THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 


PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 


CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 


NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH 


convenes the 


WORKING GROUP MEETING 


ADVISORY BOARD ON 


RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 


CONFLICT OF INTEREST
 

The verbatim transcript of the Working Group 


Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 


Worker Health held telephonically on July 31, 2006. 

 

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C O N T E N T S 

July 31, 2006 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 

DR. LEWIS WADE, DFO 

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NIOSH POLICY, CONFLICT OF INTEREST 

DR. JAMES MELIUS, WORKGROUP CHAIR 

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COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 77 
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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
 

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 


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


Director 


New York State Laborers' Health and Safety Trust Fund 


Albany, New York 

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PARTICIPANTS
 

ENGLE, MEETA, GAO 


HOWELL, EMILY, HHS 


MAURO, JOHN, SC&A 


MILLER, RICHARD, GAP 


RAFKY, MICHAEL, HHS 


SAMPSON, BOB, GAO 

 

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P R O C E E D I N G S
 

(2:00 p.m.) 


WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS
 

DR. LEWIS WADE, DFO
 

DR. WADE: This is Lew Wade and I serve as the 


Designated Federal Official for the Advisory 


Board. This is a meeting of a working group of 


the Advisory Board. This particular working 


group was put together to look very 


specifically at a draft conflict of interest 


policy that NIOSH had developed and to consider 


that policy and bring recommendations for a 


course of action for the full Board to follow 


in light of that policy, and that’s scheduled 


for a Board conference call on August the 8th . 


The Board is -- This -- This working group is 


chaired by Dr. Melius and is ably staffed by 


Brad Clawson, Mike Gibson and Dr. Ziemer. 


I would like to point out in case 


there’s some confusion, there is another 


working group of the Board also chaired by Dr. 


Melius that’s looking at specific SEC issues, 


technical issues that arise in the conduct of ­

- of the Board’s work. That working group, 

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also chaired by Dr. Melius, is staffed by Dr. 


Lockey, Ms. Munn and Mark Griffon. That is not 


the working group that -- that we’re involved 


with here. We’ll hold this meeting open to the 


public. What I would ask now is if there are 


any other Board members on the call other than 


the -- Melius, Clawson, Gibson and Ziemer, I 


need you to identify yourselves. We have to be 


sure that we do not have a quorum of the Board 


as we conduct these deliberations. Are there 


any other Board members present? 


(No response) 


 DR. WADE: Okay. I would ask, for the record, 


if there are federal employees who are on this 


call in an official capacity, would you 


identify yourselves? 


 MS. HOWELL: This is Emily Howell with HHS. 


 DR. WADE: Thank you, Emily. 


 MR. SAMPSON: This is Bob Sampson from GAO. 


 DR. WADE: Okay. Thank you. 


MS. ENGLE: I’m Meeta Engle, also from GAO. 


 DR. WADE: Welcome. Any other federal 


employees in an official capacity? 


(No response) 


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we don’t have a quorum and Jim, it’s all yours 


to -- to proceed with deliberations of the 


working group. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Dr. Wade, this is Ray. 


Can I ask one question? 


 DR. WADE: Surely. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Could I get the lady’s 


name who was last to ID herself just then from 


GAO? 


 MS. ENGLE: Yes, my name is Meeta, M-E-E-T-A. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Okay. 


 MS. ENGLE: E-N-G-L-E. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Okay. Thank you. 


 MS. ENGLE: Sure. 


 DR. WADE: Okay, Dr. Melius. 


NIOSH POLICY, CONFLICT OF INTEREST


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. We will be referring to the 


NIOSH Statement of Policy Conflict of Interest, 


the revised draft that was published as of July 


18th, 2006. It’s available at the NIOSH, the 


OCAS website. It does significantly differ 


from the previous draft so we will -- when 


referring to it, it will be helpful to be 


looking at it. And those of us that are on the 


work group also have a -- a draft set of 

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comments that I drafted and circulated to those 


members for our -- our consideration. We’ll be 


talking -- those are not available on the 


website since they’re -- serve our internal 


draft so to speak. And hopefully Brad, Mike 


and Paul, did you receive a copy of those? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, I got mine. 


MR. GIBSON: Got it, Jim. 


MR. CLAWSON: I received a copy of this draft. 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. And actually Lew -- I sent 


a copy to Lew also so he would have a copy. 


One question I have for you, Lew -- I guess we 


lost Lew already. 


 DR. WADE: No, I’m here. 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. Is on the August 8th call 


of the -- the Board, will there be an 


opportunity for public comment on the conflict 


of interest, the latest draft? 


 DR. WADE: We could make that available if you 


would like. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, I mean I think it might be 


appropriate because if not – not, I think we’re 


sort of in this position of sort of adopting a 


draft without -- without the public having had 


an opportunity to comment on it. 

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 DR. WADE: Okay. Well, I’ll do what I can to ­

- to make sure that that possibility exists. 


 DR. MELIUS: And there again there may not be 


any; and there’s certainly I think an 


opportunity for direct communication with the ­

- to NIOSH on -- on this draft policy but in 


case somebody wanted to speak to it I just 


think it’s sort of awkward to -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: All right. Just for clarity, I’m 


not certain that the Board’s action would be 


that of adopting the draft so much as 


commenting on the draft. Was it --


 DR. MELIUS: Well, yeah, let me -- let me 


clarify. That’s a good point as well. 


 DR. ZIEMER: It is -- It will be the NIOSH 


policy and they’ve given the opportunity for us 


to comment and then for public comment as well 


so there’s no action. It’s only to the extent 


that we want to be informed of the public 


comments with respect to the comments that we 


might make I would think. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. And I would also just point 


out that -- that NIOSH stated at our last Board 


meeting that their -- their intent is -- 


they’re -- they would like to get this policy 

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implemented --


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- soon and so I think the -- it 


was my impression that time was that after the 


August 8 meeting, after receiving our comments 


that they would be -- be sort of trying to move 


forward and implement the policy so I guess 


that’s why I was thinking of it as sort of 


maybe the last public discussion of the -- of 


the policy at least until it gets implemented. 


Somebody has actually called me up and asked me 


about this issue of public comment and how 


would that be addressed. So that’s why I 


wanted to --


 DR. WADE: As I said, I’ll do what is necessary 


to -- to make sure that that possibility 


exists. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, I think as long as it’s -- 


we have a --


 DR. ZIEMER: We usually have a public comment 


period so --


 DR. MELIUS: Exactly. We indicate -- that kind 


of covers that. I don't know how the -- the 


Board members want to go through this. The --


what I tried to do was to reference each of my 

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comments to the section that they ref-- 


referred to, and I’ve actually got some 


additional clarifying information that -- that 


can be added but -- but my plan would be to 


have something that we would put forward to the 


group, go to the full Board for review and -- 


and comment. 


So it may be a place to start off is in 


terms of spending our time rather than trying 


to focus on this document word for word would 


be to look in -- are there additional comments 


that we would like to make that -- that aren’t 


included here and we can sort of add them; and 


then maybe go back and -- and say are there any 


additions or clarifications or objections or 


whatever to what I’ve written here. So maybe 


Paul, Mike or Brad, do you have any additional 


comments you would like to add, you think we 


should discuss adding? 


 DR. ZIEMER: I have some suggested footnotes 


but I think they will be in the framework of 


the -- of your comments so I -- I don’t think 


they would need to be discussed outside that 


framework. My suggestion would be to just go 


through your comments. You’re asking if 

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there’s other issues that you haven’t already 


covered, right? 


 DR. MELIUS: Exactly. Brad, do you have any 


others or --


 MR. CLAWSON: This is Brad. I -- I don't have 


any right at this time but as we go through it 


I -- I did have some clarification questions on 


some of your information. But we’ll address 

those as we get into ‘em. 

 DR. MELIUS: Okay. Good. And Mike? 

 MR. GIBSON: Yeah, same for me. 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. Well, then, let’s start by 


going through and maybe see just paragraph by ­

- by paragraph that I mean the first part, I 


thought we should start off by, you know, 


stating that we, you know, think -- and I think 


we’ve talked about this at our meetings, that 


the Board is supportive of -- of NIOSH’s, you 


know, efforts to clarify and sort of codify 


their conflict of interest policy and -- and so 


we should indicate our general support for the 


changes. 


