months and years for 


things to be processed. We're trying to 


identify issues that we can help with. We 

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don't deal -- we don't -- we don't figure out 


the -- the individual cases. This Board does 


not deal with the individual cases. We are not 


an appeals board. We are a board that looks at 


how the dose reconstructions are done. We look 


at the contents of the site profiles and the 


related documents and try to give sound advice 


on -- where we can on what might improve the 


program. 


So part of the -- part of the advantage and the 


reason for having public comment is to get 


feedback, feedback from those around the 


facilities -- who are usually claimants -- who 


can give us insight as to how things are 


working or, in some cases, not working, 


depending on -- on how it's going for you. But 


we want to hear what you have to say. 


We've found that we have had to impose a time 


limit. We don't like to do this, but some 


folks have -- some folks are like me; once they 


get started, they have a hard time stopping. 


I'm used to speaking in 50-minute segments. 


But we've had to impose a ten-minute time 


limit, so in order to respect others who may 


wish to speak, we ask you to try to adhere to 

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that. If you have very lengthy comments, we 


can -- we can enter them into the -- you can 


leave additional written things with the Board 


and we can enter that into the record. But if 


you would, please hold your -- your oral 


comments to about ten minutes. 


Now that is not an -- that's not a time 


objective to be achieved. That's sort of an 


upper limit. So if you can do it in less, that 


will be great. 


We want to start out tonight to hear from your 


local representative, who's Doc -- Doc 


Hastings, and representing him here tonight is 


Barb Lisk, who's district director for 


Representative Hastings. So Barb, welcome. 


 MS. LISK: Thank you. Oops, that's a good 

start. 

(Pause) 

Okay, is this on? Okay, good. Thank you, Dr. 


Ziemer. 


I have a letter from the Congressman to read. 


There -- there is also a copy of this letter 


for the Board and for the people in the 


audience, on the back table here, as well as a 


handout from the Congressman. 

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This letter is addressed to Dr. Ziemer and Dr. 


Howard. 


Dear Dr. Ziemer and Dr. Howard. I write in 


strong support of careful, fair and timely 


consideration of each of the Special Exposure 


Cohort petitions filed for Hanford workers. In 


addition, I urge you to closely consider public 


comment brought before the National Institute 


for Occupational Safety and Health and the 


Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health 


regarding benefits for Hanford workers. 


As one of the sponsors of the Energy Employees 


Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act, 


I wholeheartedly believe that the federal 


government has a moral responsibility to aid in 


the care of those and their families who have 


been made ill as a direct result of their work 


in service to our nation. Our nation owes a 


debt of gratitude to Hanford workers for their 


contributions to our security and environmental 


cleanup. 


Since the creation of -- I'm going to say this 


out every time. Since the creation of the 


Energy Employees Occupational Illness 


Compensation Program, I have closely monitored 

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the federal government's implementation of the 


program. As the federal government considers 


critical benefits for Hanford site workers, be 


assured that I will continue to closely monitor 


any decision on compensation for Hanford 


workers. 


One of the ways the Energy Employees 


Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act 


can better serve Hanford workers is for both 


the National Institute of (sic) Occupational 


Safety and Health and the Board to carefully 


consider the information gained during outreach 


meetings on the Hanford Special Exposure 


Cohort. When local concerns are raised, I 


fully expect the National Institute of (sic) 


Occupational Safety and Health and the Board to 


pursue and follow up with those concerns. 


Specifically, I am aware of local concerns 


about dose monitoring at Hanford, including a 


lack of information on photon exposure caused 


by a phenomenon known as directional shine. In 


addition, the carcinogenic chemicals used at 


Hanford should also be investigated -- 


investigated as these chemicals do not show up 


on standard dosimetry equipment, but may 

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contribute to the development of cancer. 


I urge the Board and the National Institute of 


(sic) Occupational Safety and Health to 


carefully examine such issues, and other local 


concerns, as they would have a role in 


justifying the Special Exposure Cohort class 


for Hanford workers. The Hanford Special 


Exposure Cohort petitions before the Board and 


the National Institute of (sic) Occupational 


Safety and Health offer the opportunity for 


many workers and their families to finally have 


their claims resolved in a timely manner. 


For those who sacrificed for our nation at a 


very real cost to their health, they certainly 


deserve just and timely compensation. 


Thank you for your consideration of these 


concerns and, more importantly, the concerns of 


my constituents. Sincerely, Congressman Doc 


Hastings. 


 Thank you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much. I have a 


couple of sign-up sheets where individuals here 


tonight have indicated their desire to speak to 


the assembly. I wonder if there are any here 


who missed the sign-up sheet but did wish to 

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speak. If you -- if -- if you are in that 


category and will raise your hand, we'll -- 


we'll have -- Mr. Hinnefeld will get you the 


sign-up sheet. 


Are there any -- anyone -- okay, there are some 


that need to sign up on the sign-up sheet, so 


he'll bring that in here shortly and we'll get 


that second sheet --


UNIDENTIFIED: (Off microphone) 


(Unintelligible) see hands one more time? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Okay, there's one -- one 


back there, catch that one, and one over here. 


Okay. 


Now let me -- we'll begin then with Mary Ann -- 


Mary Ann Carri-- Carrico -- Carrico. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) (Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, tomorrow night. Okay, that'll 


be fine. Rosemary, what -- tomorrow night for 


you? Okay. 


Come back tomorrow night to hear those two. 


Okay. 


UNIDENTIFIED: Excuse me, Dr. Ziemer? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes? 


UNIDENTIFIED: Is there a way that the people 

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that are waiting on the telephone can also be 


signed up to speak? 


 DR. ZIEMER: I -- I have -- I have some names. 


I -- I have Kay Barker and -- who's speaking? 


