[Download a copy of the draft agenda here. And thanks Andrew Evaskovich for all you've done for the people who made LANL great!]DRAFT AGENDA
Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health – Meeting 61
Doubletree Hotel Albuquerque
201 Marquette Avenue Northwest, Albuquerque NM, 87102
Phone: 505-247-3344; Fax: 505-247- 7025
Teleconference Phone: 866-659-0537
Participant Code: 9933701
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
NOTE: All times in Mountain Time
1:00 p.m. – 1:15 p.m. Welcome Dr. Paul Ziemer, Chair
1:15 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. NIOSH Program Update Mr. Larry Elliott, NIOSH
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. DOE and NIOSH Security Plans Dr. Patricia Worthington, DOE, Mr. Larry Elliott, NIOSH
3:00 p.m. – 3:15 p.m. Break
3:15 p.m. – 3:45 p.m. DOE Update Dr. Patricia Worthington, DOE
3:45 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. Department of Labor Update Mr. Jeffrey L. Kotsch, DOL
4:30 p.m – 6:00 p.m. LANL SEC Petition Dr. Greg Macievic, NIOSH Petitioner(s)
6:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. Break
6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. Public Comment
7:30 p.m. Adjourn
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
9:00 a.m. – 9:15 a.m. Welcome Dr. Paul Ziemer, Chair
9:15 a.m. – 10:15 a.m. Westinghouse Atomic Power Mr. LaVon Rutherford, NIOSH
Development SEC Petition Petitioner(s)
10:15 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. Break
10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. Tyson Valley Powder Farm Mr. LaVon Rutherford, NIOSH
SEC Petition Petitioner(s)
11:30 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. SC&A New Technical Support Sandy Cohen, President, SC&A
Contract
11:45 a.m. – 1:15 p.m. Lunch
1:15 p.m. – 2:45 p.m. General Steel Industries SEC Petition Mr. David Allen, NIOSH
Petitioner(s)
2:45 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Break
3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Hood Building SEC Petition Dr. Sam Glover, NIOSH
Petitioner(s)
4:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. Blockson Chemical SEC Petition Ms. Wanda Munn
Petitioner(s)
5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. Break
7:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. Public Comment
Thursday, February 19, 2009
9:00 a.m. – 9:15 a.m. Welcome Dr. Paul Ziemer, Chair
9:15 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. SEC Petition Status Updates Mr. LaVon Rutherford, NIOSH
10:00 a.m. – 10:45 a.m. Science Update Dr. James Neton, NIOSH
10:45 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. Break
11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Subcommittee & Work Group Reports Chairs
12:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. Lunch
1:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Board Working Time Dr. Paul Ziemer, Chair
3:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Future Plans and Meetings Dr. Paul Ziemer, Chair
3:30 p.m. Adjourn
Jan 29, 2009
Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health – Meeting 61
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20 comments:
I guess here is where you squeeze in any comments about Be contamination of the public?
Feb 18, Wed 7:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. - Public Comment
Will Kevin Roark be around to take questions?
Do you want his answers?
If a conference is about radiation and public health, why would you submit a comment about Be?
It is a meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and Workers Health. The Board is appointed by the President and provides advice about dose reconstructions and recommends if classes of employees should be added to the Special Exposure Cohort. This is authorized under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. The act compensates DOE employees, contractors and subcontractors for illness incurred while working at DOE facilities. It also compensates employees of Atomic Weapons Employers. Cancers caused by radiation, Beryllium sensitivity and Chronic Beryllium Disease, and silicosis may be compensated at $150,000.
Cancer claims must undergo a dose reconstruction to determine a probability of causation. If the Probability of Causation is %50 or greater the claim is awarded. However, if the claimant is a member of a class of workers under the Special Exposure Cohort, then dose reconstruction is waived. The Special Exposure Cohort was established because certain facilities lack the necessary records to do a dose reconstruction.
LANL has been added to the cohort for all workers from 1943 to 1945. A new petition is being presented to the Board for LANL Support Services Employees for the years 1976 to 2005. Frank posted the agenda to inform LANL employees of this important event.
Please attend this meeting and support the petition
Andrew Evaskovich
Saw this in the news
Computer Thefts Renew Los Alamos Security Concerns
Friday, Jan. 30, 2009
A U.S. nuclear-weapon laboratory's security practices have again drawn attention in the wake of recent losses of computers and communication systems, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, Sept. 29, 2008).