 DR. ZIEMER: I agree with that. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. I don’t think that -- The 


first specific comments was to footnote two on 

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page one which addresses the term conflict of 


interest. And maybe -- and maybe this is 


semantics but my sense as though it would have 


been also trying to avoid the -- the appearance 


of a conflict of interest that sort of a 


potential conflict of interest has a slightly 


different connotation to it. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, Jim, when you use the word 


appearance, that’s the -- I think the same as a 


perceived conflict, right? 


 DR. MELIUS: Right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And it appears to somebody or they 


perceive it to be a conflict. My -- My 


question is, and I don't know if Lew can answer 


this or if there’s anyone, any NIOSH legal 


counsel aboard but the -- the appearance or the 


perceived conflict may be a very subjective 


thing. It may -- It may be in the eyes of the 


beholder. It’s not necessarily a legal 


conflict of interest; am I correct on that? 


 DR. WADE: We have Emily on the line. Emily, 


do you want to speak to that? 


 MS. HOWELL: Yes. The appearance of a conflict 


is -- is more of a -- it’s not a legal issue. 


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part, which is the -- the real or potential 


issues are taken care of it doesn’t legally 


constitute a conflict per se. It --


 MS. HOWELL: Right. Right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: There -- There may be one but -- 


but per se it’s not a conflict simply ‘cause 


someone perceives it to be. 


 MS. HOWELL: Right. We have --

 DR. ZIEMER: You have certain tests as to 

whether --

 MS. HOWELL: Right. 

 DR. ZIEMER: -- it is. Jim, I think as I 

understand it and I think -- I think NIOSH 


probably would agree with this, that to the 


extent possible we do want to avoid perceived 


conflicts as well as real ones. 


 DR. MELIUS: That's correct. 


 DR. ZIEMER: I’d say to the extent possible. 


We want the optics to be as -- as good as you 


can get ‘em. 


 DR. MELIUS: Correct. Yeah. And that’s the 


way we’ve always discussed this really in terms 


of discussing NIOSH policy. I mean it really 


digressed to the -- the next comment also but 


one of the things I found a little bit 

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difficult about this document was that it to 


some extent assumes that there are these other 


legal requirements or requirements that address 


conflict of interest and that this is beyond 


that. But it never fully states those legal 


requirements or -- so there are for example the 


FACA requirements that address the Board and 


the implementation of -- of FACA so I believe 


there’s some regulations and so forth tied to 


that. 


 DR. ZIEMER: If there are actual conflicts. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, that are -- that are actual 


conflicts. There are some that also address 


issues with, you know, the contractors and so 


forth, and that --


 DR. ZIEMER: Well --

 DR. MELIUS: -- requirements. If --

 DR. ZIEMER: -- yeah. 

 DR. MELIUS: If NIOSH sort of assumes that 

those are already in place and this builds on 


that yet, you know, it never really states 


those and, you know, it again goes back to what 


you were saying. It -- It -- It’s somewhat ­

- I’ve gotten somewhat confusing in -- in terms 


of trying to understand this document. 

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 DR. WADE: Jim, this is Lew Wade. We would 


certainly appreciate a comment like that. 
I 


mean I’ve captured it obviously -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. WADE: -- but we would appreciate a comment 


like that coming from the Board. 


 DR. ZIEMER: I also have a -- a suggested 


wording which could be added to the footnote. 


If you want I would read that and see if it -- 


if it sounds like something you’d want to add. 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. Go ahead. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Here’s what I jotted down. And --


And I think this would be in addition to 


footnote two. Well, let’s see. Maybe it’d 


just be a part of our comments. Here it is. 


In some cases there may be an appearance -- I 


put this in quotes, “appearance of”, quote, or 


a “perceived”, in quotes, conflict of interest 


even where no legal conflict of interest 


exists. To the extent feasible, NIOSH will 


also seek to minimize the appearance of or 


perceived conflicts of interest. 


(Brief interruption) 


DR. ZIEMER: I’m sorry? 


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think. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, okay. So the whole point of 


this is that it acknowledges that there does 


exist those perceived conflicts and that to the 


extent that you can do it you’ll try to 


minimize those as well. But the -- those 


clearly are not legal conflicts of interest. 


Now, that’s aside from the other things you 


mentioned, Jim, which seems to be a whole other 


list of things. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yes -- No, some of those are 


specific to each group that this applies to. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: The different -- I mean there’s 


the one for federal employees. There are --


There are requirements for contract employees, 


a stack of requirements. So -- So the – but I 


mean I’m comfortable with that wording, Paul, 


and the concept. And -- And I think if you 


would be kind enough to email that to me. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. If it’s agreeable with the 


other working group members we can either add 


that as a part of the comments for item one or 


recommend that it be included in the footnote 


or something like that. But I can send you the 

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wording but we need to hear from Mike and -- 


 DR. MELIUS: That's right. 

 DR. ZIEMER: -- Brad on that, I think. 

 DR. MELIUS: Mike, Brad, are you comfortable 

with that? 

 MR. CLAWSON: Yeah, I think it sounded pretty 

good. I don't know how we’d fit it into this, 


if we’d fit it in as another footnote or -- or 


how. I guess we’d have to kind of leave that 


up to you to see how --


 DR. MELIUS: I’ll -- I’ll do a draft on it and 


-- you know, we will have another -- everybody 


has another look at this draft before, you know 


-- at -- at our August 8th call so my plan 


would be to circulate what we come up with to 


the whole Board hopefully in the next day or so 


and then we -- we can all discuss it again on 


the August 8th call so --


 MR. CLAWSON: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: Mike? 


 MR. GIBSON: Yeah. I believe that the -- that 


the appearance of the conflict of interest, is 


that part of the language on the federal 


regulations or is that just something that -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: I don't know that it’s -- it’s 

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even sound. I think -- I don't know the 


answer to that. Maybe Emily does. I don’t --


I don’t think it’s an official kind of a 


conflict of interest. 


 MS. HOWELL: This is Emily. There are some 


federal regulations regarding an appearance of 


a conflict of interest that have to do with 


government employees and covered relationships 


so there is -- there are some appearance issues 


that are legal but the majority of I think what 


-- what NIOSH is talking about in this policy 


are more policy-based appearance issues as 


opposed to the legal ones. 


 DR. MELIUS: NIOSH may very well want to, you 


know, provide the clarification or I mean -- or 


a word that’s appropriately -- I think what’s 


important is to sort of capture the -- the 


general concept. And as part of the footnotes 


I think what Paul wrote will be -- would be -- 


is helpful for that. 


 DR. WADE: I think NIOSH understands the spirit 


of what’s being said and shares that spirit, 


you know. We’ll -- We’ll see that particular 


comment and we’ll consider how best to include 


it. 

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 MR. GIBSON: And then -- then we’ll have a -- 


once you have it drafted in there we’ll have a 


chance to comment on it? 


 DR. WADE: Yeah.


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


MR. GIBSON Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: Moving along to comment two, this 


was a -- a -- a change from the previous draft. 


I actually -- I think we -- that was a comment 


during our last Board meeting and then followed 


up with some written comments to -- to NIOSH to 


that effect. But that to me the whole -- the 


whole policy was much easier to -- to 


understand and work with if it separated out, 


you know, who would focus on -- probably 


because the legal and other sort of background 


requirements are different for some of these 


different groups depending on our functions and 


-- and so forth and do that. So I was 


supportive of having a separate approach for 


separate policy or at least application of the 


policy to -- for the Board and for the Board’s 


contractors. 


But I was -- was uncomfortable with the 


suggestion that somehow we would create and 

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administer our own policy, part -- partly 


because that didn’t really fully reference, you 


know, the FACA’s and -- and other requirements 


that, you know, cover us as special government 


employees and so forth. It looked fairly self 


-- you know, sort of self-serving that we 


would, you know -- we’re -- we’re creating, you 


know -- we’re commenting on one that’s for 


other people and then here, we’re creating our 


-- our own. If you look at what is included in 


I believe it’s appendix 1 which was also in the 


last policy, the three exclusions that they -- 


I think the word is NIOSH recommends the 


following exclusions. So the wording’s a 


little confusing here but I personally don’t -- 


I mean I think -- I specifically think that 


these are fine operationally. 