 MS. FEIRING: Joanie Feiring. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes --


 MS. COLLEY: (Unintelligible) Colley. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. In fact, why don't you go 


ahead, and give us your name again for our 


recorder. 

 MS. FEIRING: Me? 

 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. 

 MS. FEIRING: Joanie Feiring? Okay. I'm from 

-- well, let me -- I'm going to let Vina Colley 


speak before I speak because she's the 


president of the organization I'm working with. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 MS. COLLEY: Go ahead, you can speak, 'cause I 


kind of wanted to wait till Gai got up and 


spoke. 


 MS. FEIRING: Oh. 


 MS. COLLEY: If that's all right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, why don't -- why don't -- 


why don't you stand by and we'll get some of 


the local folks here that are present, and then 

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we'll come back to Kay Barker on the phone. 


Kay's in -- probably in Denver, I think, with 


the Rocky Flats folks, so -- 


 MS. BARKER: Yes, I am --


 DR. ZIEMER: -- let's hear --


 MS. BARKER: -- Dr. Ziemer. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. We'll hear from some of 


the Hanford folks here first who've come here 


especially tonight. 


UNIDENTIFIED: Okay. We're from Portsmouth. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, stand by just a moment. 


(Pause) 


Who's -- who is the next one, Stu, on that 


sheet? Who's the top name there? 


 MR. HINNEFELD: Charles Shatell. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Charles Shatell? 


 MR. HINNEFELD: I believe it's Shatell. 


 MR. SHATELL: Yeah, that's me. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, go ahead, sir. 


 MR. SHATELL: I guess I'm on. 


 DR. ZIEMER: You're on. 


 MR. SHATELL: Okay. I talked this afternoon to 


people and I didn't realize that this 5:00 


o'clock thing was where I had a right to talk. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And you have a better -- bigger 

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audience, also, so that's good, too. 


 MR. SHATELL: So at least -- I came to the 


Hanford project in 1944. I've been around a 


long time. And the 31st of this month I will 


be 90 years old, so -- so I been around a long 


time. 


Now in 1948, that's when I came back from the 


DuPont Company. I was one of these guys that 


DuPont found out that I could have a top secret 


clearance, and so they sent me all over the 


doggone country where they had top secret work. 


But anyhow, in 1948 I came back here, and at 


that time the project out here needed a lot of 


workers because their radiation thing was 


getting pretty high. So they got the Jones 


Company to come in and re-bid the thing for 


doing the radiation work. 


And now I been with NIOSH for many, many year, 


and they wrote a letter to the Labor Department 


when they were let out of it and -- and the 


Labor Department took over. So I was trying to 


find that letter so I could bring it out here 


tonight to read it to you, but anyhow, in my 


goings on here with -- on the Hanford project 


and with the Jones Company, I -- six times I 

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was over-radiated with different parts on -- on 


the project. Most of this came at 


(unintelligible), and so when NIOSH wrote a 


letter to me and a copy to the Labor 


Department, they said that it looked like that 


they (sic) would be a lot of money changing 


hands here. And so the first thing that the 


man that was sitting right up there from the 


Labor Department said NIOSH didn't have any 


right in the world to -- saying what they did, 


so you might as well say it right now, you're 


not going to get any money. Now that's what he 


told -- well, I wasn't here to get money. I 


was here to make a thing of what had really 


happened on radiation. 


And so anyhow, there was a whole lot of people 


in this room and this boy from the Labor 


Department says if any of you are in here 


because of the prostate cancer, you're not 


going to get any money so you might as well 


leave, and about half of them left. So anyhow, 


from that time on, I was -- of course worked 


with NIOSH and everything, and in '48 I got 


back with the Jones Company and we did a lot of 


the radiation work because operations people, 

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they were burnt out and didn't have the -- the 


operation. 


So now -- I retired in '79, and when I retired 


then I had a physical examination and 


everything and I found out that I did have 


problems with my prostate. So anyhow, when -- 


the doctor said well, we'll -- we'll take -- 


checking on it and everything, so they did and 


he took things of my prostate and they found 


out that I had cancer, a four plus four cancer. 


Now I don't know how many of you maybe are 


doctors or whatever, but a four plus four 


cancer is pretty (unintelligible), pretty 


stout. And so what -- we sent the thing in to 


Richland and then they sent it in to someplace 


in Connecticut, I believe, and -- to find out 


just exactly what it was, the four plus four. 


And so -- then it came back and it said -- and 


the doctor said well, we got to do something. 


There's three things that we could do. If you 


-- we could take your prostate out. That costs 


$50,000. Or you can go and get radiation and 


that costs $35,000 to take the radiation the 


rest of your life. Or you could have this 


Lupron shots. We've had good luck with them. 

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And so I said well, I'll try the Lupron shots. 


Well, the Lupron shots only cost $2,370 a shot 


and so I took that shot. 


So I've had this now ever since 2001. I've 


been taking those shots every four months all 


the way -- thing, and sometimes the doctor 


won't be here and I'll miss a shot. Well, if I 


miss a shot my PSA goes clear through the roof. 


And so then when I take a shot again it comes 


back down. 


But still the same time when -- the reason that 


I got this cancer to start with is we were 


working with (unintelligible), and we had 400 


valves that had to be removed and so we removed 


them. Now people out there never told us that 


they had fuel elements that was rated 550 R. 


When we got clear through it and we were clear 


down to the end and we found out, the boy from 


the R monitor using this scintillator found out 


that parts of the valve read 550 R. Now people 


that know what 550 R means, it was pretty 


rough. The engineers that was there, when that 


came up and they said 550 R, they all laughed. 


They did -- nobody wanted to be around that 550 


R. 

