ML030900555
| ML030900555 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Browns Ferry, Watts Bar, Sequoyah  |
| Issue date: | 08/15/1996 |
| From: | NRC/SECY |
| To: | |
| Byrdsong A T | |
| References | |
| +adjud/ruledam200506, -RFPFR, 50-259-CIVP, 50-260-CIVP, 50-296-CIVP, 50-327-CIVP, 50-328-CIVP, 50-390-CIVP, ASLBP 01-791-01-CIVP, NRC-215, RAS 6171, TVA-Staff-71 | |
| Download: ML030900555 (26) | |
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Title:
Interview of Charles E. Kent, Jr.
2003IMAR I I AN II: 49 OFFICE OF T14F ,,
A ULL&-IArtUPIS /&&6 " £ STAFF Docket Number: 50-390-CivP and 50-327-CivP Location: (not provided)
Date: Thursday, August 15, 1996 Work Order No.: NRC-215
- Pages 1-23
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1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + . . . .
4 OFFICE OF INVESTIGATIONS 5 INTERVIEW 6 _________-x 7 IN THE MATTER OF:
8 INTERVIEW OF Docket Nos.
9 CHARLES E. KENT, JR. 50-390-CivP 10 (CLOSED) 50-327-CivP 11 _________-x 12 Thursday, August 15, 1996 13 14 15 The above-entitled interview was 16 conducted.
17 18 BEFORE:
19 Special Agent David Van Bocker 20 21 22 23 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 P-R-O-C-E-D-I-N-G-S 1
SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Let me just get I1~
3 some background-first. Your payroll name?
4 MR. KENT: Charles E. Kent, Jr.
5 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: And your 6 position?
7 MR. KENT: I am the Radiological and 8 Chemistry Control Manager at Sequoia.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: And what' s your 10 work number here?
11 MR. KENT: 8874843.
12 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Home address.
13 MR. KENT:
14 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: That's C-0 --
15 MR. KENT:
off 16 17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: The zip?
18 MR. KENT:
19 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. And home 20 phone.
21 MR. KENT:
22 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: And Social 23 Security number.
24 MR. KENT:
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3 1 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. We'll be 2 discussing -- interviewing Charles Kent regarding the 3 Departmenti of Labor complaint filed by Gary Fiser.
4 It's dated June 25, 1996. In his complaint, Fiser 5 alleges that TVA posted his position they offered to 6 him as settlement to a complaint back in 1994. He, 7 Fisher, had reason to believe they did so with malice 8 and that the posting was a smoke screen designed to 9 hide their true intentions, that of pre-selection of 10 another candidate. That's his main allegation in this 11 whole concern here. And Charles, I notice he 12 mentioned your name earlier in this complaint also.
13 I'd like to just to maybe touch base with what he 14 talks about here.
15 He said that in March they had a meeting.
16 Mr. Grover had a meeting. He was telling them about 17 downsizing for the staff, and reorganization, and 18 elimination of certain positions, et cetera. And he 19 said shortly after that meeting that you and another 20 -individual named 'Gordon Rich, initiated a verbal 21 request to Ron Grover to transfer Sam Harvey's 22 position as a Chemistry Manager to Sequoia.
23 MR. KENT: Uh-huh.
24 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Did you have 25 knowledge of that?
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4 1 MR. KENT: Yes.
2 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Were you trying 3 to do that, to transfer Harvey's position?
4 MR. KENT: Yeah. We understood, you know, 5 that eventually, and we did not know when, but we 6 understood that eventually Corporate, like our site 7 staffs were going to be undergoing some reductions.
8 And Sam was the Corporate Chemist who was assigned to 9 Sequoia, and was doing a good job of supporting us.
10 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
11 MR. KENT: And in order for us to ensure 12 that we had that level of expertise available to us, 13 you know, we didn't want to take a chance on losing 14 the guy from the company in some kind of corporate 15 downsizing event, so we wanted to pick him up 16 permanently.
17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay.
18 MR. KENT: We needed -- we still need, you 19 know, some extra management support in our group.
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Right. Did you 21 have an opening at that time, a slot I mean?
22 MR. KENT: I had a slot I was going to put 23 him in. I have a slot that I have not filled.
24 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
25 Chemistry Manager?
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5 1 MR. KENT: A Chemistry Manager for some --
2 for a couple of years. We lost a person by the name 3 of Bruce-Bender (phonetic) --
4 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
5 MR. KENT: -- about a year ago, and we 6 have not refilled the position, partly because of 7 there's been some pressure on us to go to a standard 8 organization with the other sites.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
10 MR. KENT: And the other sites did not, 11 necessarily, have that position in their organization.
12 Well, it's kind of complicated.
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Yeah.