 But I am assuming these are sort of 


above and beyond what the -- certainly 


compatible with the current legal requirements 


for us as FACA members and special government 


employees, and view them as sort of a way of 


operationalizing that, you know, so that the 


public would be more aware of how we’re 


operating, when we are making -- you know, when 

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a person, you know is excused from a particular 


discuss-- a Board member is excused from the 


discussion or voting on a particular -- 


particular issue. 


 DR. WADE: This is Lew. I think -- I think 


there’s sort of two pieces to it. That if you 


take the FACA rules they’ll tell you or point 


to whether or not a conflict exists and -- and 


no, we should refer to them in this document, I 


agree. This section was really trying to say 


if a conflict exists, what are the exclusions 


or the actions required of a Board member. And 


I believe that the Board has evolved to this. 


I guess it would not be inappropriate for the 


Board to -- to -- to reinforce this and make it 


its own. And I think that’s what -- what’s 


happening here as NIOSH is saying, you know, 


this is how the Board has been operating. We 


think maybe the Board should -- should -- 


should make that firm in its deliberations. 


What constitutes a conflict we can use the 


factor regulations or the Board could go beyond 


if it wished. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. What -- And I guess what I 


was proposing was two things. One is that 

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maybe it should be separate comments. One is 


that I don’t think that we should, at least as 


implied here, you know, create and administer 


our own policy. 


 DR. WADE: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think we should, you know, 


discuss that but I think that more needs to be 


in the context of our -- our work as a FACA and 


so forth. And that would draw in -- and I 


frankly think that the Board ought to discuss 


that separately from these comments because I 


don’t think we should hold up the overall 


comments while we, you know, create and 


administer our -- our own or how we’re going to 


do -- do that. 


But secondly I -- I do think that since 


those three specific ways that we, you know, 


currently administer the -- the current 


practice, if we know it’s compatible with FACA 


and the other requirements. And then we should 


-- we can speak to that so I was proposing that 


we do say that we concur with those particular 


points. 


 DR. ZIEMER: This is Ziemer. I was just 


wondering conceptually what the intent here is. 

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I assume that NIOSH is essentially saying in 


essence there needs to be a fair amount of 


independence of the Board from NIOSH and in 


order to preserve that independence the Board 


perhaps should not be -- have its policies 


dictated by NIOSH per se even though in essence 


we would want a policy that was at least as 


rigorous and -- and quite parallel. 


But I guess NIOSH is suggesting that 


there be a specific document which is the 


Board’s conflict of interest policy and that 


would speak to both the Board and its 


contractor. But I -- I don’t know what create 


and administer means per se. I think the 


create part means that, Jim, I guess that means 


that we would put in place a policy and it 


could look very much like the NIOSH. There 


ought to be a great deal of parallelism. I'm 


not sure what administer means because in 


practice the administration of the Board in a 


practical way, NIOSH has some -- some 


responsibilities for helping the Board conduct 


its work. 


 DR. WADE: Right. This is Lew. Let me speak 


to that if I might again briefly. I think 

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there are two parts to this. There’s the part 


that -- that says is a Board member conflicted 


or not. Now, there are FACA rules that will be 


used and are used now to determine whether or 


not a Board member is conflicted for a 


particular site for example. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. WADE: And again there’s the FACA rules in 


place. The Board could go beyond that; it 


could add to that. It really can’t negate that 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. WADE: -- but it could put its own thought 


beyond the FACA rules. And -- And whether you 


want to do that or not I think you can 


deliberate on. The second part is if a 


conflict has been determined to exist using 


those rules then what happens? And there the 


Board if you think about it, the Board sort of 


self-administers that. The Board has developed 


these sort of operating rules. And -- And if 


a Board member is conflicted then the Board 


member steps away from the table or takes 


whatever remedy is appropriate here. So I 


think in a way the Board is sort of 

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administering the remedy if a conflict has been 


determined to exist. But I ask the question -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: What administer means in this 


case, just to make sure that we -- we knew what 


the policy required. 


 DR. WADE: When I asked can I find a Board vote 


on these remedies, no one has shown me where 


that exists. And therefore I would suggest 


that if the Board is comfortable with these 


remedies then the Board, you know, by its 


recommendation to NIOSH or by whatever vehicle 


the Board wishes to take, makes this its -- its 


policy with regard to remedy. 


 DR. MELIUS: I -- This is Jim. I just think 


we need to be clear that in adopting these, if 


these are in essence, you know, compatible 


with, you know, meet the requirements of FACA 


and so forth, and meet the requirements under, 


you know, how you -- how the federal agency 


administers the conflict of interest rules 


under -- under FACA and -- and their review 


because I don't think it’s -- 


I disagree a little bit with your 


description, Lew. I don't think that we self-


administer. We -- The administration as I see 

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it is -- is, you know, there’s -- you have a 


list of what the conflicts are. When an issue 


comes up, Paul, during a meeting, Paul as 


chair, you know, alerts you or vice versa and, 


you know, the -- the appropriate, you know, the 


Board members who may be affected by that then 


is reminded that they, you know, need to go to 


the audience, not vote or whatever, and -- and 


-- and you make an announcement of that. 


 DR. WADE: Right. But --


 DR. MELIUS: And -- And I think -- which is 


all fine and I think doing that in a public way 


I think is -- is helpful. I think having these 


three points is sort of the -- our rules for 


how this is operationalized I think would be 


helpful to have and I have no problem 


supporting that. It’s -- I don’t view it quite 


as us administering it ourselves I think. 


 DR. WADE: But the -- the Board could decide 


upon a different set of rules and then it would 


be the -- it would be my judgment as to whether 


or not those rules were consistent with FACA 


and the requirements. But these are the rules 


that we’ve been operating to. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 

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 DR. WADE: And if the Board’s comfortable with 


them, you know, stating that I think puts us 


right back to where I think we all want to be. 


 DR. MELIUS: I guess I was more as concerned 


about understanding what create and administer 


means. And -- And to me that implied that, 


well, we just made these up and, you know, 


independent of the other requirements and 


independent of our -- 


 DR. WADE: Well, point taken. I mean I 


understand. 


 DR. MELIUS: That was -- And maybe if I try to 


reword the comment, too, to capture that a 


little bit more clearly. 


 DR. WADE: Surely. 


 DR. MELIUS: Brad, Mike, is that all right with 


you? 


 MR. CLAWSON: This is Brad. Yeah, this is the 


one that I have a little bit of question on 


because I guess when we start getting into the 


Board administering their own conflict of 


interest I guess I was -- I was kind of saying 


that we -- I feel like we patrol through Lew 


and legal counsel and so forth but I’d hate to 


be kind of held accountable -- accountable also 

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for it, too. 


 DR. WADE: I understand. 


 DR. MELIUS: Paul, is that --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, you’re going to reword this 


in some way but ultimately I -- I think the -- 


the sort of policy question here is will -- 


will we have a separate document which will be 


the Board’s statement of conflict of in-- Board 


policy on conflict of interest? You know, and 


include all the FACA -- FACA requirements and 


any other requirements. 


For -- For example, right now we have 


these for the contractor and for NIOSH you -- 


you have these different sort of litmus -- 


litmus tests. Did the individual have the -- 


well, I’m looking for the questions. Did --


Did -- Did they have a supervisory 


relationship at a site or did they do work that 


impacted on the policies on the site and those 


kinds of questions. I guess my question is are 


we going to have similar tests for the Board? 


How do we determine -- I think it’s very 


important that we determine what constitutes a 


conflict of interest for a Board member. 


 DR. MELIUS: And I would -- I guess what I was 

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proposing is that, one, is that we have some 


discussion of that among the Board members. We 


really never -- the Board has never discussed 


that -- that issue in the context of this 


document. 

 DR. ZIEMER: That's right. That's right. 

 DR. MELIUS: And I would --

 DR. ZIEMER: And -- And I think we have to ask 

the question for example, do we want a -- a 


conflict of interest policy that sort of 


parallels this? Is what a -- is what is a 


conflict of interest for a site document owner, 


is, you know, is that kind of a definition also 


applied to a Board member? 


