RAB Meeting Notes template

A view of Downtown Adak, overlooking Sweeper Cove

January 22, 2003

A teleconference was held to discuss the March 2003, RAB meeting agenda. The following participated in the teleconference:

Name	Affiliation	Location
Cathy Villa	Community Co-Chair	Anchorage, AK
Mark Murphy	Navy Co-Chair	Port Orchard, WA
Tara Bourdukofsky	The Aleut Corporation	Anchorage, AK
Jenna Mueller	USFWS	Homer, AK
Sami Goldman	ADEC	Anchorage, AK
Kevin Oates	EPA	Anchorage, AK
Patty Kelly	EFA, NW	Poulsbo, WA
Mary Lou Sullivan	EFA,NW/Westaff	Poulsbo, WA
JoAnn Grady	Grady & Associates	Anchorage, AK
Larry Helgeson	EMI	Anchorage, AK
Bill Rohrer	URS	Olympia, WA

Welcome and Opening Remarks:

Cathy Villa called the teleconference to order at 6:10 P.M. (Adak Time). She stated that the purpose of the teleconference was to establish an agenda for the RAB meeting scheduled for March 5, 2003.

Suggested Topics for the March Meeting:

UXO
Cathy stated that she wanted to discuss UXO first because of issues that arose during the fall. She said she received an email from Sami Goldman regarding the C3-01A issue and she decided to investigate the issues. Cathy said last fall ADEC’s consultant, Jim Pastorick, wrote a memorandum regarding Heart Lake C3-01A in September 2002. Her understanding is that C3-01A was a former ordnance disposal site that the Navy worked on all summer. Cathy stated that in the memorandum, Jim Pastorick stated that he recommended exceptions to the Operable Unit B-1 Record of Decision. She stated that her understanding was that because of the memorandum, the issue went into informal dispute among the Navy, EPA and ADEC. She said there was a meeting on December 4, 2002, to discuss the issue and there was no agreement reached at the meeting on how to proceed. She said it was her understanding that following the meeting, there was supposed to be a teleconference among the Navy, EPA and ADEC. ADEC was unable to attend, and there was a general agreement between Navy and EPA on how to have the project managers proceed to resolve the dispute. She said that on December 23, 2002, Mark Murphy sent a proposal for settlement at the project manager’s level and it wasn’t accepted by ADEC. Mark Murphy stated that her research was essentially correct; he said that the Navy received an email from ADEC on January 21, 2003, that essentially stated that the Navy’s proposal was not a basis for resolution to the informal dipute. For this reason, the Navy has invoked formal dispute. He said that the terms for formal dispute are in the Adak Federal Facility Agreement, and as of January 22, the future decisions regarding the dispute are in the hands of higher management levels. He said his Commanding Officer would represent the Navy, and it was his understanding that Mike Gearhard would represent EPA and that Curt Fredricksson would represent ADEC. Kevin Oates and Sami Goldman agreed with their respective representatives. Mark said the upper management personnel have 21 days to resolve it at their level, and if it’s not resolved, it will be pushed to higher level personnel.

Cathy stated that her investigation led her to talk to people on the island and to former contractors who worked on the ordnance removal at C3-01A. She said it doesn’t make sense to her to change the ROD. She noted the contractors would love to go out and work on the site for five more years, however, they didn’t seem to think there was an issue with the ordnance removal from a safety perspective.

Cathy said she didn’t understand how the issue got this far. She said she doesn’t believe that ADEC wanted the hillside ripped out, then again, she wasn’t sure what the options were or what the exact issues are. Kevin stated that there was a range of options discussed on December 4, which included ripping out the hillside to doing nothing further. Kevin said that no one really believes it’s a hazard or a risk. He said there’s not much of a track record with ordnance cleanup and that the project managers really didn’t consider conditions with greater than a 30 degree slope in the ROD, C3-01A has a greater than 30 degree slope. Kevin said that they intended to look at the site and the conditions, and he said that’s as far as they got. He said if they had an infinite timeframe they would have been able to resolve the issue at the project manager level, however, the Navy felt they had to put the issue under a clock to get a resolution in a timely manner. He said a formal dispute is not necessarily a bad thing.

Mark said there are many people who have a stake in the transfer of the property, and the Navy felt it was in the interest of many parties to come to closure sooner rather than later. Mark said that there isn’t any more information that will be gathered, and the Navy did not want to delay this decision any longer. He said that the Navy wants to stay on track for the land transfer. Mark also noted that the decisions were not out of the hands of anyone at the RAB meeting.

Cathy said that she talked to a lot of people, and no one wants the hillside ripped up. She said that the way she reads the ROD, that there really isn’t an issue to resolve. She said that she recommends beefing up the ordnance safety awareness briefing and that should be all that is required. She said that the method of removal of the ordnance from C3-01A is too huge to address, and it doesn’t appear that it would be safe for the people removing it.

Mark said that everyone could read the ROD and draw conclusions, regardless, it’s not an issue that can be resolved at the teleconference. He explained that the upper management from each agency has until February 12 to be in unanimous agreement to resolve the issue.

Sami Goldman stated that she thinks it’s good to see how the stakeholders feel about the issue and she thought it was a good idea to discuss the issue in March. Mark stated that in March the project managers would, hopefully, be able to discuss the resolution. Cathy thanked everyone for their discussion and stated that she really thought it was important that she speak for the RAB members on this issue.
Finding of Suitability to Transfer Status:
Mark stated that another potential agenda item is the FOST status. Tara Bourdofsky asked Mark whether or not the Finding of Suitability to Transfer was on track. Mark stated that if the C3-01A issue is resolved fairly soon, the Navy is on track.
OU A ROD Amendment/Explanation of Significant Differences for Sign Replacement:
Mark stated that the Navy, EPA and ADEC are in the process of moving the petroleum free product recovery sites out of the OU A ROD and also remove the fish advisory signs. He said there would be more to discuss in March.
Faucet Replacement:
Mark said another potential agenda item is the lead-based paint removal that was completed. Cathy said that as long as it was completed, it didn’t need to be an agenda item at the next meeting.
Upcoming Field Season:
Mark stated that there should probably be a discussion regarding the upcoming field season. He said the biggest project is the pipeline abandonment. Cathy quipped that this appears to be a never-ending agenda item. Mark said the Navy intended to abandon the pipeline last summer, however, there was insufficient information for some of the pipeline so the Navy focused on filling in the data gaps. He said the Navy sent people into the field last summer to physically identify the pipeline locations in order to perform the job correctly next summer.
Institutional Controls Inspections:
Mark said there would be a brief presentation regarding the institutional control inspections. Cathy said she’d like it a little more focused and what exactly would be discussed. Patty Kelly said that as a result of the inspections performed, the Navy is going to improve the educational plan slightly. She said Mary Lou was working on improving the ordnance safety awareness program, and that she was also developing fish advisory fact sheets. Patty said that’s what Ms. Sullivan planned to discuss.

Adjournment: The next RAB meeting is scheduled for March 5, 2003. Cathy said that having meetings twice a year might not work. She said the one following the March meeting should be in May or June. She said that would be discussed at the next meeting.
Sami Goldman said the State is putting up a website showing all of the DOD cleanup sites. She said she knows Adak has two really good websites already, her hopes is that people can go to the State’s website and get to the other websites. She said it being rolled out slowly and it should be out sometime in March. She said people would be able to access the site through the statewide address.