Fired TVA whistle-blower faces investigation

Gail Richards says NRC trying to intimidate her for reporting lax security

By Anne Paine
THE TENNESSEAN

Gail Richards thought her nightmare was over.

In April, the http://www.tva.gov/">Tennessee Valley Authority whistle-blower reached a settlement over her firing, which came after she reported security lapses in the power producer's http://www.tva.gov/power/nuclear/index.htm"> nuclear energy program.

But now the http://www.nrc.gov/">U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission — the group that oversees TVA's nuclear facilities — has started its own investigation of Richards for potential infractions, including whether she improperly took private documents that she used to defend herself in a series of workplace allegations.

Richards said NRC investigators grilled her for several hours this month in a Washington, D.C., hotel, threatening to get the Department of Justice involved in her case — a prospect that the wife and grandmother worries could lead to prison. She and her lawyer say the NRC is guilty of the same intimidating retaliation tactics that it's supposed to protect whistle-blowers from.

"It was like I was on trial," said Richards, 62, who talked to NRC investigators on Sept. 10 after being subpoenaed."The NRC was picking up where TVA left off. I felt really intimidated. And then to have them throw the Department of Justice in my face, I just kind of lost it."

Joey Ledford, a spokesman in the NRC's Atlanta office, said he could say little about the case.

"I can confirm there's an ongoing civil matter involving Ms. Richards," Ledford said. "I can't elaborate any further.

"We thoroughly look at all allegations that come our way. We do it in a fair and evenhanded way."

Richards' attorney, Lynne Bernabei, wrote in a http://www.tennessean.com/assets/pdf/DN143270925.PDF">letter to NRC Chairman Gregory B. Jaczko earlier this week that the commission's actions are indicative of a 25-year "close relationship that is not proper between a regulator and a nuclear licensee."

Access was an issue

Richards, who worked for 18 years in TVA's human resources department, had transferred to its Nuclear Access Services in 2005, where all went smoothly at first.

There her responsibilities in TVA's Chattanooga offices included background checks and determining who would have access without an escort into secure areas of nuclear plants.

She received good reviews for her work, including a job evaluation in 2006 that included praise for her accuracy.

Things began to change, Richards said, after she reported her supervisor for allowing unauthorized people, including a cleaning crew, into secure areas.

Harassment began with false accusations that her work was riddled with errors, she said. An audit conducted by TVA in 2007 found no major errors in her work but turned up significant deficiencies in the work of others, according to her attorney's findings.

She had continued to report on her supervisor's alleged laxity and a lack of training provided to the staff who did background checks, including herself.

After being put on two performance improvement plans, Richards was fired in September 2007, though she was asked to stay on for 90 days to finish her work on a project. During a grievance hearing in the building where she worked, Richards said, she was escorted off the grounds when she provided internal documents to counter charges about her performance.

Richards reached a settlement agreement with TVA in April for an undisclosed amount of money. TVA spokesman David Mould confirmed the settlement but said he could not give details.

During the grievance hearing that was cut short, Richards said, TVA official Patrick Asendorf told her that the private documents would prompt an NRC investigation.

That investigation has come true, and another former whistle-blower said it's appalling.

"If the NRC is going to go after the same people TVA is wrongly going after, who is worrying about the safety of the plants?" said Ann Harris, who reported safety concerns in the 1980s and 1990s at TVA's Watts Bar Nuclear Plant.

Harris settled several harassment cases with TVA and now heads a group calledhttp://www.citizen.org/congress/govtaccount/articles.cfm?ID=18349"> We the People, a nuclear workers support group.

"The NRC is complicit with TVA in abusing employees," she said. "They're trying to cover their own tracks. They're trying to make Gail back down."

Bernabei said that the only effort the NRC made to look into Richards' initial charges against TVA came six months after she reported them, and only after a story about her situation was published in The Tennessean.

The NRC effort mainly amounted to a series of questions in a phone interview and attempts by NRC attorney Carolyn Evans to skew Richards' answers in a way that would cover up TVA's problems, Bernabei said.

"It is clear that this entire investigation is a vendetta by the NRC against Ms. Richards, because she had disclosed both TVA's and the NRC's cavalier attitude toward security," Bernabei wrote in her letter to the NRC.

In January of this year, an NRC letter to Richards, which referred to her comments in The Tennessean, said the agency had corroborated Richards' concern about authorized access to secure areas. She was thanked for speaking up.