 DR. MELIUS: Or does it apply to a working 


group chair? Do we --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. All of those kinds of 


questions, yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: Or something like that and -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, and see, we have a different 


set of groups. We have working group chairs 


and working group members and subcommittee 


chairs and members and so on. So there might ­

- there might be a whole category of things we 


sort of evolved on practical things, on voting, 

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on dose reconstruction issues and on special 


exposure cohort petition issues and so on. But 


there may be some issues on working groups that 


we need to clarify and so on. Anyway, I’m sort 


of -- I think I’m sort of leaning toward the 


idea that we -- we want to have some sort of a 


document that spells out for the Board members 


some specific things, but it ought to have some 


very good parallels with this documents. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, I agree. I think I’m a 


little at a loss to figure out how to best 


develop that document because I think -- I 


think that we need some discussion of sort of ­

- a little clearer discussion or maybe refresh 


our memory which isn’t -- may not be so clear 


on the FACA requirements and so forth which we 


go through as special government employees 


which have always been -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. And -- And those we don’t 


have to approve or disapprove. I mean they’re 


in place and that part of it would just be a 


matter of reminding ourselves what the rules 


are. 


 DR. MELIUS: Right. And we need to make -- 


yeah, we need to -- exactly. We need to make 

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sure we’re not creating something that is 


contrary to those or -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- actually conflicts with those 


as -- as our rules are implemented. And --


And I think there’s a balancing to that because 


we don’t want to also sort of unfairly 


restrict, given the small number of Board 


members, given the fact that the Advisory Board 


was set up to -- to represent different 


backgrounds and so forth, we need, you know, to 


understand how we’re operating. We’re not 


operating as someone who’s writing a document 


or doing a dose reconstruction where there are 


people that they deliberated things and it’s 


expected that there be -- we will not always 


agree with each other, you know. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: We represent those different 


viewpoints and backgrounds and so it’s a little 


bit more -- more complicated. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. And it’s not like an 


agency where sort of ultimately everybody’s got 


to line up and --


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: -- and salute the boss. 


 DR. MELIUS: Right, right. And so it would be 


-- frankly it’s fairly easy given everybody’s 


experience and background to come up with a 


very strict policy that there’d be nobody left 


to vote on a particular issue. 


 DR. WADE: Jim, this is Lew. Just as a matter 


of staff, would you like me to have the 


appropriate FACA rules sent out to all Board 


members prior to the call or would you like a 


presentation or --


 DR. MELIUS: I think it would be better. I 


don’t think we should try to do it on the 


conference call. 


 DR. WADE: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: I don’t -- and Paul, you -- Mike 


or Brad, I mean --


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I don’t -- I don’t think we 


can develop the Board’s policy on this 


conference call. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: But we somehow have to deal with 


the issue that this document as proposed is -- 


exempts the Board and the Board’s contractor 


from the policy. 

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 DR. MELIUS: Why don’t I clarify -- clarify 


that comment. Add a section about, you know, 


recommending a positive step that we develop a 


document? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. And -- And I would go so 


far as to say particularly when you get to the 


next item which has to do with the contractor I 


think we should -- we could even note in the 


footnote -- in fact this is one of the other 


ones I had -- is that the Board has indicated 


its intent to require its contractor and 


subcontractors to meet the same COI standards 


as NIOSH contractors. 


 DR. MELIUS: Well --

 DR. ZIEMER: Or something equivalent. 

 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. Yeah. 

 DR. ZIEMER: We’ll -- We don’t want the 

document implying that our contractor doesn’t 


have to worry about conflict of interest. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: And that we will spell it out but 


it’ll at least be as rigorous as what’s 


required here. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Something to that effect. 

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 DR. MELIUS: At the time -- I can capture that 


in the -- in the next -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. In the next bullet. 


 DR. MELIUS: In the next bullet. But --


Because really at the time we awarded the 


contract to our contractor and went through -- 


put out the bid and so on we had actually 


adopted at -- at that point conflict of 


interest requirements for that contractor. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. Right. And there is a --


the contractor has on file a contract -- a 


conflict of interest policy which -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: -- has been approved. 


 DR. MELIUS: That was in fact more rigorous 


than what was in place at that point within 


NIOSH. Now, NIOSH has since had for ORAU and 


its other contractors. Now NIOSH has a 


essentially a new policy and we need to reexamine that in the -- the context of -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. And see, here again our 


contractor has different -- different 


responsibilities than the NIOSH and the ORAU 


folks for example. They have certain document 


owners. In a sense we have certain kinds of 

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document owners, too, but they are different. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. Yeah, there’s a process and 

--

 DR. ZIEMER: We have to think through at just 

how you go about that. Anyway, yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: Mike and Brad, are you comfortable 


with that, those changes? 


 MR. CLAWSON: This is Brad. Yeah, I think we 


really need to look into it. It’s -- It’s an 


interesting web that we have there. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think so, too. 


 MR. GIBSON: Yeah, this is Mike. You know, 


again my only concern is as far as the Board 


members being conflicted for this or for that. 


I can understand the financial interest and 


this and that but when site experts who’ve ran 


a program can help write up the site profile 


you’ll know they’re not the document owner, you 


know, that’s a conflict to me. Not financial 


necessarily but, you know, if they ran a -- 


they ran a program they’re not going to step on 


their own toes when they write a site profile. 


And so it’s a -- it’s a slippery slope there. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, I think it’d be-- I’m -- 


Mike, I’m suggesting we could have some of 

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those same issues with our own contractor, too, 


when they do reviews so we have to look at the 


other side of that as well. 


 MR. GIBSON: All right. 


 MR. CLAWSON: That’-- This is Brad. But on 


the other hand, too, looking at the Board 


members, how -- how we fit into this whole 


program, it kind of seems a little bit 


ridiculous because 25 years ago you spent one 


day at one site and now you’re conflicted. And 


I’ve heard a couple of those stories already. 


But it’s -- I -- I think we’ve got a problem 


there. 


 MR. GIBSON: This is Mike, and I’m, you know, I 


guess to clarify my point a little bit more. 


I’m still waiting on the information as to how 


many hourly or salary workers who are not at a 


management or leadership position helped write 


the site profile documents as a site expert. 


And they -- I’m not talking about being 


consulted after the fact in a town hall 


meeting. I’m talking about a document author. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I mean the answer is 


probably very few. 


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there were none. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. That’s pretty few. 

 MR. GIBSON: My point is --

 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, I understand the point. 

 MR. GIBSON: If you oversee a program you may 

see it one way but for the one out there with 


your nose in the glove box you may see it a 


different way on how it was implemented. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: The comment two I will -- I will 


change as we discussed and say the Board will 


move ahead to develop its own -- develop a 


document in conversation with NIOSH, etcetera, 


and FACA and so forth. Similarly on comment 


three between this discussion about reviewing 


that proposal, the conflict of interest policy 


for our contractor. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, I would think we should. 


 MR. CLAWSON: I agree with that. This is Brad. 


 DR. MELIUS: Comment four on -- which deals 


with section 3.0 which is the disclosure and 


exclusion section. And I thought here was -- 


one of our comments before was that the -- 


initially in one of my personal comments to 


NIOSH was that the corporate conflict was -- 

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was not clearly covered by the document and 


some of that was -- was definitional, some in 


terms of the way that earlier document was -- 


was written. We -- And they’ve added 


corporate conflict of interest here. However, 


as they go through and deal with these series 


of questions about it, it wasn’t clear to me 


that they were always consistent in how that 


could apply to corporate versus personal 


conflict of interest. The questions were all 


sort of personal questions. 


 DR. ZIEMER: I think all the questions are 


personal. I don’t see how they apply to 


corporate. And the corporate thing is very 


tricky and -- and I don't know if -- if there 


are a series of questions but Lew, you know, 


they are similar to questions that arose on our 


own contractor relative to -- I think to Rocky. 


You could say, okay, what kind of questions 


were asked in order to determine -- you know, 


there was a conflict of interest decision 


determined there. 


