ML20216E080
| ML20216E080 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 02/23/1998 |
| From: | Lohaus P NRC OFFICE OF STATE PROGRAMS (OSP) |
| To: | Cool D NRC OFFICE OF NUCLEAR MATERIAL SAFETY & SAFEGUARDS (NMSS) |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20216C713 | List: |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9804160084 | |
| Download: ML20216E080 (59) | |
Text
s FEB 2 a 1998 UiCMORANDUM TO:
Donald A. Cool, Director Division of Industrial and Medical Nuclear Safety Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards FROM:
Paul H. Lohaus, Deputy Director MD %
PAUL H.LOHAUS Office of State Programs
SUBJECT:
IMPEP SESSION AT 1997 ALL AGREEMENT STATES MEETING
)
We have reviewed the transcript of the discussions held during the subject session.
{ identifies issues raised during the discussion and contains a proposed response g,
o each issue. Attachment 2 is a transcript of the discussions. We would appreciate both your comments and concurrence, and your assistanca in preparing a response to the first issue by 6 arch:13,1998.'When final, we will distribute Attachment 1 to all Regions and Agreement M
g/
)ff(g States.
I/
Lence Rakovan,415-2589 or e-mail LJR2. is the OSP contact for this action.
(,yy Attachments:
As stated cc:
J. Piccone, IMNS/NMSS S. Moore, IMNS/NMSS 4
1 9804160084 980403 PDR STPRG ESGGEN PDR Distnbution DIR RF DCD (SPX2)
SDroggitis PDR (YES., __ NO
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i CPaperiello, NMSS Agreement State File DOCUMENT NAME: G:\\lMPEPWSMTG.LJI G:\\lMPEPMS,
- SEE PREVIOUS CONCURRENCE d attachmenvenclosumg~ l;)r wth attachment / enclosure "N" = No copy Ta receive e copy of eens document. InsHeste in the box: "C" C 4 OFFICE '
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,DATE 02/20/98
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February 23, 1998 MEMORANDUM TO:
Donald A. Cool, Director Division of Industrial and Medical Nuclear Safety Office of Nuclear Material Safety an Safeguards p FROM:
Paul H. Lohaus, Deputy Director /
Office of State Programs
(
SUBJECT:
IMPEP SESSION AT 1997 ALL AGREEMENT STATES MEETING We have reviewed the transcript of the discussions held during the subject session. identifies issues raised during the discussion and contains a proposed response to each issue. Attachment 2 is a transcript of the discussions. We would appreciate both your comments and concurrence, and your assistance in preparing a response to the first issue by March 13,1998. When final, we will distribute Attachment 1 to all Reg!ons and Agreement States.
Lance Rakovan,415-2589 or e-mail LJR2, is the OSP contact for this action.
Attachments:
As stated cc:
J. Piccone, IMNS/NMSS S. Moore, IMNS/NMSS
1 l
ISSUES FROM THE 1997 ALL AGREEMENT STATE MEETING ONIMPEP Note: Page numbers refer to the transcript of the October 16,1997 All Agreement State Meeting.
1.
ISSUE:
Page 83 & 121. A review team of experience Agreement State personnel
- and one experienced NRC staff should review NRC's SS&D program. The review could identify practices that may benefit the Agreement States,and would provide independent review of that portion of the NRC's program for which some experience Agreement State personnel are uniquely qualified to perfomt RESPONSE: Response to be prepared by NMSS.
2.
ISSUE:
Page 85. The NRC should increase use of E-mail communication to facilitate the timeliness of communication with the questionnaire between the review team and the State.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and will continue with efforts to implement this recommendation.
3.
ISSUE:
Page 86. The NRC should allow responses to questions, as appropriate, to be "No change since last review" or "Only the following changes have occurred."
RESPONSE: NRC will continue to accept the use of responses to the questionnaire of "no change since last reviews" or "only the following changes have occurred."
4.
ISSUE:
Page 89. The NRC should allow inspector accompaniments to be scheduled throughout the period between formal IMPEP reviews.
RESPONSE: Accompaniments are acceptable throughout the period between IMPEP reviews. This issue is specifically addressed in the draft General Procedures for Performing IMPEP reviews and was discussed at the December 2,1997 IMPEP training for team members.
5.
ISSUE:
Page 90. All Information needed by the review team should be included in the questionnaire.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. The IMPEP questionnaire has been revised based on the experience during the interim implementation of IMPEP and comments received from States. A list of material requested to be available during the review has been added to the questionnaire which was sent to the Agreement States for comment on November 13,1997 in SP-97-079. Three comments were received by the requested date of December 19,1997. The questionnaire will be revised and issued, after receiving OMB clearance, retaining the listing of information that should be available to the team during the review.
1 February 20,1998 ATTACHMENT 1
6.
ISSUE: -
Page 93. All information that the review teams will need copies of should be identified early to the State, such as regulations.
I RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance will be given to the team leaders to identify early to the State, which information the review team will request copies of.
7.
ISSUE:
Page 94. The States should not be judged against Chapter 2800, adequacy is the standard, based on the Agreement State's own regulations, license conditions, policies and procedures.
Page 96 & 98. Some States believe that Chapter 2800 offers good guidance for evaluating the adequacy of inspection and believes that the comment on page 94 did not fully capture this aspect of IMC 2800.
RESPONSE: NRC will continue to use Inspection Manual Chapter (IMC) 2800 as base guidance forjudging inspection priority systems. Any difference will be evaluated on a
^
case-by-case basis, in addition, NRC will be seeking Agreement State comments on proposed revisions to IMC 2800, as noted in the recent All Agreement State Letter, SP-97-086.
8.
ISSUE:
Page 96. The standards or guidance the States are judged against should be clearly identified whether they are the NRC or the States.
RESPONSE: The standards the States are judged against are identified in Management Directive 5.6, Integrated Materials Performance Evaluation Program, revised November 25,1997. This revision includes the evaluation criteria for the non-common performance indicators and reflects the final Policy Statement on Adequacy and Compatibility of Agreement State Programs approved by the Commission on June 30,1997.
9.
ISSUE:
Page 97. Temporary changes to inspection frequencies should not be imposed on an Agreement State, such as changes to HDR inspections frequencies.
RESPONSE: NRC will assess the reasons for each temporary instruction (TI) issued and together with Agreement States assess the need for Agreement States to implement equivalent temporary guidance.
10.
ISSUE:
Page 99. Comments on specific inspector accompaniments should not be written as to describe the entire State program.
RESPONSE: NRC disagrees. Inspector performance deficiencies identified through the inspector accompaniments is unavoidably linked to the effectiveness of the program's training and the State's supervisory accompaniments when deficiencies are noted.
2 February 20,1998
1 11.
ISSUE:
Page 100. Is it a requirement for all inspectors to be accompanied during an IMPEP review and is more guidance needed?
RESPONSE: it is not a requirement for all inspectors to be accompanied during an IMPEP review. Guidance for the number of accompaniments is contained in the draft Procedure for the review of Performance Indicator #2, Technical Quality of Material inspection. The draft procedure recommends a minimum of three accompaniments.
For regions or large states, five or more is preferred. Guidance for selection of inspectors is documented in the draft General Procedure for Conducting IMPEP reviews.
12.
ISSUE:
Page 102. Each team member should be experienced in the area assigned to review and trained to resolve potential issues while on-site.
l RESPONSE: NRC agrees. NRC is presently developing training and qualification J
requirements for IMPEP reviewers.
I f
13.
ISSUE:
Page 102. The review team members should resolve as many as possible specific comments and questions while on site and not put this information in the draft report which is a public document.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees that review team members should resolve as many as I
possible specific comments and questions on site. The teams have also been L
instructed to continue to resolve issues after the on-site portion of the review or retum to the State if needed. However, an open issue could still be in the report if the team was not able to resolve it by the previous mentioned options.
i 14.
ISSUE: '
Page 102. The NRC should provide guidance to the States on space and equipment needs for the number of team members to be present.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance was given to the team leaders during the December 1997 training on coor6inetion with the State on the team's needs.
15.
ISSUE:
Page 104. NRC should consider making training available to those l
States that participate in IMPEP reviews and working groups.
RESPONSE: On December ~12,1997, Agreement State Letter SP-97-085, the Criteria l
for Training Funding Assistance for Agreement States was issued. In the Commission approved criteria, participation in IMPEP reviews and joint working groups are not considered as part of the criteria for training funding assistance.
16.
ISSUE:
Page 105. The review team should indicate to the State which staff members and contractors need to be available during the entire review.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance will be given to the team leaders to coordinate with the State management prior to the review and identify which staff members or contractors should be available during the review.
3 February 20,1998 l
j i
17.
ISSUE:
Page 106. For the draft report, NRC should describe how concems will be addressed and resolved in guidance for the review teams.
j i
RESPONSE: NRC agrees in part. See the response to issue 13. However, given the j
performance-based approach used in IMPEP, the State is expected to evaluate the '
I concem and implement a resolution appropriate for that specific program, it is not appropnate for the team to prescribe the method of resolution. Suggestions may be offered, however.
1 18.
ISSUE:
Page 106. It should be clearly specified that the State or Regions must i
l fully address every report item if the respondent desires its views to be in the public record.
1 RESPONSE: The Agreement State is requested to respond to recommendations in the final report. NRC does not object to responses to suggestions or other items in the draft report. The State or Region has the option of addressing any draft report item when the review team has asked for factual comments on the draft report. Many States and Regions have chosen to prepare responses to the draft report prior to the Management Review Board meeting and these are sent to the Management Review Board and to the l
public document room.
L ig.
ISSUE:
Page 106. Limit the recommendations and comments in the draft report to significant observations.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. Given the performance-based approach, it is NRC's l
intention to limit recommendations and comments to significant observations. In some L
cases, however, a number of less significant comments when collectively assessed can I
be indicative of a programmatic weakness.
4 20.
ISSUE:
Page 106. When statements are made during exit meetings that certain items will not be in the report, then the statements should not be in the report.
i RESPONSE: The review team presents preliminary findings during the exit meetings.
The reports are subject to management review after preparation by the team leader.
There have been instances (and there will likely continue to be instances), where items have been identified after the review, which may not have been previously identified or the team did not originally believe would be included in the report. The team leaders, in those cases, notified (or will notify) the State program management of the change from l
the findings discussed during the exit.
21.
ISSUE:
Page 106. Do not include a long list of questions in the report, such as detailed questions regarding SS&D reviews. Such questions should be separated from the report.
RESPONSE: NRC_ agrees. See response to issu i 13.
4 February 20,1998 i
22.
ISSUE:
Page 107 Can NRC consider withho,d.ing the draft report and only issue the final report as a public document?
RESPONSE: NRC has considered this question. Withholding the draft report and only issuing the final report as a public document would be a major change in the open manner in which IMPEP is conducted, as approved by the Commission. In 1991 NRC adopted " Principles of Good Regulation" and these principles are reflected in the Statement of Principles and Policy for the Agreement State Program, issued September 3,1997, (62 FR 46517). One of the principles is regulatory openness. IMPEP was designed such that decisions and actions would be developed and implemented in an open and publicly credible manner in order to withstand scrutiny. Such scrutiny should be welcomed by the parties involved in the reviews. 'As stated in the " Principles of Good Regulation," " Nuclear regulation is the public's business, and it must be transacted publicly and candidly." The public must be informed about and have the opportunity to participate in regulatory processes.