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So anyhow, we worked a deal and got the valves 


taken care of finally and so -- and after -- 


then my -- my cancer -- cancer that I've got, 


and here it is 2000 and almost 8, and I've 


still got the cancer and I have to take the 


shot every four months and it's getting pretty 


high. I think it's tied to the stock market 


'cause sometimes it's $2,400 and other times 


it's $2,370. And of course then the doctor has 


his part, too. So it is kind of a -- we are 


spending a lot of money. My -- my insurance 


right now is $700 a month. 


So I just wanted to come back here tonight and 


tell you about this. Now as far as money goes 


is concerned, the Labor Department in Seattle, 


they tell me everybody has prostate cancer. 


We're not going to give you any money. That's 


the first thing they tell me. Well, I didn't 


ask them for money, to start with. But I --


the government did that. And so anyhow, here I 


am. I'm going to be 90 years old, as I say, 


this (unintelligible) week, and I'm still 


taking my shots every four months. And I'm 


just like a woman is that's -- that has her 


change of life. These shots that I take every 

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four months, then I -- I get like a change of 


life. I get hot shots in my -- in my arms and 


-- and stuff, so I have to take a pill 


sometimes. And so -- and then the shot -- 


every once in a while you get a red spot in 


front of one of your eyes. So that's what I'm 


up against and, as I say, it's costing me a lot 


of money, but so be it. 


But I think the Labor Department in Seattle, 


they're not doing a good job that I think they 


should do because the -- the first thing they 


tell you, just like everybody that goes in 


there is trying to get money out of them, I 


guess. Well, that wasn't what my interest was 


in the thing. But anyhow, here we are and I 


think the Labor Department ought to be ta-- 


having another look at what they're doing 


because there is a lot of people that have 


contacted me that -- that can't get up and say 


anything, maybe. I don't know. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you very much. Next 


we'll hear from Kathryn Guffey. Kathryn? 


 MS. GUFFEY: Okay. I have filed for -- on my 


husband and this is not in protest or anything 


regarding his -- expecting you to do anything 

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because I don't expect a whole lot from anybody 


right now. I've been -- the paperwork that was 


sent to me is just unbelievable. I mean what ­

- he's dead, by the way. It sta-- and it --


he's -- worked out there for over 20 years. 


But they sent paperwork to me that I'm supposed 


to know what he was working on and what 


particular area, what chemicals, what this and 


what these things were made up with, and I'd 


imagine some of you physics -- physicists and 


doctors would have a hard time figuring some of 


that crap out. I mean it's a joke. But I'm 


going to keep on till I do. I mean I don't sit 


down and walk away. 


OCAS is responsible for conducting the 


occupational dose reconstructions for certain 


workers with cancer who file claims under the 


Act, and in accordance with the methods 


published in 42 CFR 82, dose reconstructions 


will be performed for covered employees with 


cancers that are not members of Special 


Exposure Cohort. As employees with cancer who 


are not members of Special Exposure Cohort as 


defined in the Act, SEC members with certain 


specified cancers do not require dose 

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reconstructions to qualify for compensation, 


but I can tell you now that I know of quite a 


few that di-- have -- that are under that 


umbrella that have been denied. And the basic 


principle for the dose reconstruction is to 


characterize the occupational radiation 


environment to which workers were exposed using 


available worker and workplace monitoring 


information. And that's kind of a joke most of 


the time. 


In cases where radiation data default values 


based on reasonable scientific assumptions are 


used as substitutes -- we're not dealing with 


assumptions, we're dealing with people's lives 


-- the results of worker dose reconstruction 


will be used by the Department of Labor to 


determine the probability that the worker's 


cancer was at least as likely as not due -- and 


that's out of some of their literature -- due 


to his or her occupation exposure to ionizing 


radiation during employment at a covered 


facility, criterion guidelines so forth and so 


on. 


 Compensation has been reportedly denied 60 


percent of 72,000 workers processed by U.S. 

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regulators involved in cold war nuclear 


weapons. The Washington Post, however, said 


that -- that only 21 percent of those 


applicants have actually received a check from 


the compensation program that was unveiled in 


1999 by Bill Richardson, who was the Energy 


Secretary at the time and is now Governor of 


New York (sic). [Name Redacted], 52, who 


worked at the Savannah River nuclear weapons 


plant in South Carolina was so contaminated 


that radiation alarms at the facility would 


typically go off when he walked through, the 


newspaper said. Doctors later discovered 19 


malignant tumors on his bladder. One claim for 


compensation was denied because he could not 


access secret government files or sections of 


his own personnel files. Without the records 


he could not prove the cause of his cancer. 


And that's what I'm running up against, the 


proof. The proof is the real issue, and 


Hanford is the one providing the information 


that our proof has to stand on when we go -- or 


answer any of this inf-- these letters or this 


correspondence. Now whether their proof -- 


their proofs don't sta-- won't stand up to the 

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statistics. The prostate cancer alone has 


proven that because one out of 500 is supposed 


-- under the age of 70 is supposedly -- only 


supposed to get prostate cancer, and about half 


of the 30 or so men that my husband worked with 


out there have prostate cancer. Now I'd like 


for someone to explain those statistics to me 


because I don't get it. If one out of 500, and 


you've got a -- men of a group -- a group of 


about 30 that's -- half of them have prostate 


cancer, something's wrong. 


Now we've requested some information from Fred 


Hutchinson Cancer Research, but Fred Hutchinson 


was rejected by the government as being faulty 


in its methodology, in spite of the strong 


connection between radiation and related 


exposures and cancers and were well-documented. 


