Wednesday, October 06, 1999
Bunning seeking Paducah answers
Congressional inquiry requested
BY PATRICK CROWLEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
U.S. Sen. Jim Bunning has requested a formal investigation into federal spending and cleanup plans at a government-owned uranium processing plant at Paducah, Ky.
Mr. Bunning, R-Southgate, has asked the General Accounting Office (GAO), the investigative arm of Congress, to “look into problems” at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in far western Kentucky.
“There are some obvious questions that need to be answered,” Mr. Bunning said Tuesday during a conference call from Washington with Kentucky reporters.
Mr. Bunning wants the GAO report to address three issues:
• Spending: Mr. Bunning wants to know whether too much of the money earmarked for cleaning up the plant is being spent on administration. The U.S. Department of Energy has said that 89 percent of the money budgeted for cleanup is actually being spent on paperwork.
“Almost 90 percent of the cleanup funds are going to red tape and bureaucracy,” Mr. Bunning said, adding that he wants a breakdown of the spending by the GAO.
• Inventory: There is still uncertainty as to how much contaminated material is in the plant and buried around it, Mr. Bunning said.
“Until we know what is in the plant and in the ground in Paducah, we can't fully understand the problem or the cost,” he said.
• Planning: Mr. Bunning wants to know the Department of Energy's plans and priorities in ridding the plant of contaminated material.
Mr. Bunning has asked the GAO to complete the report by February so he can include proposed new spending for the cleanup in next year's budget.
A request for a GAO report from a member of Congress is not automatic, said John Mechem, Mr. Bunning's spokesman.
But Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has signed off on the request.
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Louisville, is also expected to back Mr. Bunning's request for the report “to show a united front from Kentucky,” Mr. Mechem said.
The backing of the other senators will likely help win approval for the report, he said.
From the mid-1950s until 1977, plutonium and other highly radioactive isotopes contaminated uranium that was shipped to the Paducah plant for recycling after being used in nuclear weapons production.
In a lawsuit filed in June, three current workers alleged that employees were not informed about the contaminants or adequately trained and protected to work with them.
Mr. Bunning, a member of a House Energy subcommittee, held a hearing in Paducah on Sept, 20 at which workers at the plant testified they handled highly radioactive uranium and plutonium.
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