 DR. WADE: There are a series of questions that 


are part of the SC&A conflict of interest 


policy. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, that’s what I meant. And 


I’m just -- I’m -- I’m wondering if -- if it 


would help to have a parallel. The questions 


themselves help define what a conflict of 


interest means. 


 DR. WADE: Certainly, you know, I can’t speak 


for the agency but it certainly -- Jim’s 


comment certainly seems appropriate to me -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. WADE: -- and I think that I would 


recommend that --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. WADE: -- we just switch in somehow -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Expand that so it clearly covers 


the corporate. 


 DR. WADE: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: And if you read some of ‘em you 


could just assume individual and corporate. 


But some of ‘em just don’t read -- read 


correctly or (inaudible) correctly for -- to go 


for corporate. And the same with what’s 


referred to as Appendix 2 which is the 


disclosure form. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Which parallels this, too. 


 DR. MELIUS: It parallels this. 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: But we just need to clarify that. 


And those are, you know, the corporate conflict 


of interest and those corporate requirements 


are clearly part of the procurement review and 


so forth so it’s not a -- I mean it’s -- there 


are certain requirements that I think we just 


need to take this -- include in this policy 


just making sure we can operationalize this. 


And where there are differences or it’s not 


appropriate to -- to, you know, ask the same 


question for a corporation as you would for an 


individual, you know, then we’ll just do it. 


But I think it would help a lot if it were -- 


it were clarified. 


 MR. GIBSON: This is Mike. ORAU has -- has its 


own corporate conflict of interest policy, 


right? 


 DR. MELIUS: I believe so. 


 DR. ZIEMER: But it would have to be 


subordinate to this, right, ultimately? 


 DR. WADE: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: Right. Correct. 


 DR. ZIEMER: That is, it couldn’t be in 


conflict with this. 

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 MR. GIBSON: But we could keep using it? 


 DR. ZIEMER: And it couldn’t be more 


restrictive I suppose but -- 


 MR. GIBSON: Right. 


 DR. ZIEMER: But yeah, I think it would be 


helpful to clarify those -- those corporate 


questions. 


 MR. GIBSON: Well, and this is Mike again. You 


know, I just think some of the restrictions I 


guess on most of the parties needs some 


explanation. For example, you know, there may 


be some -- some -- some corporations or some 


agencies or whatever that may just make 


interpretations on that, what is or isn’t a 


conflict. And, you know, it can be detrimental 


to some people. You know, we had one of our 


Board members that resigned due to conflict 


and, you know, I’m not so certain that there 


was a actual conflict there rather than just a 


interpretation made by someone who has, you 


know, a policy for themselves. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Uh-huh. And that might have been 


more of a perceived than real. Well, okay. 


 MR. GIBSON: And -- Or -- Yeah, or related 


to, you know, some of the contracting -- 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, yeah. 


 MR. GIBSON: -- requirements which are, you 


know, in some -- some cases can be, you know 


fairly stringent on -- on some of these issues. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: Number five I think is I think -- 


is a relatively minor comment but there’s a I 


think in some cases they refer to a DOE/AWE, 


you know Atomic Weapons Employer; sometimes 


they don’t. And I don't think that they are 


always consistent with that. Did you work for 


DOE in the past? Well, I think it -- it might 


not be common but I think there’s also a 


question of --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, is there -- is it 


intentionally leaving that out or is that an 


oversight. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think they in some sense it may 


have been an oversight. But let’s point it out 


and someone just needs to go there -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Uh-huh. 

 DR. MELIUS: -- and clarify that. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 

 DR. MELIUS: Number six we’ve already 

discussed. That’s the appendix 2 item which 
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there ought to be a corporate form also. This 


is I think relatively minor but number seven -- 


number seven, the disclosure form. I should 


have referenced the question on it. Hang on a 


second. There’s a question on -- on page 21 


it’s question number 13 which has to do with 


legal cases. If marital, etcetera, 


professional relationship with any attorney at 


the time the attorney is or was representing 


claim with DOE or site operator. Mostly I 


think that refers to expert advice. And 


usually it’s not with the attorney as much as 


it’s I think we’re also trying to find out what 


was your relationship relative to a partic-- 


working on a -- a case involving a particular 


site. So the initial practice is to cite it 


versus what is -- what are the cases involved, 


not just which attorney because that gets very 


confusing. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Uh-huh. 

 DR. MELIUS: It can get confusing. 

 MR. GIBSON: I think, Jim -- this is Mike -- 

that part of that is described in I believe 


it’s some of the first few pages perhaps -- 


within the first six pages of the -- of the 

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ORAU corporate COI policy about being expert 


witnesses in a -- in a litigation and 


otherwise. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. And it could be. I don’t 


recall that part of it but it could very well 


be there. And in the normal -- I mean -- I 


mean to some extent you may want to ask 


questions relative to working with an attorney 


involved in that but -- but it’s also I think 


part of it is to discover what they said you 


were an expert, it’s what cases it’s what -- 


what cases that you were in and some -- it’s 


pretty standard and so if the requirement for 


federal cases is you know, you list your 


previous work for a number of years. I forget 


what the year requirement is but by the -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Verified by case rather than -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Not that I worked for, you know, 


Bob Smith and, you know, but I worked for -- 


did expert work on so and so versus -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. That sounds reasonable. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. I don’t think it’s -- as I 


say I don't think it’s a bit -- I think it 


would actually be helpful in terms of -- of the 


disclosure. And then comment number eight. 

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That one refers to the disclosure forms and I 


just think it’s the second paragraph of section 


4.0. And it currently says disclosure form 


shall be updated as needed. I think there 


should be some time frame for that. You know, 


seven days, ten days -- I don't know exactly 


what’s practical but it certainly shouldn’t be 


left open-ended. 


 DR. ZIEMER: You’re saying within a certain 


time period after a commitment is made or 


something, say four zero? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yes, it’s updated as needed. 

 DR. ZIEMER: It’s kind of open-ended right now. 

 DR. MELIUS: It’s like, well, you know, if you 

get around to it and so forth. And I -- I 


would think that the -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: You didn’t have a specific time 


period. You’re just saying, you know, spell 


out what it is, what are the ground rules here? 


 DR. MELIUS: I’m saying seven days but I mean 


it’s -- somebody told me it was -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: It was ten --


 DR. MELIUS: Ten. It was more practical to do 


it in ten days or fourteen days or whatever. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Whatever it is. 

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 DR. MELIUS: That’s -- That's fine. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, I agree. 


 DR. MELIUS: Mike and Brad, you both okay with 


that? 


 MR. GIBSON: Uh-huh. Yes. 


 MR. CLAWSON: This is Brad. Yeah, I agree with 


that. 


 DR. MELIUS: Comment number nine, section 5.5 


refers to a site profile document owner. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Uh-huh. 


 DR. MELIUS: And for the previous draft the 


owner was referred to as the -- the author of 


the -- the document. Now, I mean at least my 


interpretation is that sort of gauging from 


now, I'm not quite sure what motivated the 


change from author to -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Now, the draft --


 DR. MELIUS: The draft --


 DR. ZIEMER: The draft still used owner, didn’t 


it? 


 DR. MELIUS: It was owner and then -- but they 


kept referring to it as the author of a 


document I believe. Now, it’s the author has 


become a writer/editor. It seems -- I don’t 


think the functions have changed as described 

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earlier, at least not the -- the requirement 


they have a responsibility for their checking 


all of the work people contribute to the -- the 


document in referencing it and so forth but it 


certainly implies that it’s a more passive 


role. 


And as I’ve certainly said when we’ve 


discussed this document there’s -- we’ve not 


been -- we’ve not seen a lot of -- we haven’t 


seen active owners. Well, maybe -- they may 


very well be out there by documents that have 


been being active we’ve only really, you know, 


interfaced a lot with a few and then since this 


policy has been changed and implemented so it’s 


-- I don’t think it’s fair to reach an overall 


assessment on -- on how this is -- will be 


implemented. 