And the researchers and analysts were convinced 


the connection was proven. Fred Hutchinson's 


will also have probability charts on persons 


getting for-- various forms of cancer. And I 


feel like there's probably other cancer 


research places out there that will support 


this information as well, but I think that you 


as a group, if you're going to represent these 

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people, then you need to get with the people 


and know their individual needs. And you need 


to go out there -- if you haven't ever been out 


there and been exposed and if you've never been 


around those situations, then I have a hard 


time knowing how you're going to be able to 


help us. I mean it's a question, but it's also 


an answer. If you are not and have not ever 


been in those situations, you've never climbed 


up under those buildings in those tunnels where 


radiation dust and stuff has settled there for 


years and years, how are you going to be able 


to tell these people they are or are not 


contaminated? A dosometer (sic) around their 


neck does not protect the rest of their body. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you, Kathryn. Next, 


Chris -- looks like Janos? 


MR. JANOS: Yes. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, Chris. 


MR. JANOS: Now I'm the authorized 


representative for my mother, Wanda Janos, and 


we're case [Redacted] with NIOSH. The one 


thing I wanted to -- well, first of all I 


wanted to thank you for coming to the Tri-


Cities, and we've waited for you guys to be 

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here for a while and it's nice to have you 


here. The -- and I understand a lot of our 


complaints are with the Department of Labor. 


I've gotten some nasty letters, too, that kind 


of indicate, you know, burden's on you; go find 


the data. And we all know that -- and finally 


NIOSH did admit that the DuPont records were 


destroyed. So all evidence of reactor failures 


and other exposures to people who took off 


their dosimeter reading materials to be 


patriotic have disappeared. 


So the one technical issue that I have, and 


I've never gotten a good answer to this, it's 


my understanding that the B reactor and all of 


its cloned sister and brother reactors -- the 


D, E and F and K -- had a serious design flaw. 


And that is most of the time, especially if 


they're pushed to maximum performance, as they 


were in war time, the core got too hot. As a 


matter of fact, the first time that -- that 


Fermi started the B reactor, it shut down 


automatically, and that's great that it had a 


safety thing. But the problem was what 


happened. It got so hot that the metal casings 


in the center of the reactor, the core, melted 

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and -- revealing the enriched uranium, and it 


blew the steam -- with ionized strontium, 


cesium and iodine -- right out the back into 


the desert. Okay? Ambient vaporized ionized 


radioactive material. 


Now in that case, is dilution the solution to 


pollution? I wonder. 


Now my dad got thyroid cancer in 1948, started 


working here in 1944, so he has a good chance 


of being in the cohort. However, there are 


other issues with thyroid cancer. It's one of 


those latency type things, so we may not be in 


the window. 


But I want answers. I mean I would like to 


know why no one can explain the ambient issue. 


That reactor, between 1944 and 1970, had 1,900 


of these fuel rod failures -- cesium, 


strontium, iodine in the atmosphere, not good. 


Why is it okay that it happened? 'Cause I keep 


asking what about the ambient iodine? Iodine ­

- you know, radioactive iodine will affect a 


thyroid. It will do that. 


My dad was a reactor supervisor working on site 


and inspecting other reactors of this type. 


worry. I want justice. 


I 
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153

 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Chris. Next, Lloyd --


is it Chalcraf? 


MR. CHALCRAF: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Lloyd. 


MR. CHALCRAF: I was born in this area. I 


remember the first DuPont surveyor that come in 


here, and they were disliked very much but they 


found out -- a guy in White Bluffs, after they 


dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he 


thought well, we done the job. 


But anyway, I went to work out there at Hanford 


in -- with the Fire Department for about six -- 


six months and I transferred over the 200 


areas. I worked in S where they's melting 


slugs down from -- to take the plutonium out. 


Then I got -- they moved us back, they had a 


cut-back, and went to 300 area where they was 


bringing this uranium in from Ohio, and we had 


to handle that uranium by hand and we was 


putting it through -- was cutting it into slugs 


and we peeled the outside off and we'd get on 


fire sometimes. It would go into the water, 


but we had to handle all these uranium slugs 


and -- which went into the reactors, Ks and the 


B, D and R. 

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And in the meantime I got drafted in the Army, 


but when I come back -- for the Korean deal. 


When I come back I had my seniority that I 


carried and I got to go back to the 200 -- 100 


areas to work in the reactors. So I worked in 


B area, D, DR -- hello, Charlie -- and -- and 


all -- and at -- at K East -- I was at K East 


(unintelligible) down in March of '71 for the 


last time, and I imagine it's still in that 


position off the front face. All us folks had 


to work on the front and the rear face and 


handle that hot stuff and that's -- I took 


quite a little radiation. I don't know if 


they've got a complete record of it. 


And then we -- and I worked on the supplemental 


crew, which -- we had to move around from area 


to area, so I worked in all the -- all the DR, 


Ds, Hs, Fs, Ks, K West, all the areas in 


different jobs. And I remember Charlie Shatell 


was out there with the -- in the plumbers' 


union. 


 Anyway, that's -- and we had -- when I first 


went out there we -- this stuff was coming out 


of the stack, we used to have to run around 


with something on the ground and pick it up. 
I 
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think that's what the out-- outsiders that were 


hollering about from the east stack out of the 


200 area smokestacks. 


 But anyway, that's -- like I say, I worked in 


all of them. In the meantime, I just had 


cancer removed. I just got a Kadlec about 


three, four months ago and I got to go back in. 


They opened me up, took colon cancer out and 


now I've got a -- in the meantime I've got to 


go back in again because they -- when they put 


me together, it came apart, so I've got to go 


back in for another operation and so I've... 


And my family, in my bloodline, I don't know of 


anybody's had cancer. I mean my folks came to 


Richland in 1910 and Granddad set up a 


blacksmith shop. And by the way, my mother's 


brother was the first boy to die out of 


Richland, Washington in World War I in 1918. 


didn't realize that till I looked in the old 


papers. I remember when the DuPont surveyors, 


a little side deal, come into town, was going 


to take the property over, my grandmother led 


this guy in the house and showed him well, I 


lost my son, now you want to take my property. 


