The new "charge" was purposefully then geared away from what had gone on with Region 5 ( who gave those orders to the lab), and changed to having the SAB look into whether the EPA Finished Drinking Water 900 Test Methods were appropriate/adequate for sites known or suspected to contain radiation, with Uniontown IEL as EPA's "case in point"...
But the antics and manipulations didn't stop there.
Instead of using their existing radiation panel of qualified experts, our citizens' group received a phone call from H.Q. to inform us that Tim Fields, (directly under Admin.Carol Browner), was scrubbing the rad panel; with Tim instead hand selecting for the Uniontown IEL SAB panel members with a wide variety of "other disciplines." Sure, it LOOKED impressive, all those PhDs sitting there, but the fact of the matter was, the majority were NOT qualified radiochemists, and didn't understand the inherent deviations away from best practices, particularly when it came to proper testing for man-made radionuclides like deadly plutonium, which was years' later even admitted dumped by Army at IEL by the former landfill owner himself.
This altering of the charge combined with Tim's selection conveniently provided the cover US EPA needed : The SAB panel rubber stamped the continued usage of the US EPA Finished Drinking Water 900 Series rad test methods on Superfund Sites where improper disposal of radiation may have taken place, like IEL!.
Some ten years later, in 2003, CCLT learned from EPA's very own Research & Development scientists that for some fifteen years, R & D had tried to STOP US EPA's rad division called NAREL from continuing to use the 900 Methods on cases like Uniontown. We were livid hearing this. One day on the phone a top US EPA official involved with setting radiation drinking water standards for public consumption said to me: "Chris , we all know at EPA you are right, that the Finished Drinking Water should NOT be used on Superfund Sites, putting the burden on my shoulders, urging me to go to policy people ( he specifically mentioned a peer, Ken Lovelace , and urge Ken et al to change it. ( Lovelace committed suicide, according to his peers in 2006, just a few months after he was apparently pressured into writing "the draft" for then head of Superfund, Mike Cook, dismissing all the grave scientific/technical concerns that had been voiced by Ken's R & D peers at EPA about the 900 methods, as well at DOE's top radiochemist at INL, David Sill, and several academics, like Dr. Mike Ketterer, Dr. Mark Baskarn, and Dr. Marvin Resnikoff.
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So, again, receiving this new article today from "THE HILL" done, does not surprise us here in Ohio at IEL.given our nightmare experience regarding EPA's Science Advisory Board, but what is so egregious is though, is how EPA continues to outrageously tout it's purported desire to use "gold standards", best available science blah blah... mocking all the radiation and toxic victims not just at our site in Ohio, but all poisoned Americans, as they continue to stack the deck with not just industry types on the side of polluters, but getting rid of simultaneously R & D scientists, which we came to learn were deeply caring, honest experts who DID want to follow best available science in order to protect fellow Americans. .
Chris for CCLT, Uniontown IEL Superfund Site, Ohio Region 5