We believe that placing the draft report in the Public Document Room and holding Management Review Board meetings open to the public achieve these goals and benefits the public which we serve. Without public availability of the draft reports, it would greatly handicap the understanding of any member of the public attending a Management Review Board meeting.
23.
ISSUE:
Page 109. NRC needs to be sensitive to timing and content of the draft report when states are in licensing decisions.
RESPONSE: NRC reports factually on areas that need improvement in accordance with j
established reporting milestones. NRC agrees that it is especially important to have
}
facts, conclusions and recommendations, clearly stated when important and I
controversial licensing activities are under consideration by the State.
i 24.
ISSUE:
Page 110. NRC should send the draft report to the program manager or highest level of management involved with the closeout, instead of a yet higher level of management than was involved.
RESPONSE: Prior to the IMPEP review, the tam leader contacts the program manager for the identification of the proper level of upper management within the State for receipt of the report and for conduct of the exit acting.
25.
ISSUE:
Page 113. NRC should inform the State. staff attending the MRB what to expect during an MRB meeting.
RESPONSE: In June 1997, NRC began an orientation for Qose State staff attending MRB meetings in person prior to the meeting. We will expand this orientation to include those States staff attending the MRB via telephone.
5 February 20,1998
26.
ISSUE:
Page 114. During executive sessions of the MRB, it should be clarified whether the MRB can make decisions and inform all participants as to the process.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and the procedure for the MRB will be revised to clarify the process and actions of the MRB during executive sessions. By practice, the MRB currently reports the votes of all MRB decisions.
1 27.
l'aub Page 116. Does NRC still notify those interested in attending by tv.4hms the times for scheduled MRB?
RESPONSE: The scheduled meetings open to the public, which include the MRB meetings, can be found on the NRC home page at:
http://www.nrc. gov /NRC/PUBLIC/ meet.html The information changes frecuently. For the most up to date meeting information, call a recording of upcoming meetings at 800-952-9674 or contact the electronic bulletin board system directly at 800-952-9676.
28.
ISSUE:
Page 117. The NRC should describe in a transmittal letter, how the final report was changed as a result of the draft report review and MRB process.
RESPONSE: Details of the changes to the proposed final report as a result of the MRB meeting are documented in the first page of the final report with significant changes noted in the transmittal letter for the final report to the State. Additional details on the changes as a result of the MRB meeting can be found in the minutes of the MRB meeting, which are sent to the State and are publicly available.
29.
ISSUE:
Page 118. If there are substantial items in the proposed final report that changes the finding, the State should have more time before the MRB meeting.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. However, substantive changes from the draft to proposed final report almost always result from State comments. We will continue to work with the States to keep them informed of significant changes that occur as the proposed final report is written. Although significant delays in final report issuance could result, NRC will reschedule the MRB meeting date if a State is not prepared to meet because of significant draft report revisions that are reflected in the proposed final report.
30.
ISSUE:
Page 118. Should there be another mechanism to deal with items that contribute to an IMPEP review, but is not apparently a part of the IMPEP review itself, as an example, regulations?
RESPCNSE: NRC believes that items that contribute to the performance of the State's program should be part of the IMPEP re/,irw. The example given, regulaticns, is a non-common performance ind!=toi under IMPEP that centributes significardiy to the program compatibility determinations. NRC believes that allindicators evaluated by IMPEP reviews are necessary to arrive at valid adequacy and compatibility determinations.
6 February 20,1998
{
~
31.
ISSUE:
Page 120. Required minimum inspection frequencies should be determined by cooperations of all parties, including agreement by a majority of Agreement States, the NRC Regions and the NRC HQ with each having one vote in the determination process. Then, the NRC and Agreement States have flexibility to make changes for each agency's own jurisdiction without impacting the resource requirements of the others. The required minimum inspection frequency would be subject to review as j
needed with changes made only by approval of a majority of the regulatory agency parties. The required frequency could be a range for each licensee category. For example, the HDR minimum inspection frequency was set at one year, and determined without Agreement States input.
RESPONSE: See response to issue 7. NRC is currently committed to provide Agreement States early and substantive involvement on materials program policy changes, including inspection frequency guidance.
32.
ISSUE:
Page 121. Reciprocity inspection frequencies should be determined in the same manner as recommended in item 31.
RESPONSE: See response to issue 7 s.nd 31.
33.
ISSUE:
Page 121. Expectations for required training of Agreement State staff under IMPEP shw'd be clearly specified. Although this is an open item, the States believe that the training wo:Mr,g group report will resolve this issue.
RESPONSE: The required training of Agreement State staff under IMPEP is clearly i
specified under Management Directive 5.6 where Agreement State should have an equivalent program to IMC 1246. The working group report was distributed to all IMPEP team members during the December 1997 training and to the Agreement States as guidance for establishing a training program.
34.
ISSUE:
Page 122. One State requested that determinations of compatibility, especially of regulations, should be removed from the IMPEP process. However, several other states disag:eed (pages 122-127) with this s's an issue and stated support that compatibility determinations remain as part of the IMPEP process.
RERONSE: See response to issue 30.
35.
ISSUE:
Page 125. As an item for the Organization of Agreement States to consider, guidance for State program managers to effectively utilize the IMPEP results to improve the Agreement State program within the State.
RESPONSE: For OAS action.
G:\\lMPEPWS.OAS 7
February 20,1998
o 81 1
tnose back in.
So that hopefully we'll have a more useful.
2 product that we're all dealing with.
3 That's about all I had, hopefully, to lay you 4
kind of a background for Steve's session.
5 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
Okay good.
- Thanks, 6
Kathy.
Steve is going to start us out on an interactive 7
session here, and any questions that we have that relate 8
to Kathy, Kathy will be here to answer those, too.
So, 9
Steve.
10 MR. COLLINS:
At least from Illinois' l
11 perspective, IMPEP is a substantial improvement over the 12 previous evaluation process that intended to be an audit I
)
13 rather than a management review; or at least that was the i
14 perspective a lot of us had when there were so many 15 numbers, and so much data, and so much looking at files, l
16 and less talking about how we get things done and does it i
17 get done.
18 What this particular session is about is, can 19 IMPEP be improved?
And now is the time for the states to 20 give their perspective.
I'm asking for your input in the 21 order of the following identified steps.
And it's 22 basically if you take the chronological order of steps you 23 go through in an IMPEP process, that's the order that I 24 had picked out and used here.
25 I had 75 copies of some notes that I handed NEAL R. GROSS ATTACHMENT 2 l
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1 out.
Th2re should have been a sheet _with printing on the I
l 2
front and back that had each one of these steps on it.
3 The steps are:
the questionnaire, the inspection 4
accompaniments; on-site review team and the interactions 5
with them; the draft report; the management review board 6
meeting; the final report; and then one that's not in 7
order but added on because it doesn't get covered anywhere 8
else -- is Agreement State input into the criteria used as 9
a part of IMPEP evaluations.
10 Now, just before we get started with that 11 particular process, Mike, does your question fit within 12 any one of those?
Or your comments?
13 MR. MOBLEY:
I don't think so.
It's --
14 MR. COLLINS:
We'll let you start, then.
15 MR. MOBLEY:
Okay.
It's a very specific 16 question.
Mike Mobley from Tennessee.
And the question i
17 is about the SSED program.
Is the NRC's SS&D program 18 reviewed by IMPEP?
It would seem that if the state's 19 program is reviewed by IMPEP that the NRC's program should j
1 20 be reviewed also.
Might be just a normal evaluation of 21 this program.
22 MR. COLLINS:
Not yet, Don.
I haven't l
23 recognized you.
24 (Laughter.)
25 Under item 7.d. on the very back of'the page NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS ANDTRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHoDE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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thara, you'll ne';ica a vary detoiled and specific 2
recommendation that Illinois has put in for that.
3 MR. MOBLEY:
I didn't read far enough, Steve.
4 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
You might want to 5
- .ention that Don is going to be talking about the device 6
program, too.
7 MR. COLLINS:
Tomorrow.
8 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
Tomorrow.
9 MR. COLLINS:
Right.
And just so you'll know 10 before you make a comment so you can address it if you l
11 wish, even though we're getting out of order a little bit 12 here, a review team of experienced -- this is Agreement 13 State input into the criteria used as part of evaluations, 14 item d.
i 15 "A review team of experienced Agreement State 16 personnel and one experienced NRC staff" -- parallel to 17 the way it's done now when it's going the other way --
18 "should review the NRC's SS&D program.
The review could 19 identify practices that may benefit the Agreement States 20 would provide independent review of that portion of the 21 NRC's program for which some experienced Agreement State 22 personnel are uniquely qualified."
r 23 DR. COOL:
Don Cool from NRC.
Actually, I 24 welcome the suggestion to have that review done.
We have 25 used the IMPEP criteria that we use on the reviews for the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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84 l'
states and dono en internal raview of the SS&D program; 2
that in fact wasn't done last fall.
We had one of our 3
folks go through who was not a regular part of the program 4
and do the equivalent of an IMPEP review..But that's an 5
internal audit, much like you would do an internal audit.
6 And standing back, from a program standpoint I 7
think it would be an excellent idea to do an IMPEP on that 8
particular piece of the program.
And in fact, I'm working 9
with the regions to conduct an IMPEP of the rest of my 10 materials program in a manner similar to the way that we 11 look at the regions.
12 So conceptually, I've got no difficulty with j
i 13 it as long as we can sort out the arrangements and timing 14 schedule of it.
So I'm perfectly willing to try and work.
15 with you, and I actually have no objection at all.
That's 16 very similar to a number of the things that tr.e commission 17 is doing in its excellence arena.
18 And in fact, this might be one of the things 19 that we might want to take back and propose to the 20 commission in the next cycle that it goes through in terms 21 of its program plan.
You heard the commission talk this 22 morning about a strategic plan.
Undergirding that are a 23 series of perfrrmance plans and then a whole series of 24 activities.
25 One of the other areas that was looked at with l
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85 l,
I strotcgic cccc:cment was regulctory excellence:
what can
?
we do to. improve our quality?
And we identified a number 3
of things in the first blush that they wanted to look at 4
in terms of excellence.
This might well constitute a good 5
suggestion for the next round so that we can get into a 6
budget planning cycle which maybe would be a year or so 7
from that, just so that we can establish the resources and 8
the scheduling.
9 MR. COLLINS:
Okay, let's go back to the 10 chronological order now.
The first step that any of us 11 usually get involved in IMPEP is the questionnaire.
4 12 Illinois has put down some items on each one of these to 13 try to stimulate your thinking to get us started on each 14 one of these.
15 We found the use of E-mail was very effective.
16 We would like to see the increased use of E-mail 17 communication to facilitate the timeliness of 18 communication with the questionnaire and its answers back 19 and forth.
We were able to agree on a word processing and 20 we E-mailed stuff back and forth and we were able to end 21 up with a really good looking questionnaire that we both 22 had electronically on both ends.
l 23 It saves Kathy a lot of time and it
- well, 24 both Kathys.
These two Kathys were the ones that were 25 working on it for Illinois and it saved a lot of time.
So NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 l'
that's not'just for NRC but for the states.
But if you 2
can increase your use of E-mail it will make the 3
questionnaire process go much quicker.
4 The other one is -- and NRC has already done t
i 5
tnis.-
I didn't know that until someone got a printed copy 6.
of this -- allow response to questians,.as appropriate, to I-7 be "no' change since the last rev'tw", or "only the 8
following. changes have occurred".
Instead of'giving a 9
complete description of something just identify 10 differences.
11 Okay, any other Agreement State suggestion on 12 how we can improve IMPEP in the area of the questionnairc?
13 Don Bond, California.
14 MK'. BOND:
I'm Don Bond from California and I 15 just have a simple question at this time.
Regarding this 16 annual meeting that you plan to hold, is that going to 17 involve a questionnaire?
Because a questionnaire does 18 take considerable time for us to pull it together, and 19 we're thinking that perhaps we wouldn't want to get 20 involved in more questionnaire development for the annual 21 meeting which was just thrown out.
22 MS. SCHNEIDER:
There's no questionnaire 23 involved in that.
24 MR. COLLINS:
Matter of fact, Don, you may be 25 disappointed that, I understand the NRC state program L
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I 87 1
management has limited the amount of time that the 2
regional state person can spend on that, to about one day 3
or a day-and-a-half.
He's not going to be allowed enough 4
time that you may want to communicate, that you may end up 5
regretting that they limited it so much.
That 6
possibility.
7 (Laughter.)
8 Kathy Schneider's response there for the 9
recorder, was that the questionnaire would not be needed 10 for the annual review.
Dick Bangart.
11 MR. BANGART:
Just to clarify management's 12 position on this, we have wanted -- our objective is to 13 keep the single meeting to a day or one-day length so that 14 it's less burdensome on both NRC staff and the Agreement 15 State staff, and that's one of the reasons why there's no 16 questionnaire involved.
17 But if there's a need for follow-up i
18 discussions, follow-up interaction, that's the point once 19 each year, where.those also can be identified, as well as 20 confirming that the schedule for the next IMPEP review is 21 appropriate.
I 22 So it's not precluded, but the intent was to 23 not make the 1-day meeting the in-between year visit where 24 it's a mini-program review.
It's meant to identify issues f
l 25 and see if there is indeed, need for further action, or 1
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88 1
hopafully in most cases, no further action and just the 2
exchange of communication will suffice.
3 MR. COLLINS:
Thank you.
Roland Fletcher from 4
5 MR. FLETCHER:
Roland Fletcher, Maryland.
6 What kind of pre-annual meeting communication wil3 there 7
be so that in order to maximize use of time, both parties 8
will be prepared?
9 MS. SCHNEIDER:
In the procedure we just 10 mailed out we have a -- we'll send you a letter.
And the 11 bullets I had on that one slide, it will indicates those i
12 are the areas we want to talk about.
And that's it.
The 13 oral communication you'll hear from the regional state 14 Agreement's officer who will contact you to make the 15 arrangement.
16 MR. COLLINS:
Ted Bailey from California.
17 MR. BAILEY:
I think my question sort of flip-18 flops between one and two in the annual visit.
In the 19 past we sort of assumed that the graduation exercise for 20 inspectors is when they're accompanied by NRC and there's 21 a laying on of hands in true apostolic succession -- you 22 know, we want to do this.
23 Will the practice continue of accompanying 24 inspectors and will those be done only during the IMPEP l
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reviews?
l 2
~-
MR. BANGART:
Let me address the first point.
3 The inspector accompaniments should not be viewed as the 4
final blessing on a new inspector's ability conducting the 5
inspections.
I think clearly, without any question in my 6
own mind, that's the responsibility for the Agreement 7
State program to certify that inspectors are now in -- are l
8 qualified and fully trained to conduct inspections.
y 9
Our's hopefully, is just a confirmatory review 10 through the evaluation -- overall evaluation process; that 11 indeed supports your qualification of the inrpectors.
L 12 I don't know that we've spent a loc of time 13 addressing timing of inspector accompaniments as part of 14 the IMPEP process, but clearly it should be done in a way 15 that facilitates and recognizes competing prioricies, and.
16 if it's more appropriate and more efficient to conduct 17 those reviews throughout the year -- or those 18 accompaniments throughout the years, in-between the formal 19 IMPEP' evaluations, that should be done that way.
However 20 you and your RSAO -- and if your team has already 21 identified -- can work it out, I think is okay with us.
22 MS. SCHNEIDER:
That saves some of the past 23 progresses that we've had basically (inaudible) previous i
24 (inaudible).
So we have talked about it in great detail l
25 when we put the (inaudible).
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MR. COLLINS:
Okay.
Are there any more l
2 comments or suggestions for improvement of the 3
questionnaire?
Mike Mobley is first, from Tennessee.
4 MR. MOBLEY:
I just want to make a general 5
observation.
My staff was ecstatic over the shortness of 6
the questionnaire versus the previous questionnaire.
But 7
once we got into the actual review we found that we 8
generally were pulling out all that old information 9
anyway, and it was our suggestion that maybe that should 10 just be on the questionnaire.
11 I mean, if we're going to have to produce the 12 information anyway during the review, then we should just 13 go ahead and do that up-front as part of the 14 questionnaire.
And I can't -- I don't remember now, exact 15 specifics on that but there were some points that Bill 16 might want to --
17 MR. PACETTI:
Bill Pacetti from Florida.
I 18 was on the review team that went to Tennessee and New 19 Hampshire, and that's one of the things I noticed.
Once 20 we got there we started asking questions like, can I have 21 a 1-ist of all your inspections for the last two years, or 22 all your pending licensing actions, or all your 23 enforcement actions?
24 We spent a lot of time waiting to get that and 25 they spent a lot of time pulling it together, so maybe NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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l 91 l~
1 some set things like that could become part of the 2
questionnaire again.
3 MR. MOBLEY:
I think it would enhance the 4
process if we knew that was coming up-front and we would 5
just have it prepared and ready or have it provided 6
earlier on so they could come in and say,.well of these 7
inspections you've done in the last two years, we want to 8
see this one, this one, and this one, instead of us having 9
to dig all that up after they get there.
10 MR. COLLINS:
The Illinois experience on that 11 was, I think that Kathy Schneider communicated with Kathy 12 Allen that the first day when we get there, these are 13 additional items of information we're going to need.
And 14 we had at least a workweek or a little more to actually i
15 get those things together.
It wasn't on the questionnaire 16 and we prefer not to see it there, but it was a list of 17 things that will be needed when we show up.
18 MS. SCHNEIDER:
If I can get another shot.
I j
19 think I mentioned the questionnaires going back out.
One i
20 of the things we took into account was Mike's comment 21 after the Tennessee review and I've had some of the teams 22 and the team leaders over this past year, give me a list i
23 of things that we'd like to have the state pull together 24 and have on-site and ready.
25 That's going to be attached to the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHoDE 1SLAND # VE., N.W.
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92 1
quOctionn2 ira I'm going to be sending out to you guys for l
2 comment..One of them is like your organizational charts.
l 3
I think under the old questionnaire we asked you to submit 4
it to us.
We didn't; we usually ask for that when we get 5
on-site.
So there will be one page that has several of 6
the listings and some of the computer printouts that we 7
ask you when we get there, so you'll know that that's 8
coming and you can just keep that tear-off sheet.
9 So you'll be seeing it, and please, we'll 10 welcome any comments on what we missed or didn't include 11 in that.
12 MR. COLLINS:
Aubrey Godwin is next.
I 13 MR. GODWIN:
Godwin from Arizona.
Nobody said 14 anything about the timeliness of it and how much time we 15 had.
I'd like some response from the people that have
)
16 been through it.
Did you have enough time, was it too 17 short?
That's sort of an important thing when you get 1
18 questionnaires.
19 MR. WANGLER:
Aubrey, this is Ken Wangler from 20 North Dakota.
We had sufficient time.
I think we had 21 three weeks, perhaps; something like that.
22 MS. TAFFT:
This is Diane Tafft, New 23 Hampshire.
I think it depends a lot on the time of year 24 that the questionnaire arrives and when your review is, 25 because our questionnaire came in July and most of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS
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l l
93 1
staff was out.
It was a holiday and we did not make the l
2 month deadline in response because of that.
And so maybe 3
if it was winter or something, we would have done better.
4 MR. COLLINS:
Anyone else wish to comment, l
5 make some suggestions on the questionnaire?
Alice?
6 MS. ROGERS:
Regarding that stuff that --
7 MR. COLLINS:
Name -- Alice Rogers.
8 MS. ROGERS:
I'm Alice Rogers from Texas.
9 Regarding the things that -- the list of things that 10 Kathy's saying she would like to have available on-site, 1
11 it would also be good to know if NRC intends to keep those 12 things or not.
For instance, copies of our regulations 13 are about this thick and are hardbound and are published 14 by West Publishing Company.
And that's fine, we'11 get 15 you a copy, but we need to know so we can have time to 16 order you your own.
17 MR. WANGLER:
Ken Wangler from North Dakota.
18 I guess I have a little bit of a question on this item 19 "b." where it says you can answer questions by saying, "no 20 change since the last review" or "only the following 21 changes have occurred".
22 That's fine if you completed your l
23 questionnaire in full last time, but what happens when you 24 get several IMPEP sessions down the road?
You end up with 25 kind of the same program that we currently have with some NEAL R. GROSS CoVRT REPORTERS ANDTRANSCRIBERS l
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94 1
of these license amendments.
You know, you're on 2
amendment 25 and so you need to go through all 25 3
amendments to see where you're currently at.
l 4
And I could see where that would be a problem 5
with answering questions simply by saying, "no change 6.
since the last questionnaire".
And I guess one suggestion 7
I might have in trying to solve'this or resolve this, is 8
that if you're using electronic answering to the 9
questionnaires it's not that difficult to block and copy 10 your last answers and complete the-questionnaire in full.
11 And then the questionnaire is full and complete when 12 you're finished.
13 MR. COLLINS:
Any others on the questionnaire?
14 Okay, the second item:
accompanied inspections.
And we 15 have one comnant on that already, from Illinois.
The 1
16 states should not be judged against Chapter 2800; adequacy i
l 17 is the standard that we should be judged against, and it l
18 should be based on the Agreement State's own regulations, 19 licensed conditions, policies, and procedures.
20 So when NRC accompanies your inspectors they
-21 shouldn't be, well that's not what it says in Chapter l
i 22 2800.
Some of us say, we don't care; that's not the h
23 standard.
Mike Mobley.
24 MR. MOBLEY:
Mike Mobley.from Tennessee.
j 25 Steve, I want to echo that because it's one of the i
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95 1
specific things that we had a' big surprise in Tennessee.
2 It had to do with the -- and I assume it's Chapter'2800 3
because I'm like you; I don't even know what that is.
4 You know, we have our process in place and we 5
were asked about our reciprocity inspections, and we had 6-in a previous review, they made an issue of reciprocity 7
inspections and we had said -- I'believe we had indicated f-8' we would do. absolutely ten percent of all entries into the L
9 state.
That was.our own goal.
10 And I.believe that at the point in time of our-L 11 review, IMPEP review, we had actually done something like l
12 50 percent.