NRC calls process fair

Attorney Bernabei said TVA accusations that her client had violated rules by taking private documents to a grievance hearing were among the issues that were resolved.

Richards said she thought the settlement with TVA had put her situation to rest, but then learned of the NRC's pursuit of her in July as she and her husband were mending fences on their farm in Marion County.

She received a phone call from her son saying two NRC investigators were at her home. She thought he was joking and hung up. Soon after, they came out in the field to serve her with a subpoena.

It said she would be questioned about "potential violations of NRC regulations," protected documents and other matters.

Bernabei, who has represented many TVA whistle-blowers, said that NRC seems bent on stirring up a criminal case and that the agency has been far from evenhanded.

"The NRC is essentially by its action telling all employees that they can't invoke a grievance because they could be prosecuted," Bernabei said.

The NRC and TVA say multiple procedures are in place for employees to report problems without fear of reprisal, anonymously or not.

"Our process is very fair to confidential informants," the NRC's Ledford said. "It's also very fair when it comes to people accused of wrongdoing. Things are thoroughly researched."

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090926/NEWS02/909260333/Fired+TVA+whistle-blower+faces+investigation

T.V.A. to Pay $43 Million on Projects in Spill Area

Flood at Coles Hill with just 1 1/2 inch of Rain, Hurricane Fran put down from 5-10 inches of Rain

Comment: Uranium Mining and milling will produce large uranium tailings ponds, larger than TVA sludge pond disaster! Will this be Danville and Pittsylvania County, VA future? A hurricane or huge rains storms will cause the uranium tailing ponds to overflow or dam breaks which will go into the Bannister River, which runs into Lake Gaston, which is Virginia Beach, VA drinking water. This will become a national security problem because of the Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard drink the water from the lake! In addition, people will not move to our area with future uranium mining and milling because people want to live in nice clean areas not areas with future radiation problems! Demand the Virginia leaders to Ban Uranium mining and stop listening to the French and Canadians’ Nukes whose agenda is to take all the profits back to their country! Don't forget, according to several articles that France built the bunkers in Iraq, would not fight with us in Iraq therefore French fries was renamed Freedom Fries!

September 15, 2009
By SHAILA DEWAN

The Tennessee Valley Authority said Monday that it would spend $43 million on economic development projects in Roane County, Tenn., the site of a huge coal ash spill at one of the authority’s power plants last December.

The spill devastated property values, brought tourism virtually to a halt and diverted the stream of retirees who were supposed to be settling down on Watts Bar Lake.

The money will be spent on projects that do not directly relate to the spill, but local officials hope the work will help offset the international news coverage that made Roane County synonymous with acres of toxic sludge.

“That bell has been rung and you can’t unring it,” said Mayor Troy Beets of Kingston, one of the towns most affected by the spill. “We can’t unring the fact that we had the ash spill on Dec. 22; we can’t unring all the negative publicity that came out about it. You try to ring some more bells, just as loudly, that are positive.”

On Monday, Mr. Beets, who is also chairman of the county commission, was elected to lead the newly formed foundation that will dole out the money. The foundation board includes the county executive, two other mayors and four Tennessee Valley Authority executives.

The county and towns have compiled lists of priorities that include more than $30 million for capital improvements to the county school system, a public relations campaign and projects like a new sewage treatment plant and the conversion of an old movie theater into an arts education center.

The announcement came after months of negotiations between the authority and local officials. The authority has allotted $10 million a year for the four years it will take to clean up the spill, said Barbara Martocci, a T.V.A. spokeswoman.

Some local residents said the money was a step in the right direction.

“We’re going out on the lake five miles from the ash spill, and it doesn’t look like anything happened,” said Bob Giltnane, owner of a real estate company that specializes in the lakefront property that has lost so much value since the spill. “But people are reading the news 2,000 miles away, and they think we’re drowning in ash. That’s where we’re hurt.”

Mr. Giltnane favors building recreational improvements, like a marina.

But Brant Williams, a Kingston councilman, questioned why the authority would have such a large presence on the foundation board and called the money a “small down payment.”

“We’ve gotten billions of dollars in negative press,” Mr. Williams said, “and I can’t see how $40 million is even going to begin to overcome that.”

Half a billion gallons of mucky coal ash, which can include toxic substances like arsenic and mercury, were spilled over about 300 acres of Roane County, most of it owned by the authority, and into nearby rivers when a retaining wall at the Kingston Fossil Plant gave way on Dec. 22.