But after all we -- but I'll put it this way. 


I 
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This thing probably saved a lot of people after 


we found out what was going on here. It was 


worth the job. It was -- no argument there, 


but it was -- the people was pretty shook up 


when it first happened, but that's normal. If 


you move out, people -- all at once they moved 


in like -- in '44 -- '43 they come in. Nothing 


was -- went hot till the B area went critical 


in 04*. I've heard them talk about 03*. There 


was nobody -- 'cause I was in school right here 


in the Richland grade school and the Corps of 


Army Engineers wanted those buildings for 


offices, so they closed the school down in May 


so they could take over the offices and 


everything went -- so -- but that's what I can 


remember about it, and it was like an invasion. 


And this place was really jumping and they was 


really going to work. Morris Knutson* was 


digging ditches out and putting houses in and ­

- but I remember as a boy and I -- like I say, 


I remember from day one and we -- my -- that's 


about all I can say, but I did work in all the 


reactors. And by the way, I've talked to this 


NOA* in Ohio -- I made a report to them. You 


fellas know where I'm coming from there, so 

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that's all I can say, and I've got a reply back 


for certain things, but fella -- that's all I ­

- you know what I mean. I'm just -- I wasn't 


one of the big wheels out there. I'm just an 


ordinary guy. But when we took a lot of 


radiation, all this -- bull game we called it. 


We had to go to -- every time a reactor down, 


we'd have to go there and work on them, so 


that's about -- I'm (unintelligible) be taking 


more of your time, but I -- that's all I can 


say. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you very much. 


MR. CHALCRAF: I got to go back to Kadlec and 


get my stomach worked on next -- week from 


today. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. Let's go back 


for a moment and check -- Kay Barker, are you 


on the line? 


 MS. BARKER: Yes, Dr. Ziemer, I am. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Kay, would you like to proceed 


with your comments? 


 MS. BARKER: Yes, thank you very much. Good 


evening, Dr. Ziemer and members of the Board. 


I would like to thank Dr. Wade for allowing me 


a couple minutes of your time to make my public 

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comment via the telephone this evening. 


I would like to talk about conflict of 


interest. You're all well aware of the 


numerous times we have brought up the Neutron 


Dose Reconstruction Project conflict of 


interest for Rocky Flats. I would strongly 


suggest that the Hanford claimants be viligant 


(sic) for conflict of interest issues with 


their petition. 


I notice that Dade Moeller and Associates are 


part of the ORAU team responsible for dose 


reconstruction and evaluating SEC petitions. 


But -- and this is a big but -- they also have 


a DOE contract with Hanford for radiation 


safety and protection issues. Wouldn't this be 


like the fox guarding the henhouse if ORAU 


investigates one of their own for accuracy? 


You may remember that the Rocky Flats SEC 


petition was fraught with conflict of interest 


issues that were largely ignored by NIOSH and 


the Board. 


One last comment I would like to make is how 


outrageous I believe the $1,558 bill to 


(unintelligible) I received from the CDC is. 


This bill is in response to a FOIA I sent to 

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159 

Mr. Sundin September 1, 2006, with a reminder 


again on May 17th, 2007. I requested 


information from the logbooks that NIOSH looked 


through while at the Federal Center in Denver. 


I felt I was just as much entitled to this 


information as NIOSH was. Since they are 


records I need for my claim, I should not be 


charged for them, especially since it was not 


my fault I don't have access to this 


information. But if I want this information it 


will cost me. Why do I have to pay for 


information that NIOSH can use against my 


claim? This action will affect all other 


claimants that are not part of an SEC petition, 


as well. 


Thank you for this time. Kay Barker, Rocky 


Flats claimant and ANWAG member. Thank you, 


Dr. Ziemer. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you, Kay. Now let's 


see, Vina Colley? Is it --


 MS. COLLEY: I was kind of wanting -- has Gai 


Oglesbee -- has she spoke yet? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Let's see, Ms. Oglesbee spoke 


earlier to us. 


 MS. COLLEY: Oh, okay. 

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160

 DR. ZIEMER: So actually it was -- we ended up 


-- we ended our other meeting earlier and she 


was here and requested that she be able to 


speak at that time, so we heard from her 


earlier this afternoon. 


 MS. COLLEY: Okay. Well --


 DR. ZIEMER: And she -- and she gave me a note 


here to let you know that she's already spoken. 


 MS. COLLEY: Okay. Well, I would like to thank 


you for letting me speak, and my name is Vina 


K. Colley and I'm a former electrician that is 


still on the recall list from the Portsmouth 


Gaseous Diffusion Plant located in Piketon, 


Ohio. Due to the chemical and radiation 


exposures, I've spent the last 20-some years of 


my life in and out of the hospital and health-


pertaining. I spend much of my time gathering 


documents about the Portsmouth site and other 


nuclear sites in an attempt to understand what 


has dramatically degraded my health, and others 


that have or are presently working at the 


facilities. 


In 1999, due to the releasing of our documents 


that we had plutonium from recycled fuel from 


Hanford Woods Val-- Hanford, Woods Valley, New 

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161 

York, the Department of Energy admitted that it 


knowingly exposed workers to neptunium and 


plutonium, along with all the other radioactive 


and toxic chemicals, while employed at the 


Portsmouth site. With the releases of 


plutonium documents, it helped start the 


compensation deal, which started this sham of 


the dose reconstruction. 


Earlier today I heard them talk about the 


urinalysis test. Well, urinalysis needed to be 


taken at the beginning of the shift and also 


should have been taken at the end of the shift. 


