Agenda Work Group
Meeting Minutes
January 17, 2002
ORRHES members:
Barbara Sonnenburg, Chair; Kowetha Davidson, Chair, ORRHES
(phone); Jeff Hill; Susan Kaplan (phone); James Lewis
Public members:
Linda Gass (phone)
ATSDR staff:
La Freta Dalton (phone); Jack Hanley (phone); Bill Murray
The meeting was called to order by the Chair, Barbara
Sonnenburg, at 4:00 PM.
The minutes of the Agenda Work Group (AWG) meeting on
November 6, 2001 were reviewed by the Chair. A motion to
adopt the minutes as amended was made and seconded. The
motion passed with one abstention. Linda Gass said she
would not vote on the minutes since she had not read them.
Barbara Sonnenburg said that the minutes of the January
3, 2002, meeting were not completed yet.
Barbara Sonnenburg said the agenda for the February 11,
2002, ORRHES meeting is the first item of business.
The AWG wanted to schedule a discussion on the DOE worker
medical and exposure surveillance program. Bill Murray
called his contact at DOE and Dr. Steve Markowitz at Queens
College about making a presentation to ORRHES. They will
not be able to make a commitment until next week. Because
the February 11 meeting is only 3 ½ weeks from now,
it is not practical to schedule their talks until the March
26 meeting.
James Lewis thinks their activities need to be reviewed
to identify issues and questions for the presenters to
address so they can determine what the ORRHES wants to
hear from them.
Kowetha Davidson said we should have an overview of all
the surveillance studies.
James Lewis said he had a videotape that the Paper, Allied
Industrial, Chemical and Energy (PACE) union (a collaborator
with Queens College) has developed to describe their Worker
Health Protection Program (WHPP) for medical surveillance
on their members.
Jack Hanley mentioned that there were two projects - the
PACE WHPP and one being done for construction workers by
the University of Cincinnati. Oak Ridge associated Universities
(ORAU) is also doing surveillance on beryllium-exposed
workers at several DOE sites. He suggested that they come
and present any findings of their work and that DOE present
the background information on the program. Although not
related to the public health assessment (PHA), it would
inform ORRHES members about this issue. The members should
develop a list of concerns and questions similar to what
they did for the talk by Dr. Jackson of the Health Resources
and Services Administration (HRSA).
James Lewis suggested the talks be spaced out over two
meetings.
Barbara Sonnenburg disagreed and wants to have all speakers
together.
Barbara Sonnenburg also inquired about the speaker from
the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) to discuss their
cancer registry.
Jack Hanley has not yet completed this task.
Barbara Sonnenburg asked whether the TDH talk would be
in March and where on the agenda is there a slot for follow
up with HRSA.
La Freta Dalton said the HRSA would be covered under correspondence.
Kowetha Davidson had requested Dr. Jackson to provide
follow up on the issues raised in her thank you letter
to him.
La Freta Dalton returned to the agenda and stated that
she had given Jerry Pereira a 30-min slot. The PHA discussion
by Paul Charp and Karl Markiewicz were separated and Charp
will also give a talk on radiation (I-131) screening.
James Lewis asked if the issues for Dr. Jackson were captured
in the Action Items and recommendations.
La Freta Dalton said they were not and that Bill Carter
will review both the minutes and the videotape to identify
them and will report to ORRHES at the February meeting.
Barbara Sonnenburg read over the agenda since some of
the people on the phone did not have a copy of the latest
draft. She covered all the topics including radiation screening.
Jeff Hill asked what radiation screening was.
Jack Hanley replied that it applied to I-131.
There was a motion made and seconded to adopt the agenda.
The motion passed unanimously. There was no response from
Linda Gass. (Bill Murray later learned that her phone had
gone dead.)
The discussion turned to future topics for the agenda.
Barbara Sonnenburg remarked that the Local Oversight Committee
Citizens Advisory panel (LOC-CAP) had reviewed a document
entitled “Agenda for HHS Public Health Activities
(for Fiscal Years 2001-2006) at U.S. Department of Energy
Sites” (copies have already been sent to all ORRHES
members) at ATSDR’s request. The LOC-CAP sent a response
to ATSDR regarding activities at the ORR site. She would
like a representative of the LOC-CAP present their comments
to ORRHES.
Kowetha Davidson said the AWG should review and update
the Program of Work the AWG had developed for activities.
James Lewis remarked that the work group needs to change
its process for setting the agenda because the time between
meetings has been reduced to 6 weeks and the meeting is
only one day. A time line and tracking document is needed.
Jeff Hill suggested that they have a rough draft for the
March 26 meeting and can discuss it at the February 11
meeting.
The date for the next meeting was not set.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 PM.
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