[Congressional Bills 110th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 729 Introduced in Senate (IS)]







110th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                 S. 729

 To better provide for compensation for certain persons injured in the 
       course of employment at the Rocky Flats site in Colorado.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             March 1, 2007

  Mr. Salazar introduced the following bill; which was read twice and 
  referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To better provide for compensation for certain persons injured in the 
       course of employment at the Rocky Flats site in Colorado.

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

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Rocky Flats Special Exposure Cohort 
Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSE.

    (a) Findings.--Congress makes the following findings:
            (1) The Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation 
        Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 7384 et seq.) (referred to in 
        this section as the ``Act'') was enacted to ensure fairness and 
        equity for the civilian men and women who, during the past 50 
        years, performed duties uniquely related to the nuclear weapons 
        production and testing programs of the Department of Energy and 
        its predecessor agencies by establishing a program that would 
        provide efficient, uniform, and adequate compensation for 
        beryllium-related health conditions and radiation-related 
        health conditions.
            (2) The Act provides a process for consideration of claims 
        for compensation by individuals who were employed at relevant 
        times at various locations, but also includes provisions 
        designating employees at certain other locations as members of 
        a Special Exposure Cohort whose claims are subject to a less-
        detailed administrative process.
            (3) The Act also authorizes the President, upon 
        recommendation of the Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker 
        Health, to designate additional classes of employees at 
        Department of Energy facilities as members of the Special 
        Exposure Cohort if the President determines that--
                    (A) it is not feasible to estimate with sufficient 
                accuracy the radiation dose that the class received; 
                and
                    (B) there is a reasonable likelihood that the 
                radiation dose may have endangered the health of 
                members of the class.
            (4) It has become evident that it is not feasible to 
        estimate with sufficient accuracy the radiation dose received 
        by employees at the Department of Energy facility in Colorado 
        known as the Rocky Flats site for the following reasons:
                    (A) Many worker exposures were unmonitored or were 
                not monitored adequately over the lifetime of the plant 
                at the Rocky Flats site. Even in 2004, a former worker 
                from the 1950s agreed to be scanned under the former 
                radiation worker program of the Department of Energy 
                and was found to have a significant internal deposition 
                of radiation that had been undetected and unrecorded 
                for more than 50 years.
                    (B) No lung counter for detecting and measuring 
                plutonium and americium in the lungs existed at Rocky 
                Flats until the late 1960s. Without this equipment, the 
                very insoluble oxide forms of plutonium cannot be 
                detected, and a large number of workers had inhalation 
                exposures that went undetected and unmeasured.
                    (C) Exposure to neutron radiation was not monitored 
                at the Rocky Flats site until the late 1950s, and most 
                of those measurements through 1970 have been found to 
                be in error. In some areas of the plant at the site, 
                the neutron doses were as much as 2 to 10 times as 
                great as the gamma doses received by workers, but only 
                gamma doses were recorded.
                    (D) Radiation exposures of many workers at the 
                Rocky Flats site were not measured (and in some cases 
                estimated doses were assigned), while some records have 
                been destroyed or lost. As a result, the exposure 
                histories and other data available are not adequate to 
                determine properly whether Rocky Flats workers qualify 
                for compensation under the Act.
                    (E) The model that has been used for dose 
                reconstruction by the National Institute for 
                Occupational Safety and Health (referred to in this 
                section as the ``Institute'') in determining whether 
                Rocky Flats workers qualify for compensation under the 
                Act is in error. The default values used for particle 
                size and solubility of the internally deposited 
                plutonium in workers are in error. Use of these 
                erroneous values to calculate internal doses for 
                claimants can result in dose calculations of as much as 
                3 to 10 times below what the Rocky Flats records and 
                autopsy data indicate.
            (5) The administrative costs related to Rocky Flats claims 
        have been disproportionately high relative to the number of 
        claims that have been processed.
            (6) Some Rocky Flats workers, despite having worked with 
        tons of plutonium and having known exposures leading to serious 
        health effects, have been denied compensation under the Act as 
        a result of potentially flawed calculations based on records 
        that are incomplete or in error, as well as the use of 
        incorrect models.
            (7) Achieving the purposes of the Act with respect to 
        workers at Rocky Flats is more likely to be achieved if claims 
        by those workers are subject to the administrative procedures 
        applicable to members of the Special Exposure Cohort.
    (b) Purpose.--The purpose of this Act is to revise the Energy 
Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 to 
include certain Rocky Flats workers as members of the Special Exposure 
Cohort.

SEC. 3. DEFINITION OF MEMBER OF SPECIAL EXPOSURE COHORT.

    (a) In General.--Section 3621(14) of the Energy Employees 
Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 U.S.C. 
7384l(14)) is amended by adding at the end the following new 
subparagraph:
                    ``(D) The employee was so employed for a number of 
                work days aggregating at least 250 work days before 
                January 1, 2006, by the Department of Energy or a 
                Department of Energy contractor or subcontractor at the 
                Rocky Flats site in Colorado.''.
    (b) Authority To Reapply.--A claim that an individual qualifies, by 
reason of section 3621(14)(D) of the Energy Employees Occupational 
Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000, as added by subsection (a), 
for compensation or benefits under such Act shall be considered for 
compensation or benefits notwithstanding any denial of any other claim 
for compensation with respect to such individual.
                                 <all>