ML20211D468

Discusses 860925 Testimony Re NRC Secret Receipt in Advance of Util Brief Re State of New York,Suffolk County & Town of Southampton Contentions.Collaboration of NRC & Util Alleged.Related Info Encl

ML20211D468
Person / Time
Site:	Shoreham File:Long Island Lighting Company icon.png
Issue date:	10/08/1986
From:	Grasso L SUFFOLK LIFE NEWSPAPERS, RIVERHEAD, NY
To:	Kline J, Margulies M, Shon F Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel
Shared Package
ML20211D394	List: ML20211D392 ML20211D468
References
OL-5, NUDOCS 8610220201
Download: ML20211D468 (7)

Text

4 Surrotu L rs NEWSPAPERS P.O. Box 167. Riverhead, N.Y. 11901 0102 516l369 0800 October 8, 1986 Morton B. Margulies, Esq.

Dr. Jerry R. Kline Mr. Frederick J. Shon Administrative Judges Atomic Safety and Licensing Board U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555

Dear Administrative Judges:

On September 25th, in Riverhead, New York, I testified before you that the NRC Staff and LILC0 had grossly damaged the integrity of the Shoreham licensing proceedings. I was referring to the recent incident of the NRC Staff secretly receiving from LILC0 an advance copy of LILC0's brief relating to New York State's, Suffolk County's, and Southampton's contentions and-then repeatedly copying or superficially editing LILC0's positions, and even words.

I emphasize that the NRC Staff did this secretly, while holding itself out as " independent" of LILCO. I attach to this letter examples of the NRC Staff's copying.

You should also know, as the two enclosed newspaper articles show, that the NRC Staff has publicly made inconsistent statements about its role with LILCO in this incident. Last week, an NRC Staff lawyer personally told me, and I quoted him in the enclosed article from Suffolk Life, that the NRC Staff had not obtained an advance copy of LILCO's brief. In Newsday of October 2, however, an NRC Staff counsel was quoted as admitting the opposite: that the NRC Staff had really received a copy of LILCO's brief three days in advance. My suspicion is that this is not likely to be the complete story. It may even represent a part of a much larger hidden collaboration of the NRC Staff and LILCO. The fact is that I want to know the whole truth.

The secret relaticnship of the NRC Staff and LILC0 must be ,

fully investigated by the ASLB, and an objective report on '

the facts and their implications must be made public. I hereby ask for such an investigation. If the ASLB is unwilling to take up this matter on its own initiative, I shall intervene formally in the Shoreham operating license proceeding and seek to compel such an investigation by all available legal means.

8610220201 861017 PDR G ADOCK 05000322 PDR One Of America's largest Weekly Newspapers

8 Morton B. Margulics, Esq.

Dr. Jerry R. Kline t

Mr. Frederick J. Shon October 8, 1986 Page 2 The ASLB should not underestimate how seriously the people of Long Island view the apparent complicity of the NRC Staff with LILCO. While we have over the past few years learned better than to assume that the NRC is fair, or even not strongly biased against our interests, we still expect our public servants, whose salaries we pay, to be candid and open in dealing with matters that put our lives and safety at risk. As the editor of Suffolk Life, a newspaper with circulation of more than 330,000 in Suffolk County, and as a person who is in touch with the strong pro-safety, anti-Shoreham, and anti-LILCO feelings of the people who live here, I can tell you that the public here will not tolerate any NRC behavior that smacks of collusion with LILCO. The public wants all of the facts concerning the NRC Staff relationship to LILCO, and particularly the most recent incident, on the table and open to view. If the ,

ASLB, permits this serious issue to be swept under the rug, the ASLB itself will be furthering, and hiding, an ongoing impropriety in the relationship of the NRC Staff to LILCO.

Finally, there must be an end to the NRC Staff's cozy and secret ties to LILCO. Either the NRC Staff should take itself out of the Shoreham operating license proceeding, or it should openly declare itself to be LILCO's ally and the public's opponent'. We do not want to see any longer an NRC Staff that is really working for LILC0 while sitting in the hearing room with a fake halo over its head that reads " independent." We want an end to that deception once and for all.

Nothing I have written should be viewed as anything personal toward any member of the NRC Staff. My words are intended as purely professional and as a means of objectively getting to the roots of a matter of enormous importance to the people of Suffolk County -- the integrity of the operating license hearings before the ASLB and the truth about the NRC Staff's relationship to LILCO. Certainly the ASLB must share these same goals.

1 J h W Lou Grasso Managing Editor Suffolk Life Newspapers LG

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Morton B. Margulies,.Esq.

t.