But then they drug out this NRC document that 13 said you had to do 100 percent of radiography, reciprocity 14 notifications --
l 15 MR._ COLLINS:
For licensees.
l 16 MR. MOBLEY:
-- all this kind of stuff, you
~
17 know.
And that was great; that was the_NRC's stuff but 18 that wasn't Tennessee's stuff.
19 DR '. COOL:
That's item 7.a. and 7.b. on the 20 second page.
21 MR. MOBLEY:
Okay.
I understand.
I need to j
22 read ahead here, Steve.
23 MR. COLLINS:
I'm saying, it's going to be 24 reinforced more --
l 25' MR. MOBLEY:
Okay.
But I mean, we need to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHoDE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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i 96 1
know cxSctly whOther it is NRC standards -- not standards, 2
but NRC guidance that we're meeting here, or is it the 3
Tennessee program that we're dealing with.
In my i
4, perspective, here in Tennessee it's the Tennessee program.
5 MS. SCHNEIDER:
Since you're going to give all 6
these to me and I should understand what you're saying, 7
when you're saying not to be judged against 2800, you're 8
not talking about the frequency for the inspections, 9
you're talking about the conduction on the inspections, is 10 that correct?
Or are you talking about pulling that all 11 together?
12 MR. COLLINS:
Item number 2 is the 13 accompaniment to the inspection itself, not the policy 14 decision on frequency.
That's item 7.a. and b.
We'll do 15 that later.
1C MS. SCHNEIDER:
Okay, okay.
17 MR. COLLINS:
Aubrey Godwin.
18 MR. GODWIN:
Aubrey Godwin.
There's a couple 19 of good things in 2800 people ought to look at that talks 20 about training characteristics and things like that, that 21 people really ought to take a hard look at in 2800.
22 secondly, I feel very strongly that the 23 conduct of the inspection part, not all the associated, 24 bureaucratic filing and stuff like that that's in 2800, 25 but the adequacy in how to conduct and what you look for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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I, 97 1
in inspections should be followed.
And I'm not sure that 2
your comment fully captures that.
3 I think that there ought to be some sort of 4
continuity atate-to-state, particularly in industrial 5
radiography and things like that.
We ought to be looking 6
for pretty much the same thing from state-to-state.
I 7
would think we need to revise your comment a little bit to 8
recognize more clearly, that the adequacy and the general 9
subject matter is what we're looking at in 2800, but the 10 other stuff about how to file reports and give reports to 11 who and things like that, is just inappropriate totally.
12 MR. COLLINS:
Well, Illinois.
And it's my l
l 13 understanding every state is supposed to have taken some 14 beginning point, such as Chapter 2800, and develop its own 15 set of inspection policies and procedures.
16 And we've done that and we want to be judged 17 against that.
It's most extracted from 2800 and modified le where it's better, of course.
But that's our point.
But 19 I agree with you totally that 2800 does have some really 20 good stuff in it.
21 Ed Bailey.
22 MR. BAILEY:
Bailey from California.
I don't l
23 know if this is really the place or the frequency is the 24 place, but on the HDRs -- and I guess it may relate to the 25 temporary frequencies that are established periodically --
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we took a look at the HDR inspections that we had done and t
2 decided that we didn't think they needed to be inspected 3
as frequently as NRC said they did.
4 And as best I remember, we acknowledged that l
5 during the review and that was pretty much accepted, 6
wasn't it Don?
Or am I letting the cat out of the bag?
l 7
MR. COLLINS:
Well, it's on item 7.a.,
the 8
last sentence -- as my example of -- we're going to get to t
9 that.
Basically, Illinois didn't have hardly any comments 10 in this area because all but one of our inspectors has ten 11 year's experience and we don't have any problems or 12 issues.
Some of the other states maybe you do.
Are there 13 any more comments or suggestions in the area of inspection 14 accompaniments?
35 MR. HEARTY:
Brian Hearty, State of Nebraska.
I 16 We have had a review within the last year and several new 17 inspectors.
We felt that, you know, when the NRC was out 18 doing our inspection accompaniments, they didn't have 2800 19 open.
They were.using their experience doing performance-20 based, making sure we hit the health and safety issues.
I 21 felt that that's how they did their inspection l
22 accompaniments and I thought it was very helpful to us.
23 MR. COLLINS:
Very good.
Roland.
24 MR. FLETCHER:
Roland Fl' etcher, Maryland.
I 25 guess in this area the only concern I have -- we did have i
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s
(
99 1
a not too good performance in one of our inspectors during 2
the accompanied inspection, and I guess a concern with the 3
comments in general seem to be interpreted describing the 1
4 whole program.
And I think that's where we've got to be l
l 5
very careful how these comments are written.
6 I think it's since been resolved, but.
7 initially the response seems to be that there was a -- you 8
know, there may have been a training problem with the 9
whole program and it just turned out that one inspector 10 essentially, froze and did not follow through the way he l
11 should have.
1 12 MR. COLLINS:
Diane Tafft.
13 MS. TAFFT:
Diane Tafft, New Hampshire.
Just 14 the question:
do the inspectors, 100 percent of the 15 inspectors for the regulator IMPEP, go out with 16 accompaniments for every state?
I mean, even though we're l
17 a small state, that was a question we had.
We only have l
18 two or three people.
The response we got is yes, they do 1
19 100 percent of all inspectors in every state.
Is that l
j 20 really true?
j i
l 21 MR. COLLINS:
In every state, yes, but not
)
l 22 during every review.
23 MS. TAFFT:
Well, that was it.
I mean, the i
I 24 fact that we have only a few we thought, well maybe you 25 should just do one or two, you know.
Just wondered.
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100 1
MR. COLLINS:
We have seven inspectors; three o
2 of them were accompanied the last time.
Certainly the 3
newest inapector was.
4 MS. SCHNEIDER:
There's no requirement that we 5
go out with all inspectors.
We do look at the new 6
inspectors and I think there -- it's nothing written down.
7 I do think some of the team leaders try and go out with 8
people every couple of years.
We did that under the old 9
policy statement.
It may be something we need to look at 10 and give our review teams more guidance.
11 There's no way we can do all inspectors.
How 12 many do you have.
Well, we can keep Jack Horner there 13 for, you know, a couple of months, but we don't do 100 14 percent.
15 MR. BAILEY:
Yes, I think all of our 16 inspectors have been accompanied within the last two 17 review periods except the brand-new ones, and normally we 18 have begged off on any inspector that we didn't think was 19 fully qualified to do independent inspections at the time 20 of the review -- for whatever reason.
21 Don, is that 22 MR. BOND:
Yes.
23 MR. COLLINS:
Mike Mobley.
l 24,
MR. MOBLEY:
I just want to make a comment.
I think that we have worked with the individual that was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS ANDTRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHoDE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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101 1
going to do the accompaniments to try-to make sure that 2
they saw the people that we thought needed the 3
accompaniment, as well as anybody that they particularly 4
wanted to target, as well as even facilities that they l
5 wanted to target for the accompaniments.
i 6
And also, I want to make a comment about this.
j 7
This is-one of -- to me -- one of the strongest parts of 8
our reviews under IMPEP as well as under the previous 9
program.
We've always had a really positive experience.
10 I can remember -- and people may not remember Ernie Resner 11
-- but I had one of the most positive experiences I've 12 ever had with an NRC individual with him, going out on an 13 accompaniment with me.
I still remember that.
14 And it's always, I think -- as far as I know 15 in Tennessee, we've always had very positive l
16 accompaniments.
Even when deficiencies are found, that's 17 used as a thing for that inspector to grow as well as for
.18 the program to develop or work out.
19 MR. COLLINS:
Any other comments or 20' suggestions'on this area?
21 MR. PADGETT:
Aaron Padgett, North Carolina.
22 I would just like to support Mike Mobley's comments.
l-23 That's been our experience also.
The accompaniments have 24 been very positive; good exchange; good feedback.
'25 MR. COLLINS:
Okay.
On-site review team and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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c 102 l~
1 interactions with them.
"Each team member should be i-2 experienced in the area assigned to review and trained to 3
resolve potential issues while on-site."
4 We had a little bit of experience there.
One 5
of tb '
i.bers asked a lot of the right questions, 6
t oc'-
,J notes, but then didn't go back to the 7
indis-
.lo had actually done the work, to try to I
8 resolve all of those before they got back to their home 9
base, and ended up putting all of these comments without 10 answers in the draft report.
11 Well we then, since the draft report is a 12 public record, we felt like we had to respond to them and 13 got them into the public record.
So we basically said, 14 got to make sure that the training is provided so that 15 these individuals, if they have questions, resolve as many 16 of these issues as they can while they're there, to talk 17 to the people person-to-person.
18 And the second item is, we would request NRC 19 provide guidance to the state -- and this can be verbal, 20 ahead of time -- on the space and equipment needs for the 21 number of team members that are going to be present when 22 they come.
23 Kathy Allen asked the question and found out.
24 beforehand, but there's actually no real guidance in the 25 procedure, I don't think, that tells the planner, the team l
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ri*
103
-1 locdar, let them know how many's coming and how much they 2
need -- how many phone lines or computer hook-ups or i
3 whatever.
4 MS. SCHNEIDER:
We do have some of the 1
l 1
l 5
(inaudible) use them for training, but they're supposed to 6
centact the state (inaudible).
7 MR. COLLINS:
Okay.
'Any other suggestions or 8
comments on the on-site review team and interactions with 9
them?
Don Bond, California.
10 MR. BOND:
Thank you.
I've been a member of j
11 the IMPEP review team for two years now and I'd like to 12 start out by saying it's been a very enlightening j
i j
13 experience and I've gained a lot by it.
I've gone out to i
14 different states -- two states -- and every time I've come 15 back with more information that helps our program.
So I i
i 16 feel it's a positive move and I'd like to see it continue.
l 17 As a member of the team I have a few comments l
18 here -- I hope Kathy will agree.
One thing is, this does 19 invo3ves quite a bit of time on the part of an Agreement 20 State person to come out, to go through the review, to l
21 gather the data, to prepare the report, to go back to 22 answer questions from the team leader over and over again 23 about different issues that aren't clear.
24 Once a draft gets circulated there are more 25 questions you'7;e answering.
It takes a lot of time.
Is i
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l.
1 04
~
1 there any consideration for, you know, like a pro bono 2
arrangement where the NRC says, okay you've spent -- your 3
personnel have spent, you know, a certain amount of time l
l 4
with us; now.we're going to grant you some training slots, 5
or something in return.
6 (Laughter and applause.)
7 Okay.
The other point -- I'll just leave that 8
for a later comment if you want, but please put it down.
9 MR. COLLINS:
It was unanimous.
10 MR. BOND:
The other point I'd like to make, 11 as a team member I've found that-my needs aren't being 12 satisfied with equipment.
I bring along a laptop which is 13 State of California issued; doesn't match the sof' ware, 14 whatever, that the other team members are using.
I think 15 at the very least the coordinator ought to supply you with 16 tools that you can go out and do your job with.
17 And thiJ would not mean imposing on the state 18 where you're going, to use their equipment, but just give 19 us the necessary tools with the software, with the 20 boilerplate already there, so we don't have to re-invent 21 the wheel every time we do a report.
So I'd like to see 22 us have that.
