Cuts Called Threat To Inel Jobs, Safety Energy Secretary O’Leary Warns Key Legislator

Energy Secretary Hazel O’Leary warned a key congressman on Wednesday that further reductions to her 1996 environmental management budget plan for the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory and other nuclear sites threatens public safety and will cost thousands of jobs.

In a letter to California Republican Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House National Security subcommittee on military procurement, O’Leary said the suggested additional reduction of $1 billion would cut another 1,100 jobs from the INEL payroll. That is on top of the 2,250 jobs already being eliminated in the Energy Department’s $6 billion nationwide cutback.

Idaho’s share of an additional cutback would be over $101 million, reducing the spending on environmental cleanup in eastern Idaho for the year that begins Oct. 1 from $462 million to $360 million.

Nationally, the proposal would eliminate 11,000 jobs over the 17,000 already being erased by the department.

O’Leary predicted such a move would prompt lawsuits over federal failure to meet legal requirements and potential criminal charges for violations of environmental laws, increase costs for overall environmental cleanup, weaken already tenuous public confidence and delay safety improvements.

“I cannot tell you exactly where or when a safety incident will happen, but the nature of these risks is too dangerous to test the margins,” O’Leary wrote.

The letter came a day after O’Leary and other top administration officials met with Idaho Gov. Phil Batt and the state’s congressional delegation over the future of INEL. Neither side gave during the session in which Batt reiterated his demand that future waste shipments be scrubbed, environmental cleanup continue and jobs be protected.