14 MR. KENT: But to explain a little bit 15 about the standard organization, we have been working 16 within Redcon across the company for the past two or 17 three years to implement an organizational structure 18 that would be what we want to have long term.
19 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
20 MR. KENT: Back in-'93 when the Chemistry 21 organizations were combined with Redcon organizations, 22 we established an org structure initially that --
23 well, for one, I didn't like it initially because I 24 didn't really want it to be that way, but it was what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE, N W.
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6 1 we all agreed to. It was a consensus that we could 2 get everybody to agree to, so we did it.
3 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh. J 4 MR. KENT: And as part of our process of 5 redesign efforts, looking to the future, how we wanted 6 to have our company, have our part of the company 7 structured for the future, we have been evolving our 8 organization ever since that time period.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
10 MR. KENT: About a year and a half or so 11 ago, again because we could not get consensus on a 12 long term organization, and we had upper management 13 pressure to make some changed within our structure, to 14 eliminate maybe layers of management or levels of 15 management, an interim organization was approved. And 16 at that time, we were told to develop an 17 implementation plan for what it would take us to get 18 to that kind of organization, with no constraints on 19 how long it would take.
20 Well, that interim organization that was 21 approved did not have Bruce Bender's position in it.
22 It was gone. However, we never made -- we resisted 23 making any move to that interim organization --
24 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
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7 1 MR. KENT: -- because we knew at Sequoia 2 that what we really wanted to do was to go toward a 3 longer term. I don't want to keep changing the 4 organization. I want to go ahead and agree on what 5 the long term organization is going to be, and then 6 move to that. So instead of-jumping through a bunch 7 of hoops to implement this interim organization, which 8 we didn't like anyway, we started working with the 9 other guys at the other sites to agree on what our 10 long term organization was going to be.
11 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Try to 12 standardize all sites?
13 MR. KENT: -Right. Standardize all sites, 14 fine. But standardize not off some interim step, but 15 standardize off some long term step, so we did not 16 make any moves to implement that interim organization.
17 Now that is the organization that's in the approved 18 books here on site, -and I may be different from that 19 in several areas.-
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Right. Okay.
21 MR. KENT: With Mr. Zerain (phonetic) and 22 - everybody else's understanding, because I told them, 23 "I'm not going to move to this. You understand that."
24 And they all understood and they agreed, I didn't 25 really have to be like that, because my plan was to
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8 1 get agreement on the long term organization and to 2 move to it.
3 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay.
4 MR. KENT: Well, just last -- I can't 5 remember the date exactly, but just this past spring, 6 I guess it was, we got agreement from Mr. Zerain and 7 the other sites on what the long term organization was 8 going to be.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
10 MR. KENT: And in that long term 11 organization, which I'm satisfied with, we all are 12 really across the company are satisfied with it.
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
14 MR. KENT: In that long term organization, 15 I have basically restored the capability to have this 16 position that I had lost a couple of years ago with 17 Bruce Bender.
18 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So you still 19 have that position open now?
20 MR. KENT: Yeah. Well, yeah, you know.
21 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
22 MR. KENT: Effectively, yes. The long 23 term organization is not in the org manuals yet, but 24 it is something that our upper management has all 25 brought into, and agreed to, and all the sites have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1 agreed to, and we can move to it, and have been told 2 by Mr. Zerain to move to it, you know, as soon as we 3 can.
4 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So base --
5 MR. KENT: So we're making those tracks.
6 And in looking at that long term organization, I need 7 somebody like Sam. I could see where I could use 8 somebody like Sam.
9 SPECIALAGENTVANBOCKER: You're familiar 10 with his qualifications?
11 MR. KENT: Yeah, he works out here a lot.
12 He supports -- he was the Corporate Rep that was 13 assigned to support Sequoia. He has really good 14 secondary chemistry qualifications. We have had over 15 the years problems in that area, and Sam has been very 16 instrumental in helping us, you know, work through 17 some of the problems and develop some new approaches 18 to things, and do analysis and that kind of stuff that 19 would help us get better.
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. So you, 21 and then Rich made a -- you initiated a request.
22 MR. KENT: Right. WE initiated the 23 request to transfer him.
24 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: And then what 25 happened after that?
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10 1 MR. KENT: Well, the only thing happened 2 after that was they went up the management chain. I 3 think they talked to McGrath, and McGrath did not want 4 to just transfer him out here. You know, he didn't 5 want -- he didn't think that was the right process 6 that we should go through, was just to transfer him 7 out. And so we said okay, so we didn't. We basically 8 dropped it.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. So it 10 ended right there without any further discussion?
