ML20210G166
| ML20210G166 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 07/23/1999 |
| From: | Dicus G NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | Riccio J Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20210G171 | List: |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9908030021 | |
| Download: ML20210G166 (4) | |
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9 UNITED STATES lt
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" NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION WASHINGTON, D.C. 205Sf401 f $ I
\.....,/ July 23, 1999 CHAIRMAN Mr. James P. Riccio Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project 215 Pennsylvania Avenue, S.E.
Washington, D.C. 20003
Dear Mr. Riccio:
I am responding to your letter dated May 25,1999, in which you raised concerns about the release of preliminary Commission papers to the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) for comment. I want to assure you that it is not the Commission's policy to allow industry representatives to help draft Nuclear Regulatory Com nission (NRC) documents. We do, however, actively solicit feedback on our documents from the public. We are not aware of any draft SECY papers, which are NRC policy documents, that were given to industry representatives during the last five years that were not publicly available.
Your letter makes specific reference to SECY-99-143, " Revisions to Generic Communications Program," which was issued on May 26,1999. The purpose of this paper was to inform the Commission of actions taken or planned by the staff to improve the apncy's generic communications program and its implementation. The NRC held a public meeting on July 17, 1998, to receive and discuss stakeholder concerns in the generic communications area.
Following receipt of input from NEl after that meeting, the staff developed a draft of the SECY in question. This draft was initially discussed at a public meeting with the NRC's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards on April 7,1999.
In preparation for a subsequent public meeting on the generic communications process to be held on April 22,1999, between the NRC and NEl, the staff forwarded a draft version of SECY-99-143 to NEl on Match 30,1999, and also made the draft SECY paper available in the Public Document Room (PDR). The staff verified that the draft SECY document was available in the PDR on April 7,1999. At the April 22 meeting, the staff discussed the proposed improvements to the generic communications program, made copies of the draft SECY paper available to all who attended, and solicited comments from those who attended.
Consequently, NEl was not afforded an exclusive opportunity to participate in the development of SECY-99-143. While the document was being placed in the PDR at the same time it was made available to NEl, we recognize, as a practical matter, that few members of the public would have been aware of its existence until the April 22 meeting. To address that problem, we t are adding new web pages to our website to ensure that the NRC gives public notice of the
! availability of documents as soon as they are placed in the PDR.
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2-Your comments also prompted agency consideration of possible improvements to the NRC l processes that allow for the broadest spectrum of individuals to obtain or have access to information that is the subject of regulatory reform, poliev, or practice. The enclosed Announcement contains recent direction given to the aff in this regard. On July 7,1999, the NRC staff conducted a meeting with interested stakeholders to discuss these processes and how they might be enhanced to serve stakeholder needs better.
The NRC will continue its practice of providing information to interested stakeholders, members of the public, and members of the regulated industry so that they can effectively participate in the regulatory processes. When the Commission is aware of stakeholder interest in a particular issue, and it is appropriate to make preliminary information available, we will make draft copies of documents available to all stakeholders at the same time. The Commission also will continue its efforts to ensure that no licensee, industry group, or any other special interest group will have a preferential opportunity to review and affect the contents of agency decision-making documents such as SECY papers.
Sincerely, eta Joy Dicus
Enclosure:
As stated
FNRC PROCESS FOR RELLASING DOCUMENTS TO TlIE GENERAL PUBLit http://ww w. intern al.nre. gov /N RC/A N No U NCE/Y ELLO W/1999-059.h
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i ,, UNITED STATES
- i. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Wegg4-Announcement No. 059 Date: July 7,1999 To: All NRC Employees
SUBJECT:
NRC PROCESS FOR RELEASING DOCUMENTS TO TIIE GENERAL PUBLIC Recently, the NRC has received criticism that certain stakeholders have received copies of documents from !
the NRC staff before they are available to other interested persons. Also, even though some stakeholders are aware of copies of documents as soon as they have been released to the PDR, as a practical matter, other interested parties may not be aware of their availability.
