Kenneth Fletcher
WC Monitor
10/24/2014
AMELIA ISLAND, Fla.—A continued lack of a Senate-confirmed assistant secretary is one of several challenges facing the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) said here this week at the Weapons Complex Monitor Decisionmakers’ Forum. EM has not had a confirmed assistant secretary since the departure of Ines Triay in 2011. “A nominated and confirmed Assistant Secretary would provide the EM program with a much needed level of certainty and sense of continuity,” Hastings said in prepared remarks. “And, in turn it would provide the program leader with the authority and accountability needed to meet cleanup challenges. Having an Assistant Secretary in place would help strengthen the Environmental Management program and put the federal government in a better position to meet its legal cleanup obligations.”
Currently the EM Assistant Secretary role is being filled in an acting capacity by Mark Whitney, while Monica Regalbuto has been nominated for the role but has been not been confirmed. Whitney said this week that the lack of confirmed assistant secretary is not an issue for the program. “Maybe it’s a unique situation, but from my perspective and the folks at headquarters, it’s not an issue,” Whitney told WC Monitor on the sidelines of the forum. “Monica and I have worked together before, we have a really good relationship and I think we complement each other really well. It’s definitely not an issue for the two of us, and I think we portray that in our actions and all of us there are like a team.”
Hastings: River Protection and Richland Budgets Should Remain Separate
After ten terms in Congress that stretch back to 1994, Hastings is leaving Congress after choosing not to seek re-election this fall. This week, he also made the case for maintaining Hanford’s Office of River Protection as a separate budget entity from the site’s Richland Operations Office, a division that was spearheaded by 1998 legislation sponsored by Hastings. “In order to function properly, the ORP Site Manager must have the authority to oversee [the Waste Treatment Plant] and the Tank Farms, and requires a direct line to the Assistant Secretary for EM,” he said. “This is spelled out in the law to provide both certainty and accountability to a complex project. The budget for ORP was always to be developed and considered separately from the Richland Operations Office, although it isn’t the case under this Administration.”
The Hanford site as a whole should not be considered under one budget number for the two different offices, Hastings emphasized. “With the challenges and uncertainty facing WTP today, the need for the Office of River Protection is perhaps more important today than it was back when it was created. In short, the division of ORP and RL provides the greatest opportunity for legally enforceable cleanup commitments at both sites to be met,” Hastings said.
DOE Needs Greater Transparency, Hastings Says
DOE must also address its lack of transparency, Hastings said, noting that he has been waiting for five years for “basic information and details” on the WTP. “Cleanup is funded by taxpayer dollars. The public has a right to know what is happening at cleanup sites, how decisions are made and how budgets are formulated,” Hastings said. He added: “Greater transparency is also warranted when it comes to providing information to impacted sites, states, communities and stakeholders about how DOE decisions at one site will impact others. Individual cleanup proposals cannot be considered in a vacuum, without complete understanding of the implications on all ongoing work and the ability to meet all legal obligations of the federal government.”
‘Administration Must Stop Shortchanging EM’
The government must also provide steady stable funding to the DOE cleanup program, Hastings emphasized. “It’s not the case that the federal government does not have enough money to meet its legal cleanup commitments. In fact, many years funding for EM is down, while overall federal spending and spending at the Department of Energy overall is up,” he said. “All Administrations have a legal obligation to request adequate cleanup funding and all Congresses have a responsibility to provide it. Today, this means that this Administration must stop shortchanging EM in its budget requests, including but not limited to abandoning plans to eviscerate the Richland Operations Office in FY2016.”
Hastings also called on Congress to provide needed funding for EM. “Members of Congress must be willing to publically and forcefully request and fight for cleanup dollars and not mask meeting legal requirements as an excuse for fiscal responsibility,” he said. “Providing funding for EM does not contradict core beliefs of smaller more efficient government and fiscal responsibility. It’s a matter of setting proper priorities.”