Dr. Jeffy R. Kline Mr. Frederick J. Shon October 8, 1986 Page 3 cc: Rep. Edward J. Markey Senator Alphonse M. D'Amato Congressman Thomas J. Downey Congressman Robert J. Mrazek Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan i

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l, EXAMPLES OF PORTIONS OF NRC STAFF BRIEF ( AUGUST 15,1986)

N COPIES FROM LILC0 BRIEF~(same date)

.;NRC,Sta,ff p.'ll (footnote 7) LILC0 p. 18-19 NRC Staff p. 12-13 LILC0 p. 20, 21-22 NRC Ytaff p. 27 LILC0 p. 67 NRC Staff p. 28 (footnote 12) LILC0 p. 122 NRC Staff p. 29 LILC0 p. 39-40 NRC Staff p. 45 LILCO p. 143 NRC Staff p. 45-46 LILC0 p. 144-45

i Green Links NRC, LILCO on Shoreham ByJohn Mcdonald NRC licensing board censidering the . to claims that there were Daws in the Similarities in language used by the by LIlf0 to take the 5, lace of state Shoreham case by lawyers for the Feb.13 drill of LILCO's Shoreham auJ local emergency workers.

stas of the Nuclear Regulatory Com. state, Susolk County and Southamp- emergency plan.

mission and lawyers for Iong i=Iana ton Town.% board dadinal to listen Bordemek aald, "I feel personally Lighting Co. in ruings on the licensing to arguments on them. "Ihere is no way on earth that coin- very badly about this. I think the et.

of the Shoreham nuclear power plant cidence would permit theme daaa== of cast doubt on the independa- of the counsel Bernard Bordenick, the NRC star examples of identical language. It is tack is unwarranted. I am a public serw

in the Shoreham case, ac- vant, and I can't react the way a pri-verbatim, with i===aquential edito- vate citisen does; they can do what NRC, Mark GreenDemocratic Senate charged yesterday. candidate copy of LILCO's knowledged filing three daysthat be- he had received a rial flavoring in an obvious esort to the l mask plagiariam," said Herbert take going along with the simulta-

' Green gate whether called on*aseretly" its staK the NRC to investi-ob- ing board. fore it was filed with the NRC liegne- Brown, who represents Susolk in the ne eq tained an advance copy of the papers 08 Shoreham licensing prnamadings. He nothsagimproper had been done.

Even though he received LIIf0's provided several eaamples of the simi-LILCO spokesman George Soos i LILCO submitted to the NRC and briefs before he filed him, Bordenick larities ta tho licensing board, said, "When

• copied signincant portions of LIlfO's said,"We had already reached our deci- look at the yeare ef i

i work for use in its own, supposedly in- sion independently. If the language is by involve technical language hearings all the other involve-dependent, presentation." similiar, that is because there are onl and references to groups such as the menta in the licensing process for the Federal Emergency Management Shoreham plant, not only are these

Green's brought last allegations hadjudge week to the three. been so many waysyou can esy something.{ Agency and tho local Emergency Re-Both sets of pap, ore were raapaa- hinds of allegatione unbelievable, but l sponse Organiantion, ths group set up _ they are ridaculous."

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, FUBIBE UE U HFTWo Just one conc us'on:

a matter of co us'on By Lou Grasso legal authority issue, Iang child thyroid dose which was Island Lighting Co. the appropriate dose Throughout the long, long ^ (Shoreham Nuclear Power pathway for this exercise controversy over Shoreham, Station, Unit 1). . .De Com. scenario."

there have been frequent mission presenuy has pend- he "substantially ver-charges that the Nuclear ing before it Ulf0's appeal batim" comments, a charge Regulatory Commission and on the preemption argument leveled by Herbert Brown, ULCO are working in part- in response to the legal representing Suffolk County, nership toward putting the authority contentions and appear on numerces other plant on hne. Thatinstead of has remanded to the licens- pages throughout the two  ;

living up to its responsibility ing board ior iurther briefs. l to protect the safety of the proceedings the re=Mm and NRC attorney Orestes I public, the NRC has becee immateria1ity arga-Pirfo, adad about the.dupil-involvedin collusionwith the - ments..." cation of wordmg durmg the j utilities to foster the growth Page 18 of the U140 brief Riverhead evening beanng, of nuclear power to ensure contains these words, not as could shed no light on the its own bureaucratic life. a footnote but in the body of matter.

