[Congressional Bills 109th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3481 Introduced in House (IH)]







109th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 3481

To amend the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program 
 Act of 2000 to include certain former nuclear weapons program workers 
in the Special Exposure Cohort under the energy employees occupational 
                     illness compensation program.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             July 27, 2005

 Mr. Reynolds (for himself, Mr. Higgins, and Ms. Slaughter) introduced 
    the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the 
   Judiciary, and in addition to the Committee on Education and the 
 Workforce, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, 
 in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the 
                jurisdiction of the committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To amend the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program 
 Act of 2000 to include certain former nuclear weapons program workers 
in the Special Exposure Cohort under the energy employees occupational 
                     illness compensation program.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds that--
            (1) employees working on Cold War-era nuclear weapons were 
        employed in hundreds of facilities owned by the Federal 
        Government and private sector producing and processing 
        radioactive materials for use in the nuclear weapons program of 
        the United States beginning in the mid-1940's;
            (2) those atomic workers helped to build the nuclear 
        arsenal that served as a deterrent to the Soviet Union during 
        the Cold War, but many paid a high price in terms of their 
        health;
            (3) during the Cold War, many atomic workers were exposed 
        to radiation and placed in harm's way by the Department of 
        Energy and contractors, subcontractors, and vendors of the 
        Department--
                    (A) without the knowledge and consent of the 
                workers;
                    (B) without adequate radiation monitoring; and
                    (C) without necessary protections from internal or 
                external occupational radiation exposures;
            (4) due to the inequities posed by the factors described in 
        paragraph (3) and the resulting potential harm, Congress 
        legislatively designated classes of Cold War-era workers at the 
        Paducah, Kentucky, Portsmouth, Ohio, Oak Ridge K-25, and the 
        Amchitka Island test sites as members of the Special Exposure 
        Cohort under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness 
        Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384 et seq.);
            (5)(A) the contribution of the State of New York to the 
        security of the United States throughout the Cold War was very 
        significant; and
            (B) New York is home to 36 former atomic weapons employer 
        facilities and sites of the Department of Energy that produced 
        and processed radioactive materials, carried out classified 
        research, operated nuclear reactors, and processed high level 
        nuclear waste, 14 of which are located in the western region of 
        New York;
            (6) research by the Department of Energy, the National 
        Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the Advisory 
        Board on Radiation and Worker Health, and congressional 
        committees indicates that--
                    (A) workers at certain facilities were not 
                adequately monitored for internal or external exposures 
                to ionizing radiation to which the workers were exposed 
                during the 1940's to 1960's; and
                    (B) at other facilities, records were not 
                maintained, are not reliable, or fail to measure the 
                radioactive isotopes to which workers were exposed;
            (7) at Bethlehem Steel in Lackawanna, New York, an atomic 
        weapons employer facility (as defined in section 3621 of the 
        Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act 
        of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384l)), no personal radiation dosimetry 
        monitoring records are available;
            (8) if it is determined that it is not feasible to estimate 
        radiation dose with sufficient accuracy and there is a 
        reasonable likelihood that a class of workers may have been 
        endangered, the Secretary of Health and Human Services is 
        authorized, after receiving advice from the Advisory Board on 
        Radiation and Worker Health, to designate additional classes of 
        workers as members of the Special Exposure Cohort under section 
        3626 of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation 
        Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384q);
            (9) the Secretary of Health and Human Services promulgated 
        regulations on May 28, 2004, to establish procedures for 
        classes of individuals to petition for membership in the 
        Special Exposure Cohort;
            (10) section 3626(b) of the Energy Employees Occupational 
        Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384q(b)) 
        provides for the designation of an additional class of 
        employees in the Special Exposure Cohort if it is not feasible 
        to estimate with sufficient accuracy the radiation dose that 
        the class received and there is a reasonable likelihood that 
        the radiation dose may have endangered the health of members of 
        the class; and
            (11) legislation is needed to provide additional parameters 
        to the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Advisory 
        Board on Radiation and Worker Health for evaluating petitions 
        for the Special Exposure Cohort in cases in which there is 
        limited or nonexistent individual radiation exposure monitoring 
        or an absence of records.

