Once again, the federal government plans on stiffing the cleanup of Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Once again, the state of Washington is threatening to sue.

This annual battle has been conducted since 1989, when the state entered into the Tri-Party Agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy, which is in charge of the project.

What’s at stake is frightening.

Below the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and a mere dozen miles from the Columbia River lies a massive caldron of toxic nuclear waste. Nearly 180 steel tanks brimming with 53 million gallons of deadly radioactive goo still need to be removed. Seventy-seven of those tanks have been identified as leaking.

Based on the current pace of removal and money allocated, tank disposal would take 140 years. It was supposed to have been completed by 2018.

A chief factor in that depressing projection is that the 2009 Bush administration budget allots a smaller amount for cleanup than in any year since 1997. The U.S. Senate approved $500 million more, but that amount would still fall short of the 2006 level.

Cleanup is the only nuclear-related part of the federal budget that would suffer a cut. As Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire and U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., point out in a column published in the Washington Post, the administration would take $800 million promised for cleanups around the nation and spend it on nuclear weapons, nuclear energy and other items instead.

As has been the case for decades, the Hanford cleanup has not been accorded the respect it deserves. The first President Bush and President Clinton also raided cleanup accounts for other government spending.

If the same lack of urgency had been demonstrated during the Manhattan Project and the Cold War, history might have written a much bleaker chapter. The work done at Hanford was an important aspect of the nation’s victories over fascism and communism. The nation has a duty to fulfill its commitments to those areas of the country that mobilized and sacrificed.

The U.S. Department of Energy has demonstrated that it is incapable of managing the cleanup. Contractor scandals and continual mistakes have plagued the project from the start. The threat of lawsuits hasn’t worked. The state might have to follow through to break the 20-year cycle of neglect.

We see no other way to get the government’s attention before that toxic brew reaches the Columbia River and triggers a public health disaster for the entire Northwest.