Dere have been denials, the copy: "This board and Bordenick said in ques-of course, denials that are the Appeal Board ulthiately tioning Friday that both the difficult to disprove because ruled against LIILO on of the closed door meetings NRC staff and LILCO these issues, Long Island " reached their positions in-that have been frequently Lighting Co. (Shoreham Nu- dependen0y of each other."

held between NRC and the clear Power Station, Unit Concerning the duplication utility officials during which 1)...The commission has of wording in both briefs, he strategy for expedited hear- pending before it UILO's said"the subject matter can ings, and arguments to over- appeal on the preemption be described in just so many come arguments, are dis- argument in response to the ways." He added, "We're cussed. From time to time legal authority contentions talking about facts and there memos and other documen- and has remanded for are just so many ways you tation of these meetings further proceedmgs the re. . can say ' lacks specificity.' "

come to light, giving an in- alism and immateriality Generally, Bordenick sight into the cozy rela-

. . . . . " a l

-vo.my us em uetween On pages 12 and 13 cf the

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cur supposed guardians cf Eriefs fromEth pabes i a staff britf, the staff-listed days befcre the NRC staffis L safsty and the uilities that the county's cententiens threaten that saftty. ' tits'bri:if.

l'* New claimsabout thecozy (arguments) in summary form. De UILO brief, on When it was that this

, relationship, . alleged col- page 21, lists these same wouldindicate copied from the theNRCsK ULCO t lusion, in fact, came last summarized contentions vir- brief, Bordenick said that week during a meeting be-tween the three judges who tually verbatim.* the five day span did not .

There's more. ~ occur this time. A source' ,

make up the Atomic Safety On page 27 of the NRC and ucensing Board, which close to the hearmg process staff brief, the last para- expressed no M ** the t . is hearmg the evacuat on graph contains these words: copymg# wording was not issue, Ulf0 and attorneys "Intervenors have sunply done by LIILO. That leaves for the county, state and set out a few isolated dis-Southampton Town, who are just one other possability, if crepancies found by FEMA true, opposing approval of at the exercise in an attempt De threejudge panel was Ul40's evacuation plan. to challenge LERO's dose asked foranexplanationdur-The county's attorneys assessment capabilities. In-argued that in a number of ing last hursday evening's tervenors have not asserted hearing in Riverhead. None instances the legal briefs that the LERO PARS estalk submitted independently by was forthcoming. When lished durmg the exercise asked if they would call for U140 and the NRC staff in were wrong given the an investigation of the poss-3 August were "substantially seenario data. In faet, ible collusion, the questioner -

' verbatim."

FEMA specifically found was told to " continue with he NRC judges refused that the Ul40 onsite and your statement." No prom-to bearmg the attorneys' offsite organizations "dem- ise of an investigation was arguments on that matter, onstrated good judgement in offered.

however. makmg correct PAG de- Although it would be When questioned by a Suf- - terminations" and that understandable that both the folk life reporter following LERO PARS "were consis- NRC staff and Ulf0 could the meetings, NRC staff at- tent with the EPA PAGs for reach similiar conclusions, torney Bernard Bordenick, child thyroid dose which was it is not believable to this t whose name appears on the the appropriate dose writer that they can, inde-NRC staff brief, denied that' pathway for this exercise pendently, come up with any sections of the_ wordmg scenario." identical wording as fre-are exactly alike. "If you can Page 67 of the LIILO brief quently as occurs in the two prove that," he told the re- contains these words: briefs. Surely the public porter, "I'll buy you din- "What intervenors have should be able to expect the l

ner." Bordenick told the re- done is string together a few regulatory agency should porter the NRC staff did not isolated, minor and easily reach its own conclusions, receive any written copies of corrected discrepancies in without help from the appil-the UlfO material prior to an attempt to challenge cant...in this case Ulf0.

mbmission to the board, but LERO dose assessment Smce both briefs were sub-conceded "we did have con- capabilities...nowhere have mitted at the same time, versat2ons" with Ulf0 con- intervenors claimed that the accordmg to Bordenick, and i ceraing the contentions LERO PARS established the similarity of wordmgis a

raised by the intervenors. during the exercise were fact, despite his Mah, we A study of the two briefs wrong given the scenario are left with but one con- l

! wouId indicate that data. In iact, FEMA found clusion: collusion. I Bordenick owes the Suffolk that the onsite and offsite If the NRC won't in -

life reporter a dinner, organizations " demon- vestigate this matter, we On page 11 of the NRC strated good judgement in certainly expect that a con-staff brief, these words ap. making correct PAG de- gressional inquiry will be pear as a footnote: "This terminations" and that the made, and call upon our con-board and the Appeal Board LERO PARS "were consis- gressional representatives

. ruled against ULCO on the tent with the EPA PAGs for to do so.

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