SEC. 2. ADDITION OF CLASSES OF FORMER NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAM WORKERS 
              IN THE SPECIAL EXPOSURE COHORT UNDER ENERGY EMPLOYEES 
              OCCUPATIONAL ILLNESS COMPENSATION PROGRAM.

    Section 3626(b) of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness 
Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384q(b)) is amended--
            (1) by inserting ``(A)'' after ``(1)'';
            (2) by redesignating paragraph (2) as subparagraph (B);
            (3) by striking the period at the end and inserting ``; 
        or''; and
            (4) by adding at the end the following:
            ``(2)(A) subject to subparagraph (B), in the case of a 
        class of employees employed at an atomic weapons employer 
        facility or a Department of Energy facility during a period (in 
        the aggregate) of at least 250 days (or a shorter duration 
        connected to discrete events, as determined by the Secretary) 
        during which--
                    ``(i) the employees in the class had the potential 
                for exposure to occupational ionizing radiation from 
                production or processing materials related to atomic 
                weapons, or engaged in research, development, testing, 
                assembly, disassembly, decontamination, 
                decommissioning, or waste management, or work related 
                to such activities; and
                    ``(ii)(I) fewer than 50 percent of the employees in 
                the class were individually monitored on a regular 
                basis (using reliable methods and procedures) under a 
                formal health physics program for exposure to internal 
                and external ionizing radiation for the types of 
                radiation and specific radioactive isotopes to which 
                the employees had the potential for exposure during the 
                period when the employees were exposed;
                    ``(II) individual internal and external exposure 
                records for the types of radiation and specific 
                radioactive isotopes to which the employees in the 
                class were potentially exposed at the facility during 
                the period when the employees were exposed are 
                nonexistent or are not available; or
                    ``(III) to the extent that a portion of individual 
                internal or external records are available for the 
                period from the facility, individual radiation doses 
                cannot be reliably determined for greater than \2/3\ of 
                the employees in the class using the individual 
                internal and external monitoring records from the 
                facility; and
            ``(B) in the case of a class of employees employed at a 
        facility for which the National Institute for Occupational 
        Safety and Health has updated the report and made the 
        determination described in section 3169(b)(4) of the Ronald W. 
        Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005 
        (Public Law 108-375; 42 U.S.C. 7384 note) during a period 
        determined under the report, during which (as determined by the 
        Secretary) the employees at the facility met the criteria 
        described in clauses (i) and (ii) of subparagraph (A).''.

SEC. 3. REGULATIONS.

    (a) In General.--Not later than 90 days after the date of enactment 
of this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall modify 
the regulations and procedures of the Secretary relating to the Special 
Exposure Cohort under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness 
Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384 et seq.) to conform 
the regulations and procedures to section 3626(b)(2) of the Energy 
Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (as 
amended by section 2).
    (b) Bethlehem Steel Site.--
            (1) Initiation of petition.--Not later than 90 days after 
        the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Health and 
        Human Services shall initiate a petition to include workers 
        employed at the Bethlehem Steel site in Lackawanna, New York as 
        a class to be included in the Special Exposure Cohort in 
        accordance with section 3626(b)(2) of the Energy Employees 
        Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (as 
        amended by section 2).
            (2) Evaluation.--The evaluation of the petition shall be 
        conducted in accordance with section 3626 of the Energy 
        Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 
        (42 U.S.C. 7384q).
    (c) Report.--Not later than 90 days after the date of enactment of 
this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall submit to 
Congress a report that identifies the facilities, classes, and the 
number of claimants in each class who meet the criteria established 
under section 3626(b)(2) of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness 
Compensation Program Act of 2000 (as amended by section 2) for 
membership in the Special Exposure Cohort.
                                 <all>