Sometimes workers like myself and others, we 


never had a urinalys (sic) test for over a 


year, sometimes a year and a half. We all know 


that what the mistakes in the law are probably, 


you know, deliberate. And we need to extend to 


the families -- we need to extend to family 


needs, adding that I may suggest a primary 


political force to get convers-- get 


conversion, Republican, Democrat, whoever, 


involved in this. 


We need to add infant mortality to the 


compensation act, and at least for the female 


workers there is a study called "Mortality 

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162 

Among Female Nuclear Studies" and it should be 


added to this compensation. There was a lot of 


things, problems that they found in the 


females. I know when we testified here at 


Piketon, [Name Redacted] had six women who 


worked in her department and five of them had 


total hysterectomies. I had a total 


hysterectomy. 


And I would like to comment on Gai Oglesbee 


coor-- coordination of the submission of the 


SE-- SEC petition in good faith. It was on --


by September 18th, 2002. The petition covered 


a wide range of metorius (sic) classes across 


the nation who were and are permitted by the 


assignment government caretakers from defending 


the causation. This petition represented over 


7,600 petition, many P.R.E.S.S. members and 


Nuclear Workers for Just-- Justice who agreed 


to sign on to the petition, cont-- we 


contributed, supporting the evidence and Gai 


Oglesbee wrote the petition. And so we -- we 


think that the petition should still be good to 


cover these some 7,600 petitioners. Of course 


many of them have passed on now. 


 The Portsmouth site, I've been told just here 

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recently, according to a 1990 GAO report, has ­

- was the second on the list for the most 


serious problems. And an attorney, [Name 


Redacted] of the Chesney* firm, said that the 


report was documented March of 1990. And ATSDR 


came to our site. They claim that we have no 


health problems, we have no problems off-site, 


but Piketon is a special cohort site. And a 


1985 GAO report states that the Piketon workers 


have the highest exposures of all the gaseous 


diffusion plants. 


I can understand they put us in an open system, 


like a gas chamber, but they didn't turn on the 


gas. They just let us die one by one, slow, 


slow pain, death. And what do the criminals 


want to do? Study us to death with more dose 


reconstructions for jobs. I've been waiting 


since 1985 for compensation and for the company 


to do the right thing. But here it is 2002 


(sic) and that hasn't happened yet. My 


application had -- received a positive 


termination in 2004 for chronic bronchitis and 


depression from an independent physician panel. 


Then my records were locked up until 2007. 


This means that the panel has concluded that 

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the toxic exposure to chemical substance the 


DOC (sic) was significant factor aggravating 


contributing to the cause of the illness or 


which my claim was filed. There was an award 


in 2004. In 2007 I finally got a medical card 


for chronic bronchitis after many e-mails, 


phone conversations and getting my records 


locked up. I have been waiting now for seven 


years. Some more results about the claim is a 


criminal act to keep causing me so much stress 


with a low immune system, heart problems, toxic 


neuropathy, lung problems and thyroid problems, 


and now have to worry about breast cancer and 


my two nodules that I scared -- scared to have 


them to look at them. 


There are many things also that has been 


awarded by state compensation that the 


physician's panel hasn't recognized. And in 


2000 my records went to a nurse in Washington, 


D.C. She saw all of these problems that I was 


having and she said that her boss told her that 


Gai Oglesbee and I were two nut cases. But she 


looked through my records and she saw there was 


plenty of documentation, you know, from the 


doctors that we had these problems. She sent 

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me a signed FedEx paper to sign to get my 


records, all okayed with the medical conditions 


to the physician's panel. She was fired. My 


records were locked up. I had my records 


unlocked again. 


Then when my records went to the physician 


panel, I only was awarded two of the illnesses. 


Then my records were locked up from 2004 to 


2007. 


My problems that I have and many of my 


coworkers are low immune system, heart 


problems, toxic neuropathy, lung problems -- 


you know, how -- how much more stress is the 


government going to do -- give us by continuing 


to study us? Can anyone in that room explain 


to us why they want to keep studying us? You 


know, when I heard them today about this dose 


reconstruction, I wanted to sit down and just 


cry. I can't believe that we are cold war 


heroes and our government has no more respect 


for us than this. And if the Piketon workers 


can't be considered -- we're not even listed on 


the Super Fund list, even though we are second 


of one of the worst sites in the world. No one 


has ever recognized us as being that. 

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166

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 MS. COLLEY: So if we can't get toxic chemical 


illnesses compensation, how are these other 


workers going to get it? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. That's a --


 MS. COLLEY: Let's do away with the dose 


reconstruction and let's give these workers 


their compensation, and let's give them the 


medical card. We told you that back in 2000 we 


didn't want to be tested anymore. Before 2000 


I had been tested by some 100 doctors in the 


state of Ohio to the workers compensation for 


toxic chemical and illnesses. I didn't want to 


be tested anymore. If you had give all these 


workers a medical card and $150,000, you would 


have been better off today. But now $150,000 


is just a piece of dirt to what -- financially 


burden that you've put us in. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 MS. COLLEY: It's not only just me. It's all 


the workers, the Piketon workers, Oak Ridge 


workers, Hanford workers. We're all special 


cohorts. The government put us in this stuff. 


They knew it was there. They never told us. 


It's time for them to do the right thing. 

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167

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you for your 


comments, Vina. 


Are there any others on the telephone that wish 


to comment? 


 MS. FEIRING: Yes, this is Joanie Feiring. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Joanie, go ahead. 


 MS. FEIRING: I'm Joanie Feiring. My father 


worked at the Piketon plant from 1954 to 1964. 


He died with four different cancers -- 


prostate, bone, lung and skin. I've been 


working with Vina Colley on these issues here 


in Portsmouth, Ohio and I want to say something 


about -- as well as that situation, the 


secondary exposures, which is just really 


starting to come to the light. 