11 MR. KENT: Yeah, we just ended it right 12 there without any further discussion. My thought was 13 if they anticipated making cuts in Corporate, this 14 might be a way of, you know, helping relieve some 15 pressure on some positions, but again that was back in 16 the spring.
17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
18 MR. KENT: I don't remember the time 19 frame, and I don't know that they knew what they were 20 going to have to do organizationally at that time.
21 But because of that, we just sort of dropped it, and 22 they don't want to transfer him out here. We weren't 23 ready to post a vacancy at that time.
24 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh. Did 25 you feel that -- was McGrath not say blocking this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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11 1 transfer, but just stopping this process, that he was 2 in any way holding up Fiser?
3 MR. KENT: No. I mean --
4 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Was there 5 discussion at all of Fiser?
6 MR. KENT: No. No, that was -- I -- you 7 know, I don't think anybody knew at that time that 8 Corporate was going to -- we felt that eventually 9 there was going to be pressure for Corporate to 10 reduce, you know. I mean, we all -- I mean, we were 11 already planning within our organization reductions 12 for this year.
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
14 MR. KENT: And I think we all understood 15 and believed that, you know, the continuing pressure 16 on Corporate would be to reduce also. And because of 17 the contribution Sam had made, his technical 18 expertise, we thought he'd be a good part of our team, 19 and let's go ahead and try to get him if we can.
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN'BOCKER: Uh-huh.
21 MR. KENT: When they said -- when they 22 were reluctant to do it, we said okay, you know. We 23 just didn't push it any more.
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12 1 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: All right.
2 Getting back, I asked initially, were you aware that 3 Fiser filed this DOL complaint?
4 MR. KENT: I was made aware of that, that 5 he had filed a DOL complaint.
6 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Who made you 7 aware of that?
8 MR. KENT: I honestly don't remember.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Do you remember 10 when?
11 MR. KENT: It was probably right around 12 the time of when we had our Selection Panel, that I 13 was aware that one had been filed. I might have got 14 it from conversations with Wilson McArthur, or 15 somebody else that Gary had told.
16 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So you knew it 17 prior to going into making the selection then?
18 MR. KENT: I think I did. I think I did 19 prior to making the selection. I believe -- I 20 honestly don't remember now how I found it. Wilson 21 could have told me, somebody from Watts Bar could have 22 told me. You know, I don't really remember.
23 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Were you aware 24 that he had filed previous DOLs in the previous years?
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13 1 MR. KENT: Oh, I knew about the one he had 2 filed back-in '94 or something.
3 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Were you part 4 of that, or did you get involved in that?
5 MR. KENT: I provided some information 6 related to it. Part of that had to do with -- the 7 information I provided was related to trying to hire 8 Gary out here, which I tried to do during that time 9 period. And my testimony was really related to, you 10 know, I was trying to pick him up.
11 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh. Part 12 of his complaint is, he's alleging that McGrath and 13 McArthur conspired against him by controlling -the 14 Selection Board. Do you remember when you were 15 approached to be on the Selection Committee to fill 16 vacant positions?
17 MR. KENT: No, not specifically. I mean, 18 it was a pretty good while before we had the Selection 19 Committee.
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Who approached 21 you?
22 MR. KENT: I think we may have talked 23 about it in one of our peer team meetings, you know, 24 a month or so earlier. Probably Wilson. I believe it 25 was Wilson, and we discussed what they were going to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 1 do, you know, that they were going to post these jobs 2 and have a Selection Team. And I think it was in that 3 kind of environment that they asked us, all of the 4 peers from various sites, to be on the Selection 5 Board, all the Redcon to be on the Selection 6 Committee, which would include myself, and Cory and 7 Cox (phonetic), and they added a Corporate guy, Rick 8 Rogers (phonetic).
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Jocher from 10 Brown's Ferry.
11 MR. KENT: Uh-huh. And Jack Cox and 12 myself were all requested --
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Jack Cox from 14 Watts Bar?
15 MR. KENT: Uh-huh. Yeah, we were all 16 requested to be on the Board.
17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. What 18 happened to Cox, do you know?
19 MR. KENT: The day they had the board 20 meeting, which I didn't know -- I don't think I knew 21 how long that meeting was going to be. We knew it was 22 going to be in the afternoon like peer team meetings.