As a result, I want to remind the staff of our responsibilities in making documents available to the public and inform the staff of changes to our external web page made in response to this criticism. By following the instructions below, we can all support the agency performance goal ofincreasing public confidence in the NRC.
Our Management Directive (MD) on the " Release ofInformation to the Public" (MD 3.4) states the following objective:
"To ensure that documents will not be provided to one licensee or a member of the public unless they can be made available, generally through the NRC Public Document Room, to all persons, except under the conditions described in Part II(A) and (B) of Handbook 3.4" (til exceptions from Part II(A) and (B) noted below) t l
Consistent with this, I expect staff to verify that a document exists in the Public Document Room (PDR) before releasing a copy to the public, excluding the exceptions noted in the MD. To determine if a !
document is in the PDR, the staff may contact the PDR at 202-634-3273. Similarly, the staff are also
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responsible for ensuring that documents that are referred to in Federal Register Notices as publicly ,
t.vailable, are actually available through the PDR.
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As a reminder, documents that are to be released the public, must be prepared in accordance with guidance !
contained in Management Directive 3.57 " Corr:spondence Management." If the document is to be placed in the PDR, the originating office must designate "PUBLIC" on the official record copy distribution list so l l that it receives the proper processing through the Nuclear Documents System (NUDOCS). j i
The long-term solution to the problem of providing a copy of documents to Lil interested segments of the )
public at the same time and in the same manner will be provided through the agency-wide implementation l
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I NRC PROCESS FOR RELEASING DOCUMENTS TO THE GENERAL PUBLli http J/ w ww .h te rnal.nrc. gov /N R C/ AN N O U N CE/ YELLO W/1999-059.h w of ADAMS. At that time, publicly released douuments will be available electronically at the same time to all interested stakeholders. However, a temporary solution has been put into place until the public can access ADAMS.
To provide a temporary solution, the PDR staff has established a web page, httrn//www.nrc.nov/NRC/PDR/pdrdoc.html , that provides a daily list of the high interest advance paper copies of documents made available each day. The web page also includes the SECY papers, Staff Requirement Memoranda, and Commissioner' Notation Vote Response Sheets that are released daily by SECY. The staff can check this web page to verify that an advance copy of a document is in the PDR before providing it to persons outside the NRC.
The staff should keep in mind that it may take up to five days for a document to be available to the public in the PDR from the normal processing route through NUDOCS. If it is essential to ensure that a high-interest document is available in the PDR sooner than the five day period, the staff can provide an advance paper copy to the PDR staff in addition to sending it through NUDOCS. For time-critical documents, rather than relyin?, on interoffice mail, the staff can either hand-deliver or fax (202-634-3343) the document directly to the PDR. The staff should note on the advance copies that they send to the PDR that it is ofimmediate interest and should be contained in the daily list of advance copies.
Finally, the staffis reminded to provide an equitable opportunity for comment to all interested stakeholders. By our careful attention to the above responsibilities, we can continue to ensure that the broadest spectmm of individuals can obtain or have access to information that is the subject of regulatory reform, initiatives, policy, or practice.
If you have any questions, please contact Louise Lund, OEDO, at 301-415-8508 or Elizabeth Yeates, PDR, at 202-634-3380.
/s/
William D. Travers Executive Director for Operations
[ NRC Internal llome Page lIndex of Yellow Announcements ]
- 1. The xceptions, listed in the MD, apply to draft documents specifically disseminated to the public for comment, such as draft environmental impact statements, draft regulatory guides, and proposed rules.
Other exceptions noted in MD 3.4 include (1) necessary communications between the NRC staff and licencee, vendors, and others in the normal course of agency business, (2) draft research documents, and (3) draft NRC documents to other Federal Agencies.
Nothing in this memorandum is intended to impede the prompt notification oflicensees of issues that arise which require timely notification, typically concurrent with placing the document in the PDR, i.e., on a case-by-case basis, Notifications of Enforcement Discretion, outage-related license amendments, etc. In addition, this memorandum does not alter existing policies for handling the release of cenain sensitive ,
documents, such as enforcement actions or proprietary information. This also does not apply to documents l released in a properly noticed meetmg. i I
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