But at the same time I mean a lot is 


depending on that document owner being very 


actively involved in -- in -- in, in reviewing 


and seeking out other opinions on or other 


expertise or a wide range of expertise on a 


particular issue or about -- information about 


-- about a particular -- particular site. And 


we -- I mean a lot of the success or failure of 

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this policy or at least of the credibility of 


this policy and what’s done is going to depend 


on that. And I guess I get a little bit 


concerned when it -- there’s some wordsmithing 


which may be minor. It may not be something to 


be overly concerned about but appears to sort 


of downgrade that -- that function. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I -- I think NIOSH knows 


what the issue is. I’m -- I’m wondering if 


part of the problem is in fact finding the 


right words because we are aware and they are 


aware of some cases where it appeared that the 


-- the document owner really didn’t know that 


much about the site and didn’t appear to be in 


a position to speak on behalf of the concepts 


being evaluated and soon to defer to the site 


experts on almost all issues. 


And -- And we were concerned and I 


think NIOSH was concerned, and certainly 


members of the public were concerned that at -- 


at least it looked like there were cases where 


the -- where the so-called owner didn’t really 


own it. They didn’t have a grasp for what was 


going on. And somehow we want to make it clear 


that the owner’s got to know the document and 

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has got to have verified what -- and somehow 


validated input from various site experts. But 


I don't know -- I don't know what the right 


words are in terms of writer, editor, author, 


owner. And -- But have I characterized, Jim, 


the concern there? 


 DR. MELIUS: Absolutely. And I think -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: We want to make it clear that this 


person is not just a -- a cut and paste person 


that sits there and takes whatever site experts 


feed them and just paste it in, right? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. Absolutely. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. And I think NIOSH is aware 


of that concern and maybe they haven’t fully 


captured the issue but I guess you’re 


suggesting here that somehow some words that 


would even strengthen the -- the idea? 


 DR. MELIUS: I just wanted to -- to also to 


reinforce about this issue. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: But that’s -- I mean when we 


received this updated document we didn’t really 


receive --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


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the -- the changes are -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 

 DR. MELIUS: -- in wording again. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Editor -- I mean I can 

edit a document. I can get rid of the dangling 


participles, right, Jim? 


 DR. MELIUS: Right. Very well. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Without knowing anything about the 


site. 


 DR. MELIUS: And within the, you know, federal 


bureaucracy there are -- there’s a -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Technical attitude. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- title called writer/editor 


that’s --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- a technical writer that pieces 


together things but not necessarily with any 


technical expertise or knowledge about the -- 


the material. And that’s different than, you 


know, someone with much more -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Let -- Let me ask Lew. Because I 


think, Lew, NIOSH is sensitive to this issue. 


 DR. WADE: Yes, NIOSH is sensitive to this 


issue but I would suggest that -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Probably the -- if we could 

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somehow make it clear that -- and I think they 


are attempting to make it clear that this 


person’s role is not just pasting paragraphs 


together. 


 DR. WADE: Right. But I think a strong 


statement on the part of the Board and any 


advice that the Board would want to offer as to 


how to make this clear would be appreciated. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Jim, to some extent you’ve done 


that when you said the person should not just 


be assembling sections written by experts 


without a critical review so -- and that’s the 


idea certainly. 


 DR. WADE: And --


 DR. ZIEMER: So maybe you’ve captured -- maybe 


you’ve captured the concern here. 


 DR. MELIUS: I don't know quite how to go 


beyond it at this point but -- and -- and aside 


from whatever words are in here the -- the test 


is going to be actually in the implementation 


and --

 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Yeah. 

 DR. MELIUS: -- evaluation. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Right. Right. 

 DR. WADE: Well, I would make sure that those 

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sentiments are -- are in any document you send 


forward. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Jim, this is Brad. One -- One 


of the things, you know, that I’ve heard so 


often that has come out and we’ve been hitting 


on it very hard, but this document owner can’t 


be a façade. He can’t be a person up there 


just -- just doing this. This is a person that 


-- that owns this document, that knows these 


profiles, has done his research into it. And I 


think this is what we’re hearing from the 


public and so forth. I don't know the exact 


words on how to be able to put it in but -- but 


this document owner has got to be able to 


justify and back up what -- what that site 


profile is all about. 


 DR. ZIEMER: That’s true. Exactly. 


 DR. MELIUS: And I would just add that this 


comment applies to I mean the other owners 


also, the TIB, technical information bulletin 


owners and others which are all described as 


primary writer/editors. And again it’s the 


responsibility is in some ways greater than 


that and that needs to be understood. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yup. 

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 DR. MELIUS: Mike, do you have any comments on 

that or --

 MR. GIBSON: Yeah. And also, you know, like 

the definitions of critical review. I think we 


have to be very careful in how we spell it out 


so -- in order to at least allow for some 


outside information and not just have all the 


critical reviewers necessarily that have worked 


for the -- the program manager or whoever else 


that put the document together. There should 


be some critical reviews, not just town hall 


meetings by people that, whether they were 


hourly or salaried, actually were hands on 


people out in the field. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think certainly if I were -- and 


actually providing the -- the attribution for 


each part of the document will -- will help to 


judge that but, you know, certainly -- 


 MR. CLAWSON: This is -- This is Brad again. 


And, you know, it -- it gets back to the basis 


of what these document owners own. We’re 


basing a lot of this off the site profile. 


Everything that we’re -- we’re dealing with is 


really based off -- off of this site profile 


and this is a very critical portion of this 

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dose reconstruction and everything else that 


we’re doing so I feel that this is one area 


that we really need to be conscious of -- of 


how it’s been owned, who’s owned it and the 


information that is fed into this. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. I agree. 


 DR. MELIUS: Number -- Comment number ten is ­

- refers to -- it’s section 6.4 which is a 


complex-wide technical information bulletin 


owner which is listed under the non-key program 


functions. And if I understand that correctly 


that means a sort of lesser standard of 


conflict applied here. And I think certainly 


this -- this one sort of -- this sort of begs 


the difference about in terms of what, you 


know, is the example I used. Well, that 


technical information bulletin applies to a 


single site or mainly to one site or a few 


sites or if primarily to one site then I think 


there’s a real issue of -- of perceived 


conflict or if -- if that expert is -- would be 


conflicted if that were a, you know, involved 


in a site profile involving that site, that 


same site. 


So somehow by, you know, saying it’s a 

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complex-wide issue it’s not clear to me that 


it’s appropriate that that had a lesser -- 


necessarily have a lesser standard. Maybe 


there are examples where that might be 


appropriate but to me a lot of the -- I guess I 


just don’t -- I’m skeptical on -- on that and 


maybe it needs to be better described or 


defined for that. Anybody else have comments 


on that or --


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, this is Ziemer. I think 


that in a general sense it probably is logical 


that it is -- has a -- is kind of a lesser 


level of concern. 


However, in specific cases I think one 


could imagine if you had a complex-wide 


technical information bulletin on -- and I’m -- 


at a little bit at a loss for an example but 


may-- maybe there would be a complex-wide one 


on -- on the use of NTA film for neutron 


dosimetry let’s say. Or -- Or how you, you 


know, convert the -- the readings for dose rate 


factors or something. In any event it seems to 


me that it’s possible that a person that 


authored that would have been a person who had 


that kind of responsibility on at least one of 

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the sites impacted at some time in the past. 


 The very fact that they’re perhaps an 


expert in that area, it seems to me that would 


be a -- it wouldn’t be surprising that -- but ­

- but maybe we would need to -- to take a look 


at what the nature of the complex-wide 


technical information bulletins, what all -- 


what all is covered there and how -- what the 


genesis of those are in terms of authorship and 


so on. 


 DR. MELIUS: Correct. I mean --


 DR. ZIEMER: I mean is it a non-issue or is it 


a moot point or are in fact experts brought in 


who in fact have done that very job at some one 


of the affected sites? 


 DR. MELIUS: Frankly I don't know what NIOSH’s 


practice is, whether they -- for example I can 


see a site-specific technical information 


bulletin that -- which would be covered, would 


be a key program function as I understand it, 


but would then be taken and applied to some 


other sites and so forth which I guess in some 


ways could raise it’s own issues. 


But at least, you know, for the primary 


site where it was developed, which I expect 

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would be the one where it was the most 


important there would be, you know, careful 


consideration of conflict -- conflict of 


interest for that so it would be covered here. 