23 I don't know that I knew how late it was going to be 24 until maybe a few days before, but I got a call, and 25 I told them, you know, that I would support that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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15 1 meeting, even doing it. And Jack had a previous 2 commitment. I don't know what it was, but he said he 3 just couldn't stay, so he didn't stay for it.
4 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So he had a 5 previous commitment so he couldn't serve on the 6 Selection Committee.
7 MR. KENT: He couldn't serve. Yeah, but 8 he was at our peer meeting, which was all morning 9 until about probably -- we met probably 9:00 or so to 10 maybe two or three in the afternoon. And then Jack 11 had to leave for some other commitment. We didn't 12 really question him on it. He had to leave for some 13 other commitment.
14 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Did he have any 15 preformed opinion on any of the candidates?
16 MR. KENT: Jack? No, I don't think he 17 did. I mean, he didn't say that he did or not. He 18 did relate to myself and Cory that Fiser had been 19 working for him. Fiser was serving him in the same 20 role that basically Sam had been helping me with, and 21 Chander had been helping Brown's Ferry with. And he 22 said that Fiser had done a real good job, he thought, 23 and supporting out there in their start-up. That's 24 essentially all the discussion we had on that.
25 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
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16 1 MR. KENT: Since he did not know who all 2 the candidates were going to be, or you know, or 3 anything else, I guess he just -- he knew Gary was one 4 of the candidates, I guess. He wanted to throw in his 5 two cents worth for Gary, who'd done a good job for 6 him.
7 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: By serving on 8 the committee, did you feel that you could give an 9 unbiased on the three candidates for the Chemistry 10 Position?
11 MR. KENT: Uh-huh.
12 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Even though 13 that -- you said who had worked for you, Harvey?
14 MR. KENT: Yeah. Harvey had been 15 supporting us. It was a part-time -- you see, the way 16 they do that is the Corporate guys are assigned layers 17 of responsibility.
18 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
19 MR. KENT: And Harvey just happened to be 20 the one that got assigned to Sequoia. I don't know if 21 it was specifically for Harvey. I don't think we 22 asked for Harvey. I think it just, you know, somebody 23 in Corporate decided that, you know, we'll assign 24 Harvey to Sequoia and Chander to Brown's Ferry, 25 probably because of their experience base, because I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE, N.W.
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17 1 think Chander probably has more (inaudible) experience 2 than other of the other two guys that were in 3 Corporate. And Sam and Gary both have PWR experience, 4 and I would suspect -that Sam was assigned to Sequoia 5 because our -- the bulk of our- problems were with 6 secondary site Chemistry, and Sam had real good 7 secondary site experience, and he sort of, you know, 8 his expertise in that area.
9 SPECIAL AGENT-VAN BOCKER: Yeah.
10 MR. KENT: And Watts Bar being a start-up 11 plant, probably needed support, you know, general 12 support which Gary could probably provide because Gary 13 has been a Chem Manager at a plant before. He knows, 14 you know, the whole picture.
15 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
16 MR. KENT: So I assume that's how they got 17 assigned to the site. They work on a-part-time basis 18 at the site. They don't really work full-time at the 19 site. They come out when we have special needs or --
20 and I'd say probably he's at the site at least on 21 average one to two days a week every week.
22 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
23 MR. KENT: Sometimes based on what's going 24 on, he might be out there, you know, more, but it's a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 11 1
1 part-time assignment. He also has Corporate 2 responsibilities that he has to fulfill.
3 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. Were you 4 aware of any moves or wrongdoing on the part of 5 McGrath or McArthur concerning the posting of the 6 positions or selection of the Selection Board?
7 MR. KENT: No. No, to the best of our 8 understanding, the posting of the positions was an 9 outcome of the -- they had to reduce staff. And in 10 order to reduce staff, and select the people that they 11 were going to have remain, they decided -- you know, 12 the process they went through was posting the 13 positions, and selection of the candidates that they 14 were going to have.
15 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh. Do you 16 feel it was right that they posted the positions 17 versus going on seniority, that they just -- Fiser 18 claims that they should have --
19 MR. KENT: Just followed seniority.
20 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Followed 21 seniority versus posting this.
22 MR. KENT: Well, I don't know. The 23 company as a whole, you know, that's a fairly common 24 practice company-wide.
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19 1 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: To post 2 positions.
3 MR. KENT: When you're reorganizing and 4 you're downsizing, you know, I think you're -- you 5 know, you have to make decisions about how -- what you 6 need to mix the talent you need for the future, and 7 you may have to consolidate jobs and that kind of 8 thing. And that is an approved process for doing 9 that, you know; you decide what jobs you're going to 10 have in the future. You post them and then you fill 11 them. And like engineering, they're doing that in 12 engineering right now across the valley, to be able to 13 move to this, you know, new engineering organization 14 they're going to have. And I think they may be doing 15 it in other areas also, so it's not an uncommon thing 16 to handle it that way.
