N-Waste Opponents Stage Can-Do Rally

Gov. Phil Batt and Defense Secretary William Perry may receive so many aluminum cans in the mail that they will have to find a “temporary storage site” for them as well as nuclear waste, protesters of resumed radioactive dumping in Idaho predict.

Kaye Turner, a Pocatello elementary-school librarian, introduced the “cans for casks” campaign at a Snake River Alliance rally in Shoshone’s City Park in protest of efforts to dump more waste at the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory. About 150 people attended, organizers said.

The cans bear yellow labels saying, “Stop the shipments! Store nuclear waste as safely as possible, as close to its point of generation as possible.”

For 43 cents in postage, alliance supporters can send a can to Batt, Perry or Republican Sens. Dirk Kempthorne or Larry Craig.

The alliance’s “Stop the Shipments” rally came as talks appeared to be reaching a conclusion between the Batt and Clinton administrations on a deal that would convince the governor to voluntarily accept new shipments at about half the number the government wants to dump. In return Batt wants ironclad, court-enforced guarantees that all waste will be removed in 40 years.

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