The authority has estimated that the cleanup will cost $1.2 billion, including the $43 million, Ms. Martocci said. The authority has also spent $40.2 billion to buy out 142 property owners, she said.

But many homeowners are dissatisfied, saying that they have not been reimbursed for the decline in their property values and that the claims process has been arbitrary and unfair. Several lawsuits are under way.

“It’s a joke,” said Sarah McCoin, who lives on her family’s nearby farm, referring to the economic development money. “It’s another way that T.V.A. is going to project a positive image while so many of us are in really, really bad shape, and T.V.A. has totally ignored that they’ve destroyed our community.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/us/15ash.html?ref=us

Johnson hears complaints from coal ash victims

Comment: Who are responsible for the coal ash pond that spill last December? Now the taxpayers are paying for some of the cleanup. People lives and homes are destroyed, their health at risk!! One doctor in article refuses to blood work to check for medals, why, did a certain company pay them off??? All the ash ponds were and are legal; they are still there waiting for the next disaster to happen!! Remember, uranium mining thru out the world from 60 years ago are still there, the federal, state government does not regulate these disasters closely enough - why, they do not care!!

By DUNCAN MANSFIELD , 06.07.09, 08:39 PM EDT

KINGSTON, Tenn. -- Residents who live near the site of a massive coal ash spill told a Texas congresswoman Sunday that they worry about their health, the lost value their homes and the slow pace of the cleanup by the Tennessee Valley Authority.

U.S. Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson's House Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment oversees the TVA and already has held two hearings in Washington about the Dec. 22 breach in a huge coal ash storage facility at Kingston that released 5.4 million cubic yards of toxic-laden ashen muck into the Emory River and a lakeside neighborhood.

A 90-minute town hall meeting, one resident after another told Johnson their concerns.

"I don't have an answer for you today, but I will get you one," the Dallas Democrat said.

Resident Gary Topmiller said his dock is coated with ash, "our property has become a prison," and he's suffering nosebleeds and coughing.

He called TVA "a cold bunch of people" who won't help "because we hired an attorney."

"This will not be the end of it," Johnson said after the meeting. "This is just the beginning."

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency assumed oversight of the cleanup about a month ago. To this point, most of TVA's work has been focused on building systems to contain the ash and repairing infrastructure, including roads and railroad lines to the site.

Leo Francendese, EPA's onsite coordinator, shared residents' concern about the pace of the actual cleanup.

"We need to move faster about getting ash out of the river," he told the audience.

The cleanup began at 1,000 cubic yards of ash a day, he said. It's now up to 4,000 cubic yards a day, will soon go to 6,000-8,000 cubic yards daily and should be at 15,000 cubic yards daily by the end of July.

"I have set a time limit of no later than the spring of next year to have the lion's share of the ash out of the river," Francendese said. "That is a dramatic improvement from the two, three or five-year plans that we have heard."

TVA chief environmental officer Anda Ray said the utility views the disaster as "very personal to us" because of its long association with the Kingston community and tried to assure residents that TVA "remains committed to clean this up."

Johnson expressed little sympathy for TVA, the nation's largest public utility, which has been operating the coal-fired Kingston plant since the 1950s.

"To let it (the ash) pile up that much that it could spill over, to me is irresponsibility," she said.

When one resident said it seemed unfair TVA ratepayers will have to pay for cleaning up a disaster caused by the utility's mistakes, Johnson said, "I can't even imagine TVA not having any kind of insurance." TVA reported in a recent financial document that some of its insurers are denying claims.

Among the complaints, resident Penny Dotson told Johnson her grandson was having respiratory problems, so TVA relocated them to a rental house. But she said TVA recently told her the lease was canceled and she didn't know where they will go.

Donnie and Sharon Andrews said Sharon's chronic hepatitis is worsening and they blame the spill. They said their doctor refused to check her for heavy metal contamination, but TVA officials said toxicologists working under a TVA contract with Oak Ridge Associated Universities will provide those kinds of tests for free.

TVA has settled about 50 personal claims with residents and businesses, but has seven lawsuits pending in federal court, including some that would seek class-action status.

TVA President and CEO Tom Kilgore said last week the agency has spent $108 million on the cleanup so far and still estimates the final tab could reach nearly $1 billion.

TVA has 9 million consumers across Tennessee and parts of Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/06/07/ap6514003.html