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Lack of compensation for nuclear workers

Tuesday, February 6 at 10:32 AM

This Speakout has not been edited

By Terrie Barrie, Craig

The Alliance of Nuclear Worker Advocacy Groups (ANWAG) wishes to thank Ann Imse and your paper for its continued coverage on the lack of compensation provided to the majority of claimants under the Energy Employee Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (EEOICPA).

ANWAG is a national organization of groups representing Department of Energy contract workers and their families, which has monitored the implementation of EEOICPA. ANWAG has often voiced its concerns to the responsible federal agencies as well as to Congress and the media.

Sadly, Mr. Charlie Wolf problems with the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health’s (NIOSH) dose reconstruction program and the Department of Labor’s (DOL) Part E program is not an isolated issue. We hear from claimants from across the country with similar complaints of inaccurate or missing information from their personal employment files. ANWAG is also aware of a claim where DOL paid $9,900.00 to a District Medical Consultant to deny one claim.

Rocky Flats is not the only facility where the site profile is flawed. It appears NIOSH only performed a cursory investigation into the sites. It is up to the Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health to discover the truth. ANWAG finds it inexcusable, that after six years, these types of problems still exist. And, unfortunately, the claimants cannot find remedy through the claims appeal process. The incorrect methods developed by NIOSH cannot be challenged on appeal - only the application of the flawed method to an individual case.

Part E of EEOICPA, which is to compensate workers for wage loss and impairment, further add insult to the injuries already suffered by these workers and their families. The Department of Labor has ignored the majority of the public comments submitted by members of Congress, labor unions, advocacy groups and individuals on the final interim rules. The Final Rules places an enormous and impossible burden of proof on the claimant to prove by a preponderance of evidence that the disease(s) they suffer from are the result of their workplace exposures. If workers or their survivors had access to all the documents, there would be no need for a federal compensation program.

ANWAG calls on Congress, once again, to step up to the plate and stop this injustice to the workers and their survivors and stop the gross waste of taxpayer dollars. The Cold War Veterans or their survivors desperately need a comprehensive reform bill passed this year to correct this tragedy of national proportions, which has gone on for too long.

READER COMMENTS

As an adult survivor of an Savannah River Site retiree, I wanted to share my personal experience with this program. EEOICP had no problem paying my father's 5th wife $225,000, but my denial was "lost in the mail."

Obviously, the evidence was enough to process his claim without protest and after 4 years of waiting.

Would you consider it fraud if a claimant denies any one else eligible, gets paid the full compensation and then others are later discovered?

Would you consider someone a dependent if you bought them their home and car, as well as paid their bills and bought their food while they were underemployeed? How would you fell if you setup a Trust Fund for your child that was mysteriously empty after you died ?

Now, another older stepbrother, never adopted by my father, is being awarded his claim after only one year waiting. Seems all you need to submit is evidence showing you lived with the employee as a child and never worked for a living. Wow.

Does that mean anyone from an alcoholic cousin or foster child who spent a month in your home can make a claim?

As the sole biological child, it is my intention to be heard and I am asking for your help.

ANYONE KNOW A GREAT LAWYER ?

Former President William Clinton intended this program as a thank you to those of us who suffered. Actually, many true sufferers are being ignored. Placing the burden of proof on "the common man" is like appointing Aunt Barbara as a Supreme Court Justice..some of us aren't savy enough to handle our claims and the chances of finding a lawyer are slim to none.

After, having to expose my personal information proving my poverty status and still being denied, having my mail misdirected and phone call messages unreturned, I've lost the joy I felt when I read the original intention for this program.

The worst part is knowing that a life changing amount of money is being paid to people who disrespected my father and could care less about his only child.

Would someone please tell Clinton that I'm not happy ?

Posted by Sheri Floyd on February 7, 2007 10:57 AM