23 MR. COLLINS:
You would also trade whiter and 24 pink team and red team involvement for training time 25 probably too, wouldn't you?
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1 05
-1 MR. BOND:-'I would rathar what?
2 MR. COLLINS:
Trade time for state people 3
developing guidance documents for NRC and for licenses.
4 MR.. BOND:
Oh, well that's up to Mr. Bailey to 5
ask for the world.
I'll just --
6 (Laughter.).
?
7 I'll keep it simple.
I had the pleasure of
)
8 working with the team leader, who's here in the-room, and 9
I'll give you his name -- Mr. Horner.
He has a very good 10 system for gathering the boilerplate and putting the l
11 information in that we need,-and I'd like to see you, you j
l 12 know, use as much of that as possible.
l 13-So that's -- thank you.
14
.MR. COLLINS:
Any other comments on the on-15 site review team and interactions?
Alice.
16 MS. ROGERS:
Alice Rogers with Texas.
It l
17 would be real good to know if you all expect each and 18 every staff member and each and every contractor to be
'19 available during.the entire review or not.
We had some 20-difficulties with our contractor who works for Richard L
21 Ratliff from the Department of Health being on emergency
.22 response duty during the week that the review team was at t
- 23 our shop.
24 MR. COLLINS:
Any additional ones?
- Okay, 25 moving along:
the draft report.
We would like to see a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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o 1DS l
I daccription of how concerns will be addressed and resolved 2
-- possibly in a cover letter or in guidance to the team 3
members or something.
We would like to see clearly j
4 specified that the state -- or if it's a region being 5
evaluated -- must fully address every report item if the 6
respondent desires its views to be in the public record.
7 That draft report is' going to go into the 8
public record and if it says something that you don't 9
disagree with'-- normally our response was, oh it's no big 10 deal; we'll just ignore it.
But then when we found no, 11 that's all going to be in the public record, then we're 12 going to address every single thing in there that we have l
13 any minor disagreement with.
So that needs to be fully 14 known to everybody, 15 We would like to see the recommendations and 16 comments that are in the draft report limited to 17 significant observations.
We might have quite a bit of 18 discussion on whether it's significant or not.
And we 19 would like to discuss that before it gets into the draft l
20 report.
21 When statements are made during exit meetings 22 that certain items will not be in the report, then these 23 statements should not end up in the report.
That's enough-1 l
24 said about that, I think.
25 Do not include a long list of questions in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHoDE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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107 I
report.
If th0re's a long liot of datailed quastions such 2
as specific ones regarding sealed source and device 3
reviews or something, I think those detailed kinds of 4
questions can be separated from the report.and put in an 5
attachment or something that doesn't actually get in'the 6
report.
It's technical stuff that you need answers to but l
7 they're not really at the level where they should clutter 8
up the report and make it twice as long as it would 9
otherwise be.
10 Are there any more comments and suggestions on 11 the draft report?
Mike was first.
l l
12 MR. MOBLEY:
Mike Mobley from Tennessee.
Im 13 sure that information regarding the process was all 14 circulated and everything, but when I have something as a 15 draft report I think it's a draft report and it's not 16 published and circulated and everything.
And so it's kind i
17 of a surprise to me to learn that it was published and 18 circulated and everything.
19 I don't know whether it's that necessary or 20-whatever, because it seems to me that some of the issues 21 that you've identified here are just those kinds of things 22 that the draft report process is supposed to be there to 23 address.
Do we have a draft-draft report or -- I mean, 24 how do we really deal with that, or is this just the way 25 it is?
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1 l
108 1
I know in our internal audit process in the 2
state, that we get a copy and we comment on that and it l
3 goes forward and it's not made public until the final 4
report is made.
5 MR. COLLINS:
It's my understanding that as a 6
part of the government in the sunshine type of thing, that l
7 this is all open.
As an attornep or -- Chip, would you 8
like to --
9 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
I would ask Hampton, my l
10 colleague back here --
11 MR. COLLINS:
Is it correct that the draft 12 report is available and it basically has to be public and 13 made public?
We can't keep it in a, "not to be disclosed 14 except for the direct parties' involved" until it's a final 15 report?
16 MR. NEWSOME:
I don't think we've ever talked 17 about that specifically, but I think before I answer that 18 maybe I'd want to talk with.--
19 MR. OOLLINS:
While I'm still doing all the l
20 talk we'll just ask you to look into it, and if it could i
21 be kept private until it's final, then it would be very 22 good.
23 MR. MOBLEY:
Or until it's the final draft.
i l
24 MR. COLLINS:
Would you identify yourself?
f l
25 MR. MOBLEY:
But if it -- you know, it's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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extremely a pre-decisional document that can be withheld 2'
under FOIA if it's not, you know, a final document.
3 MR'. COLLINS:
Identify yourself for the 4
' record, please.
5 MR. TEWSOME:
It's Hampton Newsome from OGC, j
i 6
NRC.
But as to this particular question, how we're 7
treating these documents, you know, I have to talk to the j
8 staff.
9 MR. COLLINS:
Okay, Richard and then Roland, i
10 MR. RATLIFF:
Yes, Richard Ratliff of Texas.
11 I think the whole issue of the draft report really becomes 12 critical for states when we're going through licensing 13 issues.
And NRC needs to be sensitive to timing and
)
14 what's in it because speculation, other things that are 15 hypothetical, that don't seem to cause NRC problems, can l
16 really cause the state a problem when you're in the middle l
17 of a licensing decision on a certain issue.
l 18 And so I think those need to be really like l
19 you said, kept to a minimum and just, what are the
-20 specific details and the real specific problens.
21 MR. FLETCHER:
Roland Fletcher, Maryland.
22 This beccmes even'more critical when you're dealing with 23 certain specific licensees who are looking for any 24 argument that might work at a court hearing, that would 25 indicate that they are not being properly regulated.
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110 l
(..
1 Bacsuso tha NRC says, even though it's a draft in a public h
l 2
notice, that the state may have some staff training and 3
staff education deficiencies.
4 Now, the final report straightened that out 5
but for the purposes of a hearing or purposes even, of L
6' making an impression, sometines these kinds of statements 7
work against you.
And regardless of whether it's a draft 8
or not you've got to take the time to straighten out the 9
information, and that can be a time-consuming process.
10 MR. COLLINS:
Stan Marshall.
11 MR. MARSHALL:
Marshall, Nevada.
I'm l
12 currently reviewing a draft report from our recent IMPEP 13 review, and I think -- I'll change this to a suggestion 14 that the draft report come to maybe the program manager or 15 the highest level of management involved with the 16 closecut, instead of maybe to yet a higher level than was 17 not involved.
id I think sending it to me or the highest level I
i l
19 in closecut might reduce some explanation time about the 20 factual review.
It's simply at this time, a factual
)
i i
I 21 review.
I think NRC team will respond we13 and quickly to l
22 comments from me, but I've actually got another hoop to 23 jump through because I've got to convince somebody that 24 wasn't even there what might be even insignificant 1y 25 incorrectly about the report.
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I think I can gain probably, a couple of weeks 2
if.it came back to us, or at least those in the closeout.
3 MR. COLLINS:
Ed.
l 4
MR. BAILEY:
I think one of the problems with 1
5 not.having that draft report out there is that when you go 6
to the management review board, that's when the final is l
I 7
put on the report.
So it's a draft' report as I. understand 8
it, until it goes to that board, and that board mightLsay 9
yes, we concur on the finding.
10 I'm sensitive to the idea that certain things l
11 may creep;into the draft report that can easily be 12 explained away or something as a misunderstanding, and I 13 don't know whether a preliminary draft would help or not.
l 14 But having'been liaison to some of the MRBs, I.think it's l
15 very important -- or I felt it was important -- in 16 reviewing it at the MRB level that you did hear some of 17 these things that maybe got favorably resolved in favor of 18 the state, rather than having everything already resolved 19 when you go there and sort of rubber stamping.
20 MS. SCHNEIDER:
Can I~just for clarification -
l L
21 this is Kathy Schneider -- 3ast to make sure everyone
-1 L
22 understands the process.
What we do is, we generate a 23 draft report for comment which we didn't do previously 24 under the old way of doing reviews, which is -- the whole 25 system whan we devised IMPEF was public, everything would l
\\
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be in th2 public document, opan -- it goes out for 2
comment.
l 3
It comes back, the teams look at the comments the actual comments.
Some states also take at that 4
5 time to actually address their recommendations or 6
suggestions.
The team then re-examines the report in 7
light of what comments the state ~has made and issues what l
8 we call a proposed final, which goes to the management
)
9 review board.
10 The state gets a copy of that, and that's the 11 copy that Ed's talking about.
We do use that also as a 12 mechanism -- the teams have used that as a mechanism -- to 13 identify items that the team had one position, the state 14 took another position.
I 15 So sometimes those proposed finals have things 16 where we've pointed out the state had a different opinion, 17 we tried to include -- excuse me, we include a copy of the 18 state's response as part of that proposed final that 19 again, goes into.the public document room.
And then the 20 final report is the one where the MRB has taken a look at 21 and made the final determination.
22 Just make sure we all understand the 23 sequencing.
24 MR. COLLINS:
Any more comments or suggestions i
25 on the draft report part of the process?
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113 1
okay, the next thing that you had after draft 2
report is your MRB meeting.
All in all, we really had a 3
fun time at the MRB meetings; we didn't have any 4
suggestions.
As long as there's a dictionary handy so if 5
somebody can look up what misanthrope and such words like 6
that mean.
7 Does anyone have any comments or suggestions B
for the NRC regarding the MRB meeting?
Mike Mobley.
9 MR. MOBLEY:
I made the suggestion -- it may l
10 already have been incorporated or whatever
- but when I i
11 went up to the MRB meeting I had no idea as to what to 12 expect or how it was going to go down.
I had kind of read 13 about some of the others and I called Bill Spell in 14 Louisiana, who I think actually did his by phone.
15 Number one, I would suggest to states that you
)
16 go be there and be present, because it was a much better 17 experience for me for that reason.
But I think that it 18 would have been a little bit more comfortable to me had I 19 known a little bit more about how the process would go 20 down and everything.
21 Now, it quickly became very straightforward or l
22 whatever, but it just would have been a little bit I
23 would not have been totally in the dark as to how to 24 expect the process to proceed.
25 MR. COLLINS:
If you're not aware, there is i
i NEAL R. GROSS l
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I 114 1
tha option for cny ona of thsca -- you can phona in and 2
get connected to the bridge and listen in to an MRB 3
meeting of anyone's.
If someone is concerned and hasn't 4
been there, you can do that to learn.
5 Richard Ratliff from Texas.
6 MR. RATLIFF:
Yes.
One thing on-ours, we had 7
an executive session where they went out of the room and 8
made a decision.
When our boards do that, the legal 9
entities make a statement that no decision is to be made, 10 no final decisions.
But it appeared that a final decision 11 was made in executive session, and that goes contrary to 12 what we see in all rulemaking and all actions we take, and 13 I think that needs to be clarified in how that works.
14 MR. COLLINS:
Roland Fletcher?
15 MR. FLETCHER:
Roland Fletcher, Maryland.
