ML20059F056
| ML20059F056 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Claiborne |
| Issue date: | 01/05/1994 |
| From: | Gordon H AFFILIATION NOT ASSIGNED |
| To: | NRC OFFICE OF NUCLEAR MATERIAL SAFETY & SAFEGUARDS (NMSS) |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9401130131 | |
| Download: ML20059F056 (2) | |
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800 Scott Street
- IJttle Rock, Arkansas 72201 501-372 1804 rose January 5,199d Chief, Enrichment Branch Division of Fuel Cycle Safety & Safeguards a
U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission j
Washington, DC 20555
Dear Sir:
I would like to respond to the issues in the NRC's DEIS for the Claibome Enrichment Center.
The environmental impact of the Claibome Enrichment Center in Homer, Louisiana is accurately described in the studies in the DEIS report.
I agree with the report, that there is negligibie impact. My conclusion is based on my conversations with nuclear engineering friends at die University of Virginia and having visited the European sites of similar plants.
The economic impact of the plant will be astounding in two ways.
First, the CEC economic impact will be in the offering of good paying jobs to people already living in the community who, up to this point, have not been able to find these types ofjobs. It will give them economic and political resources that will improve their quality oflife and the life of the community.
Secondly, the tax money that goes to the government agencies, such as the estimated 55 million to the school system from the use tax, will greatly improve the parish's ability to improve its tax base by having attractive governmental infrastructure that will attract other people and industries.
The environmental and economic impact is secondary to the whole question of environmental racism.
There is deep-seated racism in Claiborne Parish. I was born in Homer and chose to return to serve as the Presbyterian minister, As minister, Chamber of Commerce President, and
- 1. ion's Club President, I watched the racism be used for economic and political control by the elite, both black and white, of the community.
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As short a time ago as 1987 the medical clinic had de facto segregated waiting rooms.
I The first shot fired in the d; bate over the CEC was a white man's declaration, "IfI have to make a racial issue out of this, I will."
This is to say that racial tension invades everything in the parish. There is no way to avoid it. The racism is best dealt with by addressing it openly and ho'nestly.
The sophisticated way in which racism is used to maintain control, defeat progress and serve those in power makes dealing with new projects cuming from outside the community very difficult, especially a project that w.ll change the status quo racism.
The CEC could not have been located anywhere within the parish where it did not affect the lives of black or white peopic. It is a small parish with the traditional scathern residential integration of big white homes, surrounded by small black homes, small white homes surrounded by smaller black homes.
The CEC did not displace any family, black or white. The site selection was not based on racial depressed land values. The presence of the plant will increase the value of property around it and in the parish as a whole, unlike the opposite effect of projects based on ecological racism.
In fact, the presence of CEC is one of the best solutions to the hereditary racism of Claiborne Parish. By offering well-paying jobs to the younger leadership of the parish, by their holding technological sophisticated and worldwide respected jobs, they will be empowered to change the future of Claibome Parish for the better.
The provincialism that has been intentionally maintained for power and control has given
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i the community a poor selfimage. The presence of CEC, raising the economic level of the parish and drawing visitors from around the country and the world, will allow the people of Claiborne Parish to see their real goodness and to rise above the racist and provincial control of the past.
Ecologically the plart is 1.ot a threat. Economically the plant is a tremendous asset.
l Societally the plant is a dran atic change for the better.
Sincerely,
- w.R 'b 0 bc-(
Howard Gordon Minister 1
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