If these are -- these other ones I mean 


are complex-wide one is a very generic kind of 


bulletin then I don't think this would 


necessarily be as important an issue, it’s -- 


in it’s application, where it applies and so 


forth. And I think there at least needs to be 


some consideration of that in -- in how these 


are -- are developed and assigned. 


 DR. WADE: This is Lew. I mean I do think the 


intent was these sort of generic documents that 


really don’t -- aren’t rooted in any particular 


site. But I think the clarifications you point 


out need to be made. 


 MR. GIBSON: This is Mike and I respectfully 


just -- I don't know if I completely agree with 


everything that’s been said because, you know, 


I’ve seen, for example, a white paper on high 


fired oxides and that was only because it came 


out as an issue first at Mound. And their 


internal staff took the lead and put out this 


white paper and these DOE contractors, you 

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know, all the time and a lot of times the rest 


of the sites just follow the lead of the first 


person who has the problem. And that may not 


necessarily be the site with the worst problem. 


And so --


 DR. MELIUS: You know, that’s a good point, 


Mike. 


 MR. GIBSON: You know, I’ve seen at least two 


or three examples of that. 


DR. MELIUS: Yeah. And maybe what we need to 


do is -- I think it’s going to be -- the 


question is going to be the specific bulletin 


that’s being developed. 


MR. GIBSON: Correct. 


DR. MELIUS: And then there needs to be some, 


you know, judgment as to how that, you know -- 


you know, perceived conflict of interest of the 


people involved and doing that and how that 


should be covered under -- how that -- how this 


conflict of interest should be applied in these 


instances. And I think we need to, you know, 


make the comment that -- that we’re not 


completely comfortable with the way it is now, 


to either, you know, get that clarification 


from -- from NIOSH and how they define these 

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and how these are done or there needs to be 


some sort of, you know -- this policy should be 


modified to include a, you know, a review and a 


determination as to how it would be handled 


under this -- this policy of given the 


background of and where -- where that policy 


would apply. 


MR. GIBSON: Excuse me. This is Mike again. 


think that also gets back to that point about 


really defining who does the -- the critical 


assessment of the document -- 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 MR. GIBSON: -- because, you know, they -- they 


can may have well just have learned the 


approach and adopted it for a site based on 


someone else’s research, and, you know, then it 


just -- then it’s just -- it’s not a real 


transparent -- how deep does that -- that 


critical reviewer’s knowledge go? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. Yeah. I will try to -- I 


will modify comment ten to try to make it more 


-- capture some of these thoughts also. 


 MR. GIBSON: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: Number eleven referred to section 


7.2 which is some of the disclosure issues and 


I 
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again there may be some federal rules that 


cover this. I’m just worried about a overly 


broad definition of business confidential, the 


application of that. I guess I was 


particularly worried because whoever wrote this 


document put it in quotes. Like if they had 


said just basically -- had left the quotes off 


I might have just said well, that’s, you know, 


some sort of good government term and they all 


know what it means. 


But just by putting it in quotes I think 


it implies that there’s a fair amount of 


judgment involved and discretion and I think we 


need to be careful that we not declare 


everything so business confidential that it’s 


impossible to -- I mean there is not, you know, 


adequate disclosure. Again, we’re not after 


somebody’s trade secrets or, you know, 


information that somehow would jeopardize the 


business. But at the same time it can’t be so 


broad that, you know, no information is 


provided even though we’re, you know -- again 


the disclosure and the transparency from that 


disclosure would be helpful to everyone 


involved. Reaction or comments on that, Paul 

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or --


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I just assumed that this, 


you know, we -- we have some documents for 


example from our contractor that we have 


redacted for the public meeting where -- where 


rates are removed and so on. I just assumed 


that there -- there’s kind of a known list of 


things. I -- I actually wasn’t very concerned 


about this but your -- your concern that there 


isn’t more -- I mean there’s some very -- very 


specific things that you don’t disclose. For 


example, the -- the pay rates or the -- of the 


-- in other words, they could have the bottom 


line cost of the contract and they -- they can 


show -- I think they even show hours of people 


but they don’t show the individual rates and so 


on. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah, that -- that -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Those things are fairly 


straightforward. Now, are there -- are there 


other things that the company says this is a 


trade secret, do you automatically don’t 


include it? I -- I don't know what -- what 


would be left out here. 


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-- like for trade secrets that the agency would 


-- would go through that -- even to the extent 


that they would just define what they mean by 


trade secret and this is confidential. I think 


that would be helpful so you would know what’s 


being kept -- kept from you. I mean I can give 


you -- I can’t give you a specific example but 


I know based on some of the email notifications 


we used to get about some of the -- ORAU’s 


documents that they were using that were a 


technical basis, some of the lists of sort of 


technical information, what they were working 


on so when I requested it because I thought 


that it would be helpful for my work as a Board 


member they -- I got a letter, you know, a note 


back from them saying, sorry, no, this is all 


business confidential. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: And that -- now I didn’t pursue it 


and, you know, I didn’t think it was that -- 


that important but I think it does apply to 


more than just your rate of pay and so forth or 


can. And again if -- if a better description 


of both what’s included there as well as the 


process for including it or not -- 

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 DR. ZIEMER: Well, now, let me ask this 


question. What -- What gets disclosed? They 


have these conflict of information forms that 


go in from the contractor employees to NIOSH I 


guess, right? And we all fill those out. So 


what is it when these disclosure forms are made 


publicly available online what -- what gets 


redacted? 


 DR. WADE: Emily, can you answer that? 


 MS. HOWELL: Michael just came in. Could you 


repeat the question for him? 


 DR. ZIEMER: Well, it’s 7.2 under compliance to 


the policy. It says the contract officer for 


each entity performing work under the program 


will inform the entity of the guidelines, the 


conflict of interest guidelines. And then the 


information goes on to say that -- that the 


employees of the contractor submit their 


conflict of interest disclosure forms to NIOSH 


and those are made public. And subject to 


redaction are trade secrets and business 


confidential. The question is what is it on 


those forms that legally -- I mean legally you 


must redact certain things I guess. 


And I think -- and Jim, your question 

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sort of revolves around who -- who determines 


what’s redacted and what are the ground rules? 


Can -- Can the contractor simply say this is 


all business confidential and you can’t tell 


people what -- what we’re submitting or, you 


know, what -- what’s -- what are the ground 


rules? And you’re kind of asking that, Jim, 


right, in your question? What is it that’s 


business confidential I think is what you’re 


asking. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. 


 DR. ZIEMER: What does that term mean? 


MR. RAFKY: This is Michael Rafky. I think 


when we wrote this what we were thinking about 


was information that you might have to redact 


due to the Privacy Act as well as information ­

- when we talked to a number of the contractors 


in working on this what we considered business 


confidential were things that somebody 


mentioned like pay rate specifically of people 


-- specific individuals -- as well as 


disclosure of any projects that were -- that 


they were considering or that they were in the 


process of bidding for but that information 


hadn’t been made public. And I think those -- 

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those were sort of the large category that we 


would want to redact in terms of these. 


 DR. ZIEMER: So when they do a conflict of 


interest they may tell you, oh, by the way, 


we’re bidding on this contract with XYZ Agency 


that includes some activities on say this 


particular site? 


MR. RAFKY: Right. If you look at the -- 


DR. ZIEMER: But we don’t want anybody to know 


we’re bidding on that because we don’t have the 


contract and it’s business confidential. Is 


that what we’re talking about? 


 MR. RAFKY: Yes, that’s what we’re -- that’s 


what we’re trying to avoid, that being a 


factor. Yeah, somebody -- not only is this a 


process of signing a contract or bidding for 


work that would cause a conflict. We would 


want to know that before awarding the contract 


but you could redact that information from 


being publicly available because it’s something 


that it’s not happened yet and it might reveal 


sort of internal business or trade secrets of 


that contractor. 


 MR. GIBSON: This is Mike Gibson -- Mike 


Gibson. If I could ask Michael to just follow 

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up on this. If I understand you right then 


you’re saying overall -- does have a conflict 


of interest form for corporate conflict -- 


conflict of interest that has never been made 


public. You guys just they fill it out, you 


review it. And then you guys determine if it’s 


legitimate trade secret that should be 


redacted? Is that what I hear you saying? 