I 16 must say that in the MRBs that I participated in, and I 17 think there have been three, I've been very positively i
18 impressed by the proceedings and rome of the decisions i
l 19 that were adjusted, overturned, or however you wish to l
20 evaluate them.
21 Normally they went in favor of the states that 22 had sent some comments in or had made some verbal 23 comments.
So I think the process of the MRB, with a few 24 tweaks, can be one of the best parts of this whole 25 exercise.
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MR. COLLINS:
Aubrey Godwin.
2 MR. GODWIN:
Godwin, Arizona.
Is the reason 3
the draft is made public, is that to allow the general 1
4 public to offer comments on it also?
In other words, 5
would we potentially have to respond to public comments 6
before the MRB?
Then I don't understand why it's made i
7 public.
8 MR. COLLINS:
As Kathy mentioned, the concept 9
when we originally worked together in setting up the IMPEP 10 review process was that it would be -- all the way through 11 the process -- open, and that we would put everything into 12 the public document room.
That concept carried through to 13 the fact that the MRB itself is open to the public; 14 anybody can come that wants to.
15 So if you're going to have public openness --
16 and openness is one of our principles of good regulation 17
-- and that's where the concept of the need to have this 18 an open process originated.
So those were principles of i
19 good regulation established by the commission and openness 20 was one of them.
And this was in the spirit of that 21 principle.
l 22 But if you're going to have the MRB meeting 23 open, it doesn't make sense to not put the draft report in 24 the public document room also.
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i l*
116 I
will have the draft report, the response from the state to 2
the draft report, and the proposed final report that goes 2
to the MRB as resources to use in preparing them to attend I 4
the neeting and observe in some meaningful.way so they can 5
understand what's going on.
I 6
That doesn't happen very often that a member 1
7 of the public attend.
But we did have some outside 8
interest from the Texas review, but I think that's the 9
only one to-date.
10 MR. BANGART:
This will be a significant issue 11 and a difficult one to reach some kind of conclusion about 12 where if we choose to limit part of it and it does have 13 some ripple effects associated with it, like do we make i
14 attendance by outside interested parties essentially 15 meaningless because they won't have resource information.
16 MR. PADGETT:
Aaron Padgett, North Carolina.
17 I just have a question.
I was notified of several of the
)
18 MRBs but as I was sitting here I recollect that I haven't 19 been notified in.some time.
And you know, we may be 20 dropping the notifications in our own state, I don't know.
21 But are the notifications still going out on, you know, j
22 who you call in, who you call, and so forth, to listen in l
i 23 on the MRBs?
24 MS. SCENEIDER:
We publish it through the 25 publication of Public Notices.
My name is down as a i
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117
=
1 contact, so we've had people call in.
We don't send 2
individual notices.
I think it's on the NRC's Home Page 3
and there's a telephone number you can call if you want to 4
see upcoming meetings.
l 5
So we haven't gone and given specific i
6 notification of every MRB.
I believe during the pilot we 7
were doing that, so that everybody who was involved in the 8
pilot could sit in through all the MRBs for all the pilot 9
participants.
10 I've had one or two calls but then, you know, 11 I really haven't -- I think we've had a total of three i
12 members of the public attend through the whole two years 13 at this point.
14 MR. COLLINS:
Okay, we're going to try to 15 finish this up in about five minutes.
The next item is 16 the final report.
The only suggestion I have there is, in i
17 the transmittal letter or some other little brief 18 correspondence, communicate to the state or the region 19 that was reviewed, exactly what of stbstance has been 20 changed in the final report that differs from the draft 21 report, to make it a little easier to go in and look and 22 see.
l 23 Are there any other comments?
Ed Bailey.
24 MR. BAILEY:
Bailey from California.
I guess 25 one of the things that sort of surprised me in the final NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS ANDTRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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a 118 1
rcport -- not the final report itself but in the cover 2
letter to the final report, was the requirement to respond 3
to the recommendations.
And we're going to get around to 4
it.
5 But I guess I found that a little -- you know, 6
like when we go out and do an inspection and we cite them 7
for violations and we make suggestiens or recommendaticns, 8
we don't normally hold them t" committing to do something 9
with the recommendation.
10 MR. COLLINS:
Any other comments or 11 suggestions regarding the final report?
Roland Fletcher.
12 MR. FLETCHER:
Just one thing, and I think my 13 circumstance is a little unusual.
It's kind of like, when 14 is a final report not a final report.
And that's when, 15 you receive the final report and you think you know what's 16 going to happen and then a few days before the final i
17 report you receive something else that changes one of the 18 items of the final report but you don't have time to 19 respond before the MRB.
20 I'm just bringing that up to let everybody 21 know these things do happen.
We've got to work so that 22 they don't happen.
My only question is, when something i
23 that's contributing to your IMPEP review is not apparently 24 a part of the IMPEP review itself, do we need to look at 25 another mechanism of dealing with it?
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119 1
I'm talking specifically about regulations 2
review for compatibility.
In my situations my regulations l
3 were reviewed over about a 2-year period.
I receive three l
4 letters indicating that certain items needed to be changed 5
-- which we changed.
And for all intents and purposes we 6
believed that we were well on our v:ay to receiving
)
7 compatibility, which would have been wonderful.
l 8
But then about four days before my IMPEP I 9
received another letter which said that another review had 10 taken place that overrides, and they found some things 11 that even the first three reviews didn't find.
So there 12 was no way to get compatibility.
13 I'm only bringing this up to show that there 14 are areas that still need some work, still need some 15 cvaluation, and hopefully we're looking to try to make 16 sure the system works better.
17 MR. COLLINS:
Actually, if you present a 18 strong enough case at the MRB meeting itself, you can get 19 a lot of those things ruled on.
Even if the NRC staff 20 didn't want the MRB to rule on them, necessarily.
Okay.
21 We've had some positive experience there.
22 Okay, next item:
Agreement State input into l
23 the criteria used as part of evaluations.
I think we've 24 covered every one of these before.
The first one -- and I 25 know, Dick, you've heard it five or six times before.
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s 120 1
" Required minimum inspection frequencies 2
should be determined by cooperation of all parties, 3
including agreement by a majority of the Agreement States, 4
the NRC regions and.the NRC Headquarters with each having 5
one vote in the determination process."
That's pretty 6
specific.
7 "Then, the NRC and Agreement States have 8
flexibility to make changes for each agency's own 9
jurisdiction without impacting the resource requirements 10 of the others.
The required minimum inspection frequency 11 would be subject to review as needed with changes made 12 only by approval of a majority of the regulatory agency 13 parties."
Probably should be.
14 For example, as mentioned earlier, the HDR 15 minimum inspection frequency was set at one year by NRC, 16 without any Agreement State input.
Several of us have 17 done enough inspections now that in our particular states 18 we're not having many problems and we think that two years 19 or three years may be adequate.
Now, we can change that 20 frequency when we do find a problem case or a particular l
21 device that's giving problems, where we need to go get to 22 that particular one.
l 23 So once again, using the authorized and 24 directed statutory provision of NRC cooperating with the 25 states, we would like to see these inspections frequently l
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I5 l
l 121 I
l 1
jointly datormined.
l 2
MR. MOBLEY:
Do you want some " Amens"?
I 3
MR. COLLINS:
Whatever is appropriate.
And 4
7.b. is, reciprocity inspection frequencies -- which has 1
5 been mentioned -- should be determined in the same manner J
6 as recommended.
We understand that we have a scale --
7 some of them 100 percent, some of them 50 percent, some of 8
them 30 percent, that sort of thing -- or 100 percent, 30 9
percent.
But we would like to have those jointly 10 determined.
11
" Expectations for required training of staff 12 should be clearly specified."
We know that each state 13 program is responsible for describing its own training and 14 that sort of stuff, but there's felt to be a need for a 15 little bit more clear specification of exactly what is it 16 tha' NRC's looking for in this description.
17 And we think that that will all be answered by 18 the training working group.
We think their work product 19 will resolve that for you.
But it is an open item and we 20 didn't want to leave it off the list.
So the Agreement 21 States are already working with you to resolve that one.
l 22 A review team -- we already mentioned this one i
23
-- a review team of experienced Agreement State personnel l
24 with one NRC experienced staff should review NRC's sealed 25 source and device program.
And I provide a reason for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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(*
122 W
I*'
1 that.
2 And th'en the last one:
determinations of 3
compatibility, especially of that regulations, should'be 4
removed from the IMPEP process.
Even=though that 5
particular process has worked.for Illinois at the tine, 6
for some of the rest of us we would like to see the 7
determination compatibility on specific regulations not be 8
the IMPEP process but be separate.
9 I may have found one we don't agree on here.
10 Don?
11 MR. BOND:
Don Bond from California.
In the
'12 interest of time I'll keep this brief.
I found that 13 reciprocity is being handled in a variety of ways by most 14 of us in the room.
And there's not one discrete way that' 15 we issue reciprocity.
16 I'll give you an example.
There was a state 17 that had issued 280 or so reciprocity authorizations.
Now 18 was I supposed to look for 140 inspections?
No, because 19 the state issued these authorizations every time the
'20 licensee came in, therefore we're only looking at ten 21 different licensees maybe, that have received all these L
22 authorizations.
23 So we have to maybe sit down and get some 24 information from all of us.
How do we-handle reciprocity?
25 In California we issue an annual reciprocity l
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123 1
authorization.
It gosa out onca a yscr.
It allowa a 2
person to come in and out as long as they notify us each 3
time.
And so therefore we have 50 or 60 licensees that 4
come out frequently under this arrangement.
5 other states do things differently, and if 6
we're going to evaluate how the states are inspecting, at 7
least we should have everything in the same order so we're 8
not comparing apples to oranges and so forth.
9 Maybe tha'.'s a point for the questionnaire i
10 where you could ask the state to describe how they do reciprocity, how they handle the authorizations, and then 11 I
12 that would be clarified later when we do our review.
i 13 MR. COLLINS:
Aubrey Godwin.
14 MR. GODWIN:
Godwin, Arizona.
I would support l
15 your "b.a regarding the determination of compatibility of 16 regulations has probably been somewhat separate.
But I do 17 have a problem when you talk about other things.
I think 18 it's important that we know that devices and licensees 19 that come out of. Illinois are probably judged on pretty 20 close to the same basis as they would be in our state.
21 So I would think that's an appropriate thing 22 for IMPEP to look at.
The quality of your licensee work 23 is probably something that we all need done by IMPEP.
The 24 quality of your inspections is probably something that 25 ought to be done.
And I think that's important for us to i
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124 o
1 have confidence in each other to recognize licenses and 2
the reciprocal recognition.
So I think it's important 3
that those parts remain within IMPEP.
4 MR. COLLINS:
We think those come under 5
adequacy rather than compatibility; that's where the j
l 6
difference in the understanding --
j
)
j 7
MR. GODWIN:
Well, you know, it's sort of a 8
little of both.
As we talked about with the compatibility 9
group you've got to smear the things from one to the j
l 10 other.
But anyway, the regulations can probably be 11 separated out, but it might be a good place to have a 1
12 single letter where all the determinations were brought 13 together; which is very handy to have a single letter you 14 can take and forward to the governors and legislators and 15 things like that.
That's sometimes very handy to have.
