Kin of dead nuke workers to get checks

WASHINGTON – Hundreds of survivors of nuclear weapons workers will soon receive checks from the government under a newly revamped program to compensate those exposed to radiation and other industrial toxins, Labor Department officials said Tuesday.

Workers who are still living will have to wait to receive checks until the agency publishes regulations, probably in May, detailing how it will compensate them, according to Shelby Hallmark, who heads the Labor Department’s worker compensation programs.

Hallmark said compensating the workers for their disabilities and lost wages will rely on a more complicated formula than the lump-sum payments for at least $125,000 made to spouses or dependent children of workers who died from job-related illnesses.

Congress gave the Labor Department authority over the compensation program in October after lawmakers complained the Energy Department was running it too inefficiently.

“Their sacrifice helped keep America free, and they, or their surviving loved ones, deserve quick and compassionate compensation,” Labor Secretary Elaine Chao said of the Cold War-era workers who are seeking compensation for disabling illnesses and time off the job.

Hallmark said the agency will review all the claims that the Energy Department previously examined, including those deemed ineligible for compensation. However, he cautioned that could take time. “We want to work on the ones that we can actually pay quickly first,” he said.

House and Senate lawmakers criticized the Energy Department for squandering nearly $100 million it received since Congress created the program a little more than four years ago.

The Energy Department said it paid out benefits to just over 100 claimants out of about 25,000 who filed for help before the agency ceded control of the program to the Labor Department.

Chao said the Labor Department has paid three claims to survivors – in Tennessee and Kentucky – since becoming involved in the program, but she said payments for about 100 more have been approved and will be paid in the next month.

Additional claims from survivors will be settled before May, Hallmark said.