 MR. RAFKY: Mike, I'm sorry. Right now I can’t 


think of exactly how or what has been redacted 


in the past. I know that’s what we were 


thinking about with regard to this policy. 


 MR. GIBSON: Okay. Has the ORAU COI form for 


conflict of interest, has it been made public 


in a blank form even? 


 MR. RAFKY: I believe it already -- those are 


already contained on the website in terms of 


people -- disclosure forms that are -- have 


been submitted. 


 DR. MELIUS: First let’s -- let’s clarify 


something because if I recall the conflict of 


interest form that’s been used in the past and 


the appendix 2 draft you have here for -- which 


is for -- really for -- for individuals, I mean 


I don’t see anything on this, the individual 

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form that I mean is trade secret or business 


confidential. It’s just not asking for that 


type of information. It doesn’t ask you how 


much you earned or, you know, things like that. 


I mean I just looked through it quickly 


so maybe I missed something or -- or whatever 


but -- and so I think we’re talking about the 


corporate form and as Mike is pointing out, we 


haven’t even seen that really. Or we’re asking 


if it’s -- we’re not sure that we -- we’ve seen 


it and we certainly don’t have the -- the new 


corporate form which, you know, might I guess 


could ask that type of information. And I know 


you’ve already seek it out in terms of awarding 


contracts but --


 MR. GIBSON: Right. This is Mike again. I 


guess what I’m saying is, is there a clear-cut 


table that outlines what things are corporate ­

- what corporate restrictions are or -- you 


know, I know pay rates are not to be disclosed 


if they’re bidding on work, yada, yada 


(phonetically). But is there a table that 


clearly defines or outlines what is supposed to 


be -- what they want redacted or what -- 


 MR. RAFKY: No, in this policy so far we’ve not 

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put together any sort of table or defi-- or 


specific definition like that yet. We could 


certainly do that. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Excuse me. Could I get 


that speaker’s name just to be sure, please? 


 MR. RAFKY: It’s Michael Rafky, R-A, F like in 


Frank, K-Y. 


THE COURT REPORTER: Right. Thank you. 


 DR. MELIUS: I’m glad you’re paying attention, 


Ray. 


THE COURT REPORTER: You’re welcome. 


 MR. GIBSON: I guess what I’m saying is I would 


like to see more information on -- on just the 


definition of -- or how this works. The 


corporate -- the individual conflicts have been 


disclosed but not the corporate conflicts or 


how that’s determined. 


 MR. RAFKY: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: I think we’re all in agreement on 


the need for clarification on that. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. Yeah. Just clarify that. 


What is it that they’re talking about here? 


 DR. MELIUS: And let me rewrite that -- 

 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 

 DR. MELIUS: -- comment so -- so it’s a little 
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bit more clear. I just, yeah, couldn’t 


understand what they were even referring to I 


mean particularly because we, as we said, we 


didn’t really have a corporate form to refer to 


so in terms of the types of questions and so 


forth. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 DR. MELIUS: And I think there may -- I could 


see potentially why on that. I just think that 


in terms of what the -- the public should -- 


the public should understand what’s being 


given, you know, shown to them, available to 


them and what isn’t. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 


 MR. GIBSON: I mean I, you know, I just -- I 


guess all I’m saying is when I’ve looked 


through RFP’s for contractors bidding on Mound 


we’ve requested their RFP and it -- it’d come 


back with about 100 pages and there’s about ten 


words on those 100 pages. And it -- it 


wouldn’t even tell what type of equipment 


they’re going to use to do some 


decontamination. And, you know, once they get 


the contract and this piece of equipment comes 


in it’s used contract -- it’s used complex-wide 

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so, you know, I think more -- just more 


clarification would be -- be good. 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. And I think we need 


reassurances that something’s not going to be 


disclosed at all simply because a small portion 


of that may involve, you know, some trade 


secret equipment or something like that that -- 


that, you know, they would still disclose the ­

- the relationship with the, you know, DOE site 


or whatever might be something we might 


legitimately be concerned about. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, that’s what we’re concerned 


about. We --


 DR. MELIUS: Not use business confidential or 


trade secret to totally --


 DR. ZIEMER: Cover up something else. 


 DR. MELIUS: Now again, the level of detail may 


be affected by that but the -- the majority -- 


in fact the -- the trickiest part is the -- the 


issue of things they are bidding on or 


considering bidding on because, you know, on 


one hand there’s a -- we have a legitimate 


interest in that I think. The -- because it 


could be a perceived conflict or actual 


conflict or at the same time, you know, you 

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could understand the business proprietary 


nature of that also. They don’t want a -- 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: -- competitors to know what 


they’re up to so --


 MR. GIBSON: To my knowledge if it is posted on 


the web I haven’t found it but, you know, it 


doesn’t look like that there’s any public 


disclosures on the web for corporate conflicts 


of interest for ORAU or -- or their 


subcontractors. 


 DR. MELIUS: No, I don't think it’s ever been 


up there. I’d like to go back. Are there any 


other, after we’ve gone through this, any other 


additional comments the working group thinks we 


should make, anybody wants to suggest? 


 DR. ZIEMER: I -- I have none. 

 MR. CLAWSON: This is Brad. At this time I 

have none. 

 DR. MELIUS: Mike? 

 MR. GIBSON: Not at this point. I’d like to 

reserve judgment until once we get another 


draft of this to maybe further clarify or 


whatever. 


 DR. MELIUS: That’s fine. It’s open. I don't 

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think we’re trying to -- I think what our task 


as a work group was to -- was to get some 


comments that would form the basis for the work 


group’s -- or for the Board’s discussion. 
I 


just remind everybody that we’re going to try 


to reach closure on this issue -- on our 


comments at the conference call on the 8th . 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: So if people have additional 


comments, you know, topics that aren’t covered 


here that you’d like to add, it would certainly 


be helpful to put them in, you know, writing in 


an email to people so that people have those in 


-- in front of them during -- during the 


meeting because it’s often a lot harder in a 


conference call Board meeting to write, you 


know, something that everyone can agree on 


because not everybody is sitting next to a 


computer when they’re on the call and can get a 


document. So it would be certainly helpful if 


we -- people had those ahead of time. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Jim, this is -- this is Brad. 


Now, in all the conversation here we’re going 


to have legal counsel is going to kind of 


straighten this corporate form out? Is that my 

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understanding that they’re going to give us 


further clarification of this? 


 DR. MELIUS: Yeah. I mean I think our comments 


-- I think what we should try to do at our -- 


the August 8 meeting is set -- is a set of 


comments on the July 18th draft, you know. 


We’re not approving, you know, a corporate 


disclosure form that we haven’t seen. We’re 


recommending that they develop a separate one. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Right. And I understand that. 


was just wondering if they were going to get 


that out to the working group and kind of what 


-- what kind of a time frame we had. 


 DR. MELIUS: I mean to the extent that they can 


clarify maybe on some of these questions we’ve 


asked, or issues at the August 8th meeting. 


But I don’t -- we need to sort of just try to 


close out on the draft as it stands on July -- 


you know, July 18th, what we had in front of us 


on July 18th . And then to make our comments 


now. Things that are maybe presented to us in 


response to our comments at a later point in 


time we can review and comment on at a later 


point in time. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


I 
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 MR. CLAWSON: Okay. 


 DR. MELIUS: And I don't think it should, you 


know, foreclose any discussions with NIOSH, you 


know, or NIOSH staff or with Lew, everybody 


during the conference call but it just -- I do 


think that we need -- they would like us to 


give our, you know, general comments and 


general approvals or disapprovals at -- at that 


August 8th call so that they can start 


implementing at least large portions of this -- 


this policy. 


 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 


 DR. MELIUS: If there are no other comments? 


Lew, do you have any? 


 DR. WADE: No. Just thank you all for your 


time obviously. And we’ll look forward to the 


discussions on August 8th . 


 DR. MELIUS: Okay. Thank everybody. 

 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

 DR. MELIUS: Whoever is still listening in, 

thank you. Okay. ‘Bye now. 

(Whereupon, the working group meeting was 


adjourned at 3:35 p.m.) 

______________________________ 

77 

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 31, 


2006; 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 


4th day of August, 2006. 


STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR 


CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 


CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102