Iowa Army Ammunition Plant workers will finally get checks
Posted: Monday, June 20, 2005
U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, left, talks to Neva Cocherell of Lexington, Ky., Saturday, June 18, 2005, during a meeting of former nuclear weapons plant workers at the Machinists Union Hall in West Burlington, Iowa. Harkin discussed compensation for former workers sickened by working with radioactive materials. (AP Photo)
WEST BURLINGTON, Iowa (AP) -- The final hurdle for compensation is over for former Iowa Army Ammunition Plant workers sickened by radiation.
Starting Sunday, the 364 workers who have developed certain cancers from radiation exposure, or their surviving families, will be eligible for $150,000 plus medical expenses after being officially included in a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-approved Special Exposure Cohort.
Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, was on hand Saturday afternoon at Mechanist Union Hall in West Burlington to help commemorate their compensation -- more than half a century after 4,000 workers began assembling and testing nuclear weapons at the Middletown plant.
"Today we can acknowledge victory," Harkin told a room full of former workers and survivors. "You're going to get compensation this summer."
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, wasn't at the event, but said he feels justice has finally been served.
"(Today) is a momentous day for the former workers at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant," Grassley said in a news release. "Despite all the hardships and hurdles for these folks, justice will finally be done. And, almost more important than receiving the payments, might be the satisfaction of the government admitting they were harmed."
Congress established the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program in 2000, but until now, most workers at the IAAP plant were not able to get compensation because a lack of records made it hard to prove a connection between their jobs and their illnesses.
The Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Energy operated the plant hidden from view for two and a half decades. The 19,000-acre plant was for several years the only military installation in the nation where complete warheads were assembled.
The Special Exposure Cohort designation approved last month by Health and Humans Services Secretary Mike Leavitt includes anyone who worked at least 250 days in the nuclear program between March 1949 and 1975 and developed any one of 22 radiation-induced cancers.
Survivors of deceased workers also are eligible for the compensation.
The U.S. Department of Labor will get the paperwork and review the claims now that the compensation has been approved.
Harkin said claimants will then be notified by mail of decisions. They'll also get letters from the federal government to help waive the 60-day waiting period so that the U.S. Department of Treasury can go ahead and issue a check, the senator said.
"As best as I can determine, this process will be completed by the end of the summer," Harkin said.
Former IAAP worker Bob Anderson, who was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma in 1988, worked at the plant from 1968 to 1973 and initiated claims efforts with a letter to Harkin in 1997.
Anderson said he wanted the federal government to acknowledge the danger of the nuclear weapons work.
"We were right," Anderson said. "Working around nuclear weapons was dangerous to our health."
Starting Sunday, the 364 workers who have developed certain cancers from radiation exposure, or their surviving families, will be eligible for $150,000 plus medical expenses after being officially included in a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-approved Special Exposure Cohort.
Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, was on hand Saturday afternoon at Mechanist Union Hall in West Burlington to help commemorate their compensation -- more than half a century after 4,000 workers began assembling and testing nuclear weapons at the Middletown plant.
"Today we can acknowledge victory," Harkin told a room full of former workers and survivors. "You're going to get compensation this summer."
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, wasn't at the event, but said he feels justice has finally been served.
"(Today) is a momentous day for the former workers at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant," Grassley said in a news release. "Despite all the hardships and hurdles for these folks, justice will finally be done. And, almost more important than receiving the payments, might be the satisfaction of the government admitting they were harmed."
Congress established the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program in 2000, but until now, most workers at the IAAP plant were not able to get compensation because a lack of records made it hard to prove a connection between their jobs and their illnesses.
The Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Energy operated the plant hidden from view for two and a half decades. The 19,000-acre plant was for several years the only military installation in the nation where complete warheads were assembled.
The Special Exposure Cohort designation approved last month by Health and Humans Services Secretary Mike Leavitt includes anyone who worked at least 250 days in the nuclear program between March 1949 and 1975 and developed any one of 22 radiation-induced cancers.
Survivors of deceased workers also are eligible for the compensation.
The U.S. Department of Labor will get the paperwork and review the claims now that the compensation has been approved.
Harkin said claimants will then be notified by mail of decisions. They'll also get letters from the federal government to help waive the 60-day waiting period so that the U.S. Department of Treasury can go ahead and issue a check, the senator said.
"As best as I can determine, this process will be completed by the end of the summer," Harkin said.
Former IAAP worker Bob Anderson, who was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma in 1988, worked at the plant from 1968 to 1973 and initiated claims efforts with a letter to Harkin in 1997.
Anderson said he wanted the federal government to acknowledge the danger of the nuclear weapons work.
"We were right," Anderson said. "Working around nuclear weapons was dangerous to our health."
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