17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Right.
18 MR. KENT: Rather than just going --
19 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Yeah. It looks 20 like they're doing that across the board in all major 21 organizations.
22 MR. KENT: Uh-huh.
23 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Were you aware 24 of any safety concerns brought up prior' to or during NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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20 1 posting the positions or the Selection Committee named 2 by Fiser, any safety concerns he brought up?
3 MR. KENT: No.
4 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: By being aware 5 of his filing a DOL complaint, did it influence you in 6 any way in the selection process?
7 MR. KENT: No.
8 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: In making this 9 selection for Chander, I don't know if that's how you 10 pronounce his name. Is that Chanderon?
11 MR. KENT: Uh-huh.
12 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So he got the 13 BWR position.
14 MR. KENT: Uh-huh.
15 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: And Harvey for 16 the PWR, was that a unanimous decision by the board, 17 do you recall, by the Selection Committee?
18 MR. KENT: Well, the way the Selection 19 Committee functioned is that we interviewed all the 20 candidates. We had the criteria that we were going 21 by, and we interviewed and rated all the candidates.
22 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
23 MR. KENT: And we turned in all of our 24 ratings to Human Resources, the Corporate Human 25 Resources people, and while I think I could have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE, N W (202) 234.4433 WASHINGTON, D C. 20005-3701 (202) 234.4433
21 1 inferred who might have been selected by the comments 2 -- some of the comments that were made, none of us on 3 the board knew actually who was selected until after 4 it was all tallied up, because we never saw the --
5 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: So you each had 6 your own sheet.
7 MR. KENT: We each had our own sheet, and 8 we turned in our individual sheets. And I -- you 9 know, so I didn't know how they scored. I didn't try 10 to record any of the information other than what I had 11 on my sheet, so I really didn't know how people scored 12 on the different jobs, except how I rated them.
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Was there an 14 influence by McArthur or McGrath on how you would make 15 your selection?
16 MR. KENT: No, there was no influence. As 17 a matter of fact, McGrath, to the best -- never said 18 anything to me about the process at any time during 19 the -- when I first found out that they were going to 20 post, through after the selection. Or even today I've 21 not talked to McGrath about the process or the 22 selections, or any individual.
23 - Wilson, the only conversations we had with 24 Wilson related to the selection board were at the 25 selection board, and Wilson basically said nothing.
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22 1 He took notes. And as a matter of fact, he didn't 2 really participate in the rating or the rankings of 3 any of the people. He was there as, I guess, the 4 responsible Manager and took notes, but made no 5 comments positive or negative about anything.
6 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay. As far 7 as the questions, you were given a list of questions.
8 MR. KENT: Yeah, regarding the questions 9 that we asked during the interviews for the Selection 10 Board, we were provided with a draft list of 11 questions, and from that list we, as a group, selected 12 maybe ten questions that we were going to ask.
13 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Same ten 14 questions to ask to each person?
15 MR. KENT: Depending on the position. It 16 was regarding -- it related to the position. For 17 instance, if you were applying for a position of PWR 18 Chemist, then you got asked one set of questions. If 19 you were applying for a position of a BWR Chemist, 20 then you got another set of questions.
21 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
22 MR. KENT: If you were applying for a 23 position for both, you got asked a mix of the two sets 24 of questions that covered all the questions.
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23 1 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh. Who 2 prepared the list of questions?
3 MR. KENT: The questions, the list, the 4 initial list was prepared from -- by Corporate. I 5 guess it was McArthur and/or the Corporate HR put it 6 together. It was in a notebook. It was pretty 7 professionally done when we arrived at the Selection 8 Board. I think we may have added a question.
9 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: But you three 10 on the Selection Board selected --
11 MR. KENT: We selected the questions. WE 12 said yeah, this would be a good question for this 13 group of people. This would be a good one for this 14 group of people, and we did the same thing for all of 15 these positions, when applying for Redcon support 16 positions.
17 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
18 MR. KENT: And so we looked through this 19 long list of questions and decided we'll ask them, you 20 know, number one, number three, number seven, number 21 nineteen, eleven, et cetera.
22 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Uh-huh.
23 MR. KENT: And then we asked each 24 candidate for each specific position the same NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 1 questions, so that everybody responded to the same 2 questions for that specific position.
3 SPECIAL AGENT VAN BOCKER: Okay.
4 (End of tape.)
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