The Washington-based Project on Government Oversight, a nuclear complex watchdog group, this week released an internal e-mail from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico describing the theft of three computers from a scientist's home and the loss of a Blackberry "in a sensitive foreign country."
The losses came after Los Alamos sought to crack down on information security following a series of lapses in recent years, including a case in which a contract worker removed large amounts of classified documents from the laboratory (see GSN, Dec. 21, 2007).
The recent cases did not involve classified data, said laboratory spokesman Kevin Roark.
"There are no national security issues," he said, adding that the losses were reported immediately to laboratory officials and that off-site computers are not allowed to contain sensitive information, a wider group of material than just classified documents (Sue Major Holmes, Associated Press, Jan. 29).
POGO staffers, however, said the incidents demonstrated continuing security problems at the facility.
"Here we go again," said Senior Investigator Peter Stockton in a press release. "It appears that LANL still has not created a system strong enough to prevent the potential release of classified material" (Project on Government Oversight release, Jan. 29).
If a conference is about radiation and public health, why would you submit a comment about Be?
1/29/09 7:09 PM
Kevin Roark, is that you?
So why is this news? Someone's home was broken into and items, including computers, were stolen? It could have happened to anyone. How is this a LANL or LANS specific problem? This is just more POGO bullshit.
Pogo's double-agent mole at LANL has been forwarding them e-mail again!
These morons must work for CBS news...they seem to think like DOE does...that classified information magically disappears from the staff's brains as they leave work each day.
If a lab worker's personal computer is stolen, rather than unclassified LANL computers, are they concerned? No way!
Never mind a careless LANL staff member could easily contaminate their personal home computer with classified information if they tried.
It's unlikely, but can happen. POGO doofuses don't care about that...only things they can use to trash the Lab and it's workers.
Yep I've got this multi-terabyte data storage deivice that is packed full of classified information - and I take it home wih me every night! Anyone I come in contact with can access the device! I guess LANL computer security and POGO should be having a heart attack about that right now! And I take it with me every time I travel, even to sensitive countries! Sometimes, it is even not under my direct, conscious control! Data leakage can happen at any time, especially at night! And, absolutely no one is monitoring it and there are no built-in security features to cause inactivation should anyone try to obtain data! Quick, POGO, you should bring this to the attention to Rep. Dingle(berry) immediately! Danielle, please call your close friend Sharyl Atkisson of CBS to cover this immediately! Yikes, what are you guys waiting for??!!
New LANS policy (just you wait):
All unclassified LANL laptops must be tightly handcuffed to employees at all times whenever the leave lab areas.
Congressmen love POGO because they are able to dig up material for some of the mostly lovely 10 sec. sound bites ever heard.
Just saw this published on the LLNL blog...
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TCP contributions on the horizon
Just received a notice from UC that they will be requiring contributions to the retirement system in the range of 18 to 20 percent with UC picking up the lions share of that contribution.
Since TCP1 was structured to mirror what UC does with respect to contributions one would assume contribution will be required from TCP1 participants shortly
That's the way the cookie crumbles.
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Note that Mike just stated at the All-Hands that LANS was waiting to see what UC did with their pension contributions. Well, UC has acted and they need lots of money. In the case of UC, they've said in the past that they would split the cost with the employees and that UC would be paying for the bulk of it.
LANS is already on record stating that none of the for-profit fees will go toward helping the LANL pension. LANL employees will likely be stuck with paying the full contribution. Prepare to be reamed!
1/30/09 10:50 PM: careful, with talk like that, you're going to end up with TID's on all of your i/o ports.
If UC contributes substantially to the UCRP, yet LANS and NNSA contribute nothing to TCP1, doesn't that violate the DOE's "substantially equivalent" promise made back in 2006?
LANS and NNSA don't have to contribute a dime to TCP1 if it becomes underfunded, even if UC decides to generously donate UC money to keep UCRP going.
The DOE promise was to remain "substantially equivalent" in the aggregate. DOE will trot out some phony items for this "aggregate" computation and then claim that this proves things are still comparable, even though the TCP1 makeup funds will be coming completely out of employee paychecks.
Anyone who believed the DOE promises made back in 2006 is a fool.
Classified US military information went to New Zealand, LANL/LANS was not involved! (Can POGO believe that?!)