My mother had washed my father's clothes for 


ten years. She complained about the dust that 


was on them. And she died younger than he did 


-- than he did. She was 59, she had an 


endometrial cancer which doctors in Michigan 


had never even seen before and they didn't even 


know how to treat it. They -- they treated it 


with a treatment they actually named after her 


later. 


All of my sisters and I have health problems 

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today at very young ages, things that doctors 


just don't usually see in younger people. One 


has rheumatoid arthritis, one's had 


endometriosis and fertility problems, one has 


skin cancer that they usually see in much older 


people. I've got a number of immune system 


disorder problems. 


I want to also address -- earlier there was a 


comment made in the -- we listened to it pretty 


much all -- all day -- on using a common sense 


approach to this. And it only makes sense to 


me that if they know these -- these materials 


cause cancer and they know these people were 


exposed, that this dose reconstruction is 


unnecessary and you're spending lots and lots 


of taxpayer dollars on something that's 


erroneous. Because unless you have the 


dosimetery (sic) badges -- and I was told that 


at one time they would just drop them in 


buckets as they would leave the buildings and 


nobody knew which badge was whose and none of 


this was kept track of -- that you really 


cannot know. And I also believe now that the 


re-- the reconstruction, or any kind of -- of 


follow-up on this needs -- you need to look at 

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the maintenance issues. I just read an 


inspection from the Piketon plant that they 


admitted that they had flanges that were 


cracked, and they had no way of knowing how 


much radiation had escaped from these cracked 


flanges due to the fact that they were sealed 


with masking tape. Masking tape. I couldn't 


get past that sentence in the report. It just 


completely boggled my mind. And this was not 


in 1956 or 1966. This was in 1996. And they 


said that a more usual way of repairing this 


would have been two bolts instead of one and 


with a sealing material as opposed to this 


masking tape. 


And I feel like this is an analogy for what's 


going on here. You know, this -- this masking 


of the problem, masking of the issues. Let's 


hide it, let's hide our head in the sand and 


not try to think about it. That's -- that's 


one issue that I think needs to be addressed. 


The other is, with these exposures no one knows 


how each individual person will -- will 


respond. Each person is unique and each 


person's exposures may cause different levels 


of immune response, therefore creating 

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different illnesses. Just as a physician -- 


and we have a note from [Name Redacted] who 


believes that this dose reconstruction is 


useless, you cannot tell from a dose whether or 


not someone was injured any more than by 


knowing the dose of a medicine a patient had -- 


you can decide whether or not the patient is 


cured. Dose reconstruction is just a way to 


confuse the issue and that -- she added that 


dose reconstruction is a waste of time since 


the lowest possible dose, namely one track of a 


-- one -- one nuclear event has the probability 


of causing cancer. 


So you know, these are -- to me, if you're 


talking about common sense, you know, let's -- 


there were 10,000 -- according to your 


reporter, the report that -- the woman from the 


DOE said that 10,782 claims had deni-- had been 


denied due to exposures probably less than 50 


percent. That to me is just not acceptable 


when there's no way to be certain of this and ­

- and you know these people are getting ill 


because of this cancer expo-- these toxic 


exposures. 


So thank you for letting me express my opinion. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you very much, 


Joanie. Are there any others on the line this 


evening that wish to speak? 


 (No responses) 


I need to check with Jason -- is Jason still 


here? We have a statement from Senator 


Schumer; did -- did you want to do that today 


or tomorrow. 


 MR. BROEHM: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 


 DR. ZIEMER: We'll do that tomorrow. Okay. 


That completes my list. Are there any others 


that wish to speak that didn't get the 


opportunity -- sir, please approach the mike, 


give us your name. 


(Pause) 


MR. MCDANIEL: Dr. Ziemer, I'm Arthur McDaniel, 


and I spent 32 years at Hanford and I made a 


note to see everything I could see for past 


experiences and this sort of thing. And 


everything Charlie Shatell told you was the 


truth 'cause I used to follow him. But the 


thing of it is, I noticed from the time I 


started out there until now, or when I retired, 


that the radiation exposure, the instruments 


they have, were primitive compared to what they 

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have today. And in a sense of the word, it's a 


denial, because those people had the same -- 


the -- they should have been -- had the same 


deal that the -- that they have today. They 


should have got not into that position to where 


those people were exposed -- overexposed, which 


a lot of them were. 


And in the four years that we've been pursuing 


my father, which went to work there in '43 and 


he worked there 30 years and he died of cancer 


at 67. And the things that he used to tell my 


mother when he wouldn't come home for two or 


three days because he was all crapped up, that 


stuff was never really addressed the way it 


should have been. 


And so we went through this whole system, paper 


after paper. There was four or five conference 


calls from back east with my brothers and 


sisters trying to explain what's going on down 


here and it just -- it never sunk home 


whatsoever. It just -- well, it was like 


talking to a barn door. You just didn't get 


anything out of it. They'd say well, you 


should do this or you should do that. Well, 


what we did is we finally went out in the 

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Archives of Time at the -- at the library out 


there where they have all these deals from 


Hanford that you can look up that's happened 


over the years. 


And we knew that on the H reactor that they 


dumped a bunch of slugs out of the rear face 


onto the rear elevator, which crapped up 


everything. And my dad was involved with that. 


And so when we turned that in, DOE said no, 


that didn't ever happen. That just didn't ever 


happen. Well, then it -- and we had the proof 


that it did out of the Archives of Time, and we 


submitted that and it was -- of no avail. It 


just like -- it was like talking to nothing. 


They did-- well, so what? So it happened, so 


what? Well, that's where people got into 


trouble out there under those circumstances. 


And that's the reason in the 32 years out there 


I tried to follow everything and to look at 


everything I could look at so when something 


come up I could explain it or I been there or 


done it. 


Thanks, Dr. Ziemer. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much. Are there 


any others that wish to address the assembly 

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tonight? 