16 Also, if you have deficiencies in a single l
17 letter you can wave in front of them showing what the 18 problems are, if your legislators like the Federal 1
19 Government; if they don't, hide it.
20 MR. COLLINS:
Are there any other comments or 21 suggestions for NRC on any of the IMPEP process?
22 MR. HEARTY:
Brian Hearty, Nebraska.
One of 23 the things that Mr. Bangart had stated earlier was that 24 one item of the annual meeting is to determine if the next 25 scheduled IMPEP time period is appropriate.
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125 l,
I wondsring, icn't that dato ctt by th3 MRB cnd could that 2
timeframe be lengthened as well as shortened from an 3
annual meeting?
4 MS. SCHNEIDER:
Yes.
5 MR. COLLINS:
Yes.
Mike Mobley.
6-MR. MOBLEY:
This might not be necessarily for 7
the NRC as much as the states; maybe it's a joint process.
8 But one of the things that I think is very important to 9
get out of the IMPEP review --or any review for that 10 matter -- is to make sure that you, the program manager, 11 is effectively utilizing that process to increase the 12 program's stature within the state organization, improve 13 the program within the state, etc., etc., etc.
1.
And I just wonder, is there something that we 15 could do to put together some ideas and concepts as to how 16 managers might most effectively utilize the impact process 17 within the state to do these kinds of things?
I mean, to 18 me the IMPEP review or the NRC review is not something I 19 want to hide even when it's negative.
20 It's something that I've got in my hands, a 21 tool to use to go to my management and say, hey I need 22 help or assistance or whatever; or say that hey, this is 23 great and wonderful, all that work we did five years ago 24 is beginning to pay off; now I need some more help.
25 You know, I just wonder if there's not a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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126 1
little bit more than we can do here.
This is something L
2 other than the direct IMPEP review process.
I'll just
]
i 3
throw it out as a suggestion.
j 4
MR. COLLINS:
The next chair -- they already 5
asked -- may want to appoint you to head up a group to try 6
to look into that; I'm not sure.
{
7 MR. MOBLEY:
There's'only 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> in a day, 8
Steve.
I have a couple of more comments.
One is, I want 9
to talk about the SSED program at some point in time.
I 10 don't know whether it's appropriate here and we don't have 11
- time, 12 The second one is, I don't think the IMPEP I
l 13 process is a fantastic improvement over the previous 14 process.
It was just an extraordinarily exciting process l
I 15 for us to go through.
Tremendous.
I 16 MR. COLLINS:
We will find a time later in the 17 program somewhere to talk about the SS&D program some 18 more, and also, Aby Mosheni's presentation will be moved i
19 to a different place in the program somewhere, and Chip l
20 Cameron will tell in a minute when to be back from lunch, l
l 21 right after Ed Bailey gets finished.
22 MR. BAILEY:
Yes, I would like that number 23 five not to be necessarily unanimously agreed to.
I think 24 having the regs in the process is important, and if you're 25 one of the states who didn't have the letter of the reg to I
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS i
1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202)234 4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005 3701 (202)234 4433
127
,1 cdopt'it wh:n your review was done but went to the MRB and 2
they looked at the circumstances and so forth and said, 3
you've got a compatible program.
I think it's extremely 4
important for that to remain in IMPEP.
5 MR. COLLINS:
Okay.
Those notes should be 6
annotated to. reflect some states would like compatibility.
7 MR. BAILEY:
Do you want to vote on that?
8 Because I'm also concerned about that not being in there.
9 MR. COLLINS:
Do you want it in?
10 MR. BAILEY:
No, I don't want it -- no, I 11 think it should be part of the review process.
12 MR. MOBLEY:
I agree also.
You may be losing, 13 Steve.
14 MR. BANGART:
Are you talking about regulation 15 reviews or overall program compatibility?
(Inaudible) I 16 guess program compatibility.
You're not talking about 17 removing that from IMPEP, is that right?
(inaudible) 18 consistent with the new compatibility designation.
19 MR. COLLINS:
The LMR's stance was 20 communicated to you in writing; you have a copy of that.
21 (Laughter.)
22 MS. SCHNEIDER:
I think it's important too --
23 if I could just say one thing -- is that when this arose, 24 this was before we had our new policy statement.
So you l
l 25 know, some of the problems Roland had was really before we i
\\
1 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W, (202)2344433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005 3701 (202)234-4433 l
1
128 1
began, before the actual policy statement was issued to 2
start implementing some of the provisions in the spirit of 3
the new policy statement.
4 I mean,' excuse me, 4,
/as final but we were 5
getting the final procedures out.
So I think maybe some 6
of the problens you had aren't there now because we are 7
doing -- not as a compatibility on regulations but 8
compatibility on the program.
9 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
I'd like to thank Steve 10 and Kathy number 1 and Kathy number 2 for all of this.
11 That was some great work.
I would just ask one important 12 question since we don't want to see these things go into 13 the so-called black hole:
is NRC going to take this and 14 consider this for improvement of the IMPEP process at 15 some time, and what's the process for doing that?
Kathy 16 or Dick?
17 MR. BANGART:
We'll take the notes from the 18 meeting and then we'll identify these issues and 4
19 communicate via (inaudible) letter on those two issues 20 that we're waiting for suggestions.
And it may take some 21 lead time (inaudible) to get (inaudible) too, but the 22 training materials in order (inaudible) good 23 recommendations, I think a lot them (inaudible).
24 FACILITATOR CAMERON:
Good work.
We did go l
25 over a little time over our time.
Luckily we only 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
i 9 129 o
1 two events left:
one is to pass out the KI pills and the 1
2 second-is the cash bar, so we will get back on schedule.
3 But seriously, we will move Aby's presentation 4
to 3:30.
Something I know we're all looking forward to is 5
the DOE panel.
Can we try to be back here at 1:30?
That
)
6 gives you an hour for lunch.
And then we'll continue from 7
there.
Thank you.
1 l
r NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS ANDTRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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CD: JT Recue_
rum u
i 9_
- 4 d
ISSUES FROM THE l
1997 ALL AGREEMENT STATE MEETING ONIMPEP
. Note: Page numbers refer to the transcript of the October 16,1997 All Agreement State Meeting.-
1.
ISSUE: ~
Page 83 & 121. A review team of experience Agreement State personnel
.and one experienced NRC staff should review NRC's SS&D program. The review could identify practices that may benefit the Agreement States and would provide independent review of that portion of the NRC's program for which some experience Agreement State personnel are uniquely qualified to perform.
RESPONSE: NMSS will prepare response.
2.
ISSUE:
Page 85. The NRC should increase use of E-mail communication to facilitate the timeliness of communication with the questionnaire between the review
)
team and the State.
l RESPONSE: NRC agrees and will continue with efforts to implement this recommendation.
j 3.
ISSUE:
Page 86. The NRC should allow responses to questions, as appropriate,-
to be "No change since last review" or "Only the following changes have occurred."
RESPONSE: NRC will continue to accept the use of responses to the questionnaire of "no change since last reviews" or "only the following changes have occurred."
4.
ISSUE:
Page 89. The NRC should allow inspector accompaniments to be scheduled throughout the period between formal IMPEP reviews.
RESPONSE: Accompanirnents are acceptable throughout the period between IMPEP reviews. This issue is specifically addressed in the draft General Procedures fc Performing IMPEP reviews and was discussed at the December 2,1997 IMPEP tri ig for team members, 5.
ISSUE:
Page 90. All Information needed by the review team should be included in the questionnaire.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. The IMPEP questionnaire has been revised based on the
' experience during the interim implementation of IMPEP and comments received from States. A list of material requested to be available during the review has been added to the questionnaire which was sent to the Agreement States for comment on November 13,1997 in SP-97-079. Three comments were received by the requested date of December 19,1997. The questionnaire will be revised and issued, after receiving OMB clearance, retaining the listing of information that should be available to the team during 1
February 5,1998 a
d the review.
6.
ISSUE:
Page 93. All information that the review teams will need copies of should 4
be identified early to the State, such as regulations.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance will be given to the team leaders to identify early to the State, which information the review team will request copies of.
7.
ISSUE:
Page 94. The States should not be judged against Chapter 2800, adequacy is the standard, based on the Agreement State's own regulations, license conditions, policies and procedures.
Page 96 & 98.- Some States believe that Chapter 2800 offers good guidance for evaluating the adequacy of inspection and believes that the comment on
. page 94 did not fully capture this aspect of IMC 2800.
RESPONSE: NRC will continue to use Inspection Manual Chapter (IMC) 2800 as base
. guidance for judging inspection priority systems. Any difference will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. In addition, NRC will be seeking Agreement State comments on proposed revisions to IMC 2800, as noted in the recent All Agreement State Letter, SP-97-086.
8.
ISSUE:
Page 96. The standards or guidance the States are judged against should be clearly identified whether they are the NRC or the States.
^
RESPONSE: The standards the States are judged against are identified in Management Directive 5.6, integrated Materials Perforn ance Evaluation Program, revised November 25,1997. This revision includes the m'aluation criteria for the non-common performance indicators and reflects the final Poley Statement on Adequacy and Compatibility of Agreement State Programs approved by the Commission on of June 30, 1997.
- 9.
ISSUE:
Page 97. Temporary changes to inspection frequencies should not be imposed on an Agreement State, such as changes to HDR inspections frequencies.
RESPONSE: NRC will assess the reasons for each temporary instruction (TI) issued I
and together with Agreement States assess the need for Agreement States to implement I
equivalent temporary guidance.
10.
ISSUE:
P&ge 99. Comments on specific inspector accompaniments should not be written as to describe the entire State program.
RESPONSE: NRC disagrees. Inspector performance deficiencies identified through the inspector accompaniments is unavoidably linked to the effectiveness of the program's training and the State's supervisory accompaniments when deficiencies are noted.
~ 11.
ISSUE:
. Page 100. Is it a requirement for all inspectors to be accompanied during 2
February 5,1998 3
1 an IMPEP review and is more guidance needed?
RESPONSE: It is not a requirement for ail inspectors to be accompanied during an IMPEP review. Guidance for the number of accompaniments is contained in the draft Procedure for the review of Performance Indicator #2, Technical Quality of Material Inspection. The draft procedure recommends a minimum of three accompaniments. For regions or large states, five or more is preferred. Guidance for selection of inspectors is documented in the draft General Procedure for Conducting IMPEP reviews.
12.
ISSUE:
Page 102. Each team member should be experienced in the area assigned to review and trained to resolve potential issues while on-site.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. NRC is presently developing training and qualification requirements for IMPEP reviewers.
13.
ISSUE:
Page 102. The review te'am members should resolve as many as possible specific comments and questions while on site and not put this information in the draft report which is a public document.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees that review team members should resolve as many as possible specific comments and questions on site. The teams have also been instructed to continue to resolve issues after the on-site portion of the review or retum to the State if needed. However, an open issue could still be in the report if the team was not able to resolve it by the previous mentioned options.
14.
ISSUE:
Page 102. The NRC should provide guidance to the States on space and equipment needs for the number of team members to be present.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance was given to the team leaders during the December 1997 training on coordination with the State on the team's needs.
15.
ISSUE:
Page 104. NRC should consider making training available to those States that participate in IMPEP reviews and working groups.