From MilitaryTimes.com:
N. Zealand man finds soldier info on MP3 player
The Associated Press
Posted: Tuesday Jan 27, 2009 6:02:09 EST
Wellington, New Zealand - A New Zealand man who bought an MP3 player from a thrift shop in Oklahoma found it held 60 U.S. military files, including names and telephone numbers for American soldiers, a media report said Tuesday.
TV One News said the 60 files contained personal details of U.S. soldiers, including some who had served in Afghanistan and Iraq. A New Zealand security expert said the information should not be in the public domain, but that it did not appear likely to affect U.S. national security.
The U.S. Embassy declined to comment on the incident.
Similar breaches occured in Afghanistan in 2006, when U.S. investigators reportedly bought back stolen flash drives that contained sensitive military data from shops outside a main U.S. base in Afghan city of Bagram.
Chris Ogle, 29, from the northern New Zealand city of Whangarei, said he bought the music player at a thrift shop in Oklahoma, and that he found the files when he linked the $18 device to his computer, TV One News reported.
The report did not say exactly where and when the device was purchased, and Ogle could not be reached by The Associated Press for comment Tuesday.
The private information about troops included U.S. Social Security numbers and even which female troops were pregnant, TV One reported.
Details of equipment deployed to bases in Afghanistan and a mission briefing were also found on some files, the report said, displaying names like "Bagram," a main U.S. base in Afghanistan, from the files on screen.
A TV One News reporter called some of the phone numbers listed in the files and found that some of them were still active.
Some of the files included a warning that the release of its contents is "prohibited by federal law."
Most of the files are dated 2005 so are unlikely to compromise U.S. national security, said Peter Cozens, director of Victoria University of Wellington´s Strategic Studies Department.
"This is just slack administrative procedures which are indeed a cause of embarrassment," Cozens said. "It´s the sort of thing which ought not really to be in the public domain."
Ogle told TV One News he would hand the files to U.S. officials if asked.
"The more I look at it, the more I see and the less I think I should be" looking, Ogle said.
Janine Burns, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Embassy in the capital, Wellington, told the AP, "We have nothing to add at this time."
She had no response to Ogle´s offer to hand over the electronic files.
It´s not the first time such data files have surfaced in public.
In 2006, shopkeepers outside the Bagram base said they were selling flash drives with U.S. military information that had been stolen by some of the 2,000 Afghans employed as cleaners, office staff and laborers at Bagram.
Included on some memory drives seen by AP at the time were the Social Security numbers of hundreds of soldiers, including four generals, and lists of troops who had completed nuclear, chemical and biollogical warfare training.
The Los Angeles Times also reported that some drives had classified military secrets, including maps, charts and intelligence reports that appeared to detail how Taliban and al-Qaida leaders had been using southwestern Pakistan as a planning and training base for attacks in Afghanistan.
(www.miltarytimes.com/news/2009/01/ap_mp3_files_012709/)
If you know the track records of The White House, the Military, Congress, DoD, DOE, NNSA, DHS, FBI, CIA, NSA, State Department, Defense Contractors, LLNL, SNL, et cetera, regarding this matter, i.e. the risk of losing sensitive information, to any adversary, then you will know how bad or! good LANL is performing, as well as to protect against cyber-attacks from any adversary, especially China and Russia, as well as the naive and illthought idea of the then Senator Barack Obama to once again "resume laboratory-to laboratory exchanges that were terminated in the 1990s.", between US and China, and "We [US and China] are not enemies," then Senator Barack Obama in an interview with Arms Control Today, www.armscontrol.org/system/files/Obama_Q-A_FINAL_Dec_10_2008.pdf, with the risk of losing US nuclear weapons secrets to China, and if you know the answer to everything previously mentioned, then you will grasp how the status of LANL is regarding, the risk of losing classified information to an adversary, in comparison to any other (government) institution, and not excessive interest of LANL, that in reality will gain the adversaries of US, and as a consequence will weaken US national security.
Hey, 12:54 AM, did you really need to load everybody down with all that verbage just to make a simple point?
We get it. Keep it simple.
Yeah, the "copy and paste" function is way too easy,and way overused. Post a link. That's why they call it the "web."
12:54, here are a few relevant links from the UCRP website and upcoming and prior UC Regents meetings.
http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/19391
http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/regmeet/feb09/j3.pdf
http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/regmeet/nov08/f10.pdf
LANS will be holding a special meeting this week in the Physics Auditorium for anyone at LANL concerned about the recent Be contamination.
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