 (No responses) 


Dan, do we have you on for tomorrow, Dan 


McKeel? Thank you. 


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) (Unintelligible) meeting tomorrow? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Tomorrow we're at 7:30. It's an 


evening sess--


UNIDENTIFIED: (From the audience and off 


microphone) (Unintelligible) 


UNIDENTIFIED: Can we get a copy of the final 

report? 

UNIDENTIFIED: Yes. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. Is someone on the -- oh, was 


there another hand over here? Please approach 


the mike, and was somebody on the phone asking 


UNIDENTIFIED: Yes, I asked if we could get a 


copy of the report. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Which --


UNIDENTIFIED: Or the testimony of today. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Everything is being recorded by 


the court reporter. Once that's transcribed it 


will be on the web site. 


UNIDENTIFIED: Will that include the letter 

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that was read earlier by the -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. 


UNIDENTIFIED: -- Congressman? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, it will. 


UNIDENTIFIED: Thank you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Uh-huh. 


UNIDENTIFIED: Thank you. 


 DR. ZIEMER: It'll be verbatim. 


UNIDENTIFIED: The one thing I forgot to say a 


while ago was --


 DR. ZIEMER: Who is this? Who's speaking? 

 MS. COLLEY: Vina Colley. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

 MS. COLLEY: We're sending the foxes to watch 

the henhouse, with the exception that it is not 


the hens we're discussing but the health and 


the lives of real working class people. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. Yes, ma'am, 


give us your name, please. 


 MS. ADKINS: Yes, I'm Linda Adkins, and my 


husband, pretty much from the time he graduated 


from college, he worked at -- in the nuclear. 


He worked at Grants, New Mexico where they -- 


they were doing the yellow cake, he -- he 


worked at Argonne National Laboratory and he 

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worked at Hanford. And in 1992 he was working 


and they were doing radioactive isotopes and it 


was an experimental thing, or it -- in oth-- in 


other words, they were perfecting the 


encapsulation of these radioactive isotopes. 


And I think it was Westinghouse that was using 


Battelle's facility, and he was project 


engineer, and he didn't have a lot to -- you 


know, they worked kind of around the clock and 


he didn't have a lot of say-so as to procedure 


because it -- it was the -- there was one 


person there that didn't follow procedure and 


he didn't really have any jurisdiction over 


this person because he was a Battelle employee 


and he was with Westinghouse. I think that was 


in '92. 


 But anyway, during that time the -- he would 


come home and he would have his coveralls and ­

- and he went to work in a -- a white shirt and 


a tie, and he would come home with coveralls 


and he'd say well, that's because, you know, I 


had to be scrubbed, blah, blah, whatever. We 


got a letter from them that he was exposed and 


they said they did a chest -- and that he was 


exposed with americium-230. A few days later 

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we got a letter and we -- we were so upset 


because, you know, we -- he was an engineer and 


he understood that -- what that -- the 


ramifications of that would be. 


So we got a letter shortly after that and it 


said that they did another reading later that 


day and that the reading was different. Well, 


we were so elated, we didn't read between the 


lines. Didn't say that he wasn't exposed, said 


the readings were different. We were just, you 


know, elated that he -- but anyway, four years 


later he was diagnosed with terminal cancer of 


the upper part of the stomach, you know. And 


it's just -- to me, this whole thing is a huge 


bureaucracy, lot of people -- the more people 


they can get to file a complaint, the -- they ­

- that's where their jobs are. That's where 


the money is. That's where they get to spend. 


And I don't think that their hearts are in any 


kind of compensation or anything else, and who 


wants to go through all that? They -- they 


sent me stacks of -- trying to get me to -- 


right after he passed away. I got things from 


the University of Washington -- now the thing 


that concerns me, if I thought that it would 

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prevent another person from being exposed, then 


I would be involved. [Redacted] works out 


there today, and I just think that they were 


careless. You know, I think that they weren't 


that responsible and that honest, and I think 


that people should be able to go out and get 


their work history on anybody that they're 


concerned with, they should be able to go out 


there and get their work history and any 


incident that happened when they were in that 


locale. I think that people should be able to 


-- to -- to have access to that -- to those 


records. I don't know that they are, I haven't 


-- this is the first time I've -- I've -- you 


know, I've been to one of these, so anyway -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. 

 MS. ADKINS: That's it. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much. 

 MS. ADKINS: And I appreciate your -- 

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

 MS. ADKINS: Thank you. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. We have -- we have 

another public comment session scheduled 


tomorrow. It's later in the day, for the 


benefit of those who -- whose schedules are 

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such that this earlier hour is not convenient, 


but certainly you're all welcome to join us 


then. 


The Board will be meeting all day also 


tomorrow. There are copies of the agenda back 


there if you wish to look at the Board's 


schedule and see if there are issues that might 


be of interest to you. We -- we will be 


discussing a lot of different topics which -- 


yeah, the main Hanford discussion will actually 


be on Thursday morning, but there are some 


other related things tomorrow, so -- welcome to 


come back. Our session tomorrow begins at 


9:45. 


Thank you very much for coming, and goodnight. 


 (Whereupon, the meeting concluded at 7:10 p.m) 

______________________________ 

180 

1 CERTIFICATE OF COURT REPORTER 


STATE OF GEORGIA 


COUNTY OF FULTON 


 I, Steven Ray Green, Certified Merit Court 


Reporter, do hereby certify that I reported the 


above and foregoing on the day of July 17, 


2007; and it is a true and accurate transcript 


of the testimony captioned herein. 


 I further certify that I am neither kin 


nor counsel to any of the parties herein, nor 


have any interest in the cause named herein. 


 WITNESS my hand and official seal this the 


20th day of Sept., 2007. 


STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR 


CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 


CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102 


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