RESPONSE: On December 12,1997, Agreement State Letter SP-97-085, the Criteria for Training Funding Assistance for Agreement States was issued. In the Commission approved criteria, participation in IMPEP reviews and joint working groups are not considered as part of the criteria for training funding assistance.
16.
ISSUE:
Page 105. The review team should indicate to the State which staff members and contractors need to be available during the entire review.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and guidance will be given to ti)e team leaders to coordinate with the State management prior to the review and identif ', hich staff members or contractors should be available during the review.
17.
ISSUE:
Page 106. For the draft report, NRC should describe how concerns will 3
February 5,1998
e be addressed and resolved in guidance for the review teams.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees in part. See the response to issue 13. However, given the performance-based approach used in IMPEP, the State is expected to evaluate the concern and implement a resolution appropriate for that specific program it is not appropriated for the team to prescribe the method of resolution. Suggestions may be offered, however.
18.
ISSUE:
Page 106. It should be clearly specified that the State or Regions must fully address every report item if the respondent desires its tws to be in the public record.
RESPONSE: The Agreement State is requested to respond to geommendations in the
/
final report. NRC does not object to responses to suggestions ogov6n items in the draft
/
j report. The State or Region has the option of addressing any draft report item when the review team has asked for factual comments on the draft report. Many States and Regions have chosen to prepare responses to the draft report prior to the Management i
Review Board meeting and these are sent to the Management Review Board and to the public document room.
19.
ISSUE:
Page 106. Limit the recommendations and comments in the draft report to significant observations.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. Given the performance-based approach, it is NRC's intention to limit recommendations and comments to significant observations. In some.
l cases, however, a number of less significant comments when collectively assessed can be indicative of a programmatic weakness.
)
20.
ISSUE:
Page 106. When statements are made during exit meetings that certain items will not be in the report, then the statements should not be in the report.
i RESPONSE: The review team presents preliminary findings during the exit meetings.
The reports are subject to management review after preparation by the team leader.
There have been instances (and there will likely continue to be instances), where items j
have been identified after the review, which may not have been previously identified or the team did not originally believe would be included in the report. The team leaders, in those cases, notified (or will notify) the State program management of the change from the findings discussed during the exit.
21.
ISSUE:
Page 106. Do not include a long list of questions in the report, such as detailed questions regarding SS&D reviews. Such questions should be separated from the report.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. See response to issue 13.
22.
ISSUE:
Page 107. Can NRC consider withholding the draft report and only issue the final report as a public document?
4 February 5,1998
e RESPONSE: NPC ha considered this question. Withholding the' draft report and only issuing the final report as s pubs document would be a major change in the open manner in which IMPEP is conducted, as approved by the Commission. In 1991 NRC adopted " Principles of Good Reguk. tion" and these principles are reflected in the Statement of Principles and Policy for the Agreement State Program, issued September 3,1997, (62 FR 46517). One of the principles ic regulatory openess. IMPEP was designed such that decisions and actions would be developed and implemented in an open and publicly credible manner in order to withstand scrutiny. Such scrutiny should be welcomed by the parties involved in the reviews. As stated in the " Principles of Good Regulation," " Nuclear regulation is the public's business, and it must be transacted publicly and candidly." The public must be informed about and have the opportunity to participate in regulatory processes.
We believe that placing the draft report in the Public Document Room and holding Management Review Board meetings open to the public achieve these goals and benefits the public which we serve. Without public availability of the draft reports, it would greatly handicap the understanding of any member of the public attending a Management Review Board meeting.
23.
ISSUE:
Page 109. NRC needs to be sensitive to timing and content of the draft report when states are in licensing decisions.
RESPONSE: NRC reports factually on areas that need improvement in accordance with established reporting milestones.. NR grees that it is especially important to have l
facts, conclusions and recommendatio clearly stated when important and controversial licensing activities are under considera n by the State.
l l
24.
ISSUE:
Page 110. NRC should send the draft report to the program manager or highest level of management involved with the closeout, instead of a yet higher level of management than was involved.
RESPONSE: Prior to the IMPEP review, the team leader contacts the program manager for the identification of the proper level of upper management within the State
{
for receipt of the report and for conduct of the exit meeting.
)
25.
ISSUE:
Page 113. NRC should inform the State staff attending the MRB what to expect during an MRB meeting.
i RESPONSE: In June 1997, NRC began an orientation for those State staff attending MRB meetings in person prior to the meeting. We will expand this orientation to include those States staff attending the MRB via telephone.
26.
ISSUE:
Page 114. During executive sessions of the MRB, it should be clarified l
whether the MRB can make decisions and inform all participants as to the process.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees and the procedure for the MRB will be revised to clarify the process and actions of the MRB during executive sessions. By practice, the MRB j
5 February 5,1998
7 currently reports the votes of all MRB decisions.
27.
ISSUE:
Page 116. Does NRC still notify those interested in attending by
[
telephone the times for scheduled MRB7 RESPONSE: The scheduled meetings open to the public, which include the MRB meetings, can be found on the NRC home page at:
http://www.nrc. gov /NRC/PUBLIC/ meet.html The information changes frequently. For the mot i up to date meeting information, call a recording of upcoming meetings at 800-952-9674 or contact the electronic bulletin board system directly at 600-952-9676.
28.
ISSUE:
Page 117. The NRC should describe in a transmittalletter, how the final report was changed as a result of the draft report review and MRB process.
RESPONSE: Details of the changes to the proposed final report as a result of the MRB meeting are documented in the first page of the final report with significant changes noted in the transmittal letter for the final report to the State. Additional details on the changes as a result of the MRB meeting can be found in the minutes of the MRB meeting, which are sent to the State and are publicly available.
29.
ISSUE:
Page 118. If there are substantial items in the proposed final report that changes the finding, the State should have more time before the MRB meeting.
RESPONSE: NRC agrees. However, substantive changes from the draft to proposed final report almost always result from State comments. We will continue to work with the States to keep them informed of significant changes that occur as the proposed final report is written. Although significant delays in final report issuance could result, NRC will reschedule the MRB meeting date if a State is not prepared to meet because of significant draft report revisions that are reflected in the proposed final report.
30.
ISSUE:
- Page 118. Should there be another mechanism to deal with items that contribute to an IMPEP review, but is not apparently a part of the IMPEP review itself, as an example, regulations?
RESPONSE: NRC believes that items that contribute to the performance of the State's program should be part of the IMPEP review. The example given, regulations, is a non-common performance indicator under IMPEP that contributes significantly to the program compatibility determinations. NRC believes that allindicators evaluated by IMPEP reviews are necessary to arrive at valid adequacy and compatibility determinations.
31.
ISSUE:
Page 120. Required minimum insrMion frequencies should be i
determined by cooperations of all parties,' including agreement by a majority of L
Agreement States, the NRC Regions and the NRC HQ with each having one vote in the determination process. Then, the NRC and Agreement States have flexibility to make 6
February 5,1998 l
![
e.
changes for each agency's own jurisdiction without impacting the resource requirements of the others. The required minimum inspection frequency would be subject to review as needed with changes made only by approval of a majority of the regulatory agency i
parties. The required frequency could be a range for each licensee category. For j
example, the HDR minimum inspection frequency was set at one year, and determined l
without Agreement States input.
RESPONSE: See response to issue 7. NRC is currently committed to provide j
Agreement States early and substantive involvement on materials program policy changes, including inspection frequency guidance.
32.
ISSUE:
Page 121. Reciprocity inspection frequencies should be determined in the same manner as recommended in item 31.
RESPONSE: See response to issue 7 and 31.
33.
ISSUE:
Page 121. Expectations for required training of Agreement State staff under IMPEP should be clearly specified. Although this is an open item, the States believe that the training working group report will resolve this issue.
I RESPONSE: The required training of Agreement State staff under IMPEP is clearly specified under Management Directive 5.6 where Agreement State should have an equivalent program to IMC 1246. The working group report was distributed to all IMPEP team members during the December 1997 training and to the Agreement States as
~ guidance for establishing a training program.
34.
= ISSUE:
Page 122. One State requested thst determinations of compatibility, especially of regulations, should be removed from the IMPEP process. However, several other states disagreed (pages 122-127) with this as an issue and stated support that compatibility determinations remain as part of the IMPEP process.
l RESPONSE: See response to issue 30.
35.
ISSUE:
Page 125. As an item for the Organization of Agreement States to i
consider, guidance for State program managers to effectively utilize the IMPEP results to j
improve the Agreement State program within the State.
l RESPONSE: For OAS action.
file name: oasimp.com i
7 February 5,1998
i 1997 ALL AGREEMENT STATES MEETING Los Angeles, California October 16,1997 Problem solving session: "IMPEP: Can it be Improved?-State Perspectives" 4
IMPEP is a spostantial improvement over the previous evaluation process. Can it be improved? New is a time for the states to give their perspectives. I request your input in the order of the following identified steps of the IMPEP:
1.
The questionnaire a.
Increase use of email communication which has facilitated the timeliness of communication with the questionnaire.
b.-
Allow response to questions, as appropriate, to be "No change since last i
review." or "Only the following changes have occurred:"
c.
2.
Accompanied inspection (s) a.
The states should not be judged against Chapter 2800, adequacy is the standard, based on the Agreement State's own regulations, license conditions, policies and procedures.
b.
3.
On-site review team and interactions with them a.
Each team member should be experienced in the area assigned to review l
and ' trained to resolve potential issues while on-site.
b.
The NRC should provide guidance to the state on space and equipment needs for the number of team members to be present.
c.
4.
The draft report L
a.
Describe how concerns will be addressed and resolved.
b.
Clearly specify that the state or region must fully address every report item if the state or region desires its view to be in the public record.
c.
Limit the recommendations and comments in the draft report to significant observations.
d.
When statements are made during exit meetings that certain items will not be in the report, then the statements should not be in the report.
e.
Do not include a long list of questions in the report, such as detailed questions regarding SS&D reviews. Such questions should be separated from the report.
f.
t
_)
l
. i o
5; The MRB meeting a.
s
- 6.
- The final report I
a.-
' Describe, in a transmittal letter,!how the final report was changed as a
]
result of the draft report review and MRB process.
j
- 7.
-_ Agreement State input into the criteria used as a part of evaluations:
a.
" Required" minimum inspection frequencies should be determined by cooperation of all parties, including agreement by a majority of the Agreement States, the NRC Regions and the NRC HQ with each having one vote in the determination process. Then, the NRC and Agreement Statss have 'exibility to make changes for each agency's own jurisdiction without impacting the resource requirements of the others.
a The " required" minimum inspection frequency would be subject to review as needed with changes made only by approval of a majority of the regulatory agency parties. The " required" frequency could be a.
range for each licensee category. For example, the HDR minimum inspection frequency was set at one year, and determined without Agreement States input.
~b.
Reciprocity inspection frequencies should be determined in the same manner as recommended in the previous paragraph.
j c.
Expectations for required training of staff should be clearly specified.
d.
A review team of experienced Agreement State' personnel and one experienced NRC staff should review the NRC's SS&D program. The review could identify practices that may benefit the' Agreement States and would provide independent review of that portion of the NRC's program for which sorr.e experienced Agreement State personnel are uniquely qualified to perform.
e.
Determinations of compatibility, especially of regulations, should be removed from the IMPEP.
' )1 1
,