Uranium workers may get support

Financial, medical help: Some local employees suspect exposure caused later illnesses

A bill that could provide financial compensation and medical care for workers who were exposed to uranium and other radioactive substances got a boost Thursday when U.S. House and Senate negotiators reached a deal.

   Unlike uranium miners, manufacturing workers do not now have a compensation program. In fact, until last year, the government had always denied a direct link between work exposure in nuclear weapons complexes and later illnesses.

   Under the agreement, those workers made ill from exposure to radiation or the deadly metal beryllium at businesses that contributed to the production of nuclear weapons for the government would be eligible for $150,000 and health-care benefits.

   If the bill is approved by the full House and Senate and signed by the president, workers at some 200 private plants nationwide who were exposed to uranium, beryllium and other dangerous elements would be eligible for compensation.

   That includes 2,300 workers at the University of Chicago — and later, the Argonne National Laboratory near Lemont — who were exposed to beryllium during the early days of atomic bomb research in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

   Affected workers at the former Blockson/Olin Co. just south of Joliet and some employees of the William E. Pratt Co., once located at Cass Street and Henderson Avenue in Joliet, who were exposed to uranium, also could be eligible for the compensation and benefits.

Recent findings on Joliet

   In a recent three-part series, USA Today found that Blockson/Olin and Pratt had secret government contracts to aid nuclear weapons manufacturing. The stories said the Pratt company ground uranium rods used for nuclear fuel from 1943 to 1946.

   The USA Today investigation also revealed that Blockson/Olin produced nearly 2 million pounds of uranium for government weapons manufacturing from 1952 to 1962 in an area called Building 55. Uranium was a byproduct of the process to turn phosphorus into a heavy-duty cleaner.

   Officials with the Illinois Department of Nuclear Safety said little was known in those days about uranium, which was relatively new. Regardless, they said, the emphasis in the 1940s and 1950s was on production, not safety.

   Since The Herald News has printed articles on the uranium extraction at Blockson/Olin in the past few weeks, some two dozen former workers or relatives have called wondering if the cancers and other ills the former workers are now suffering are somehow linked to the work they did at the company, on Patterson Road west of Brandon Road.

   Curt Richards of Olin, which bought Blockson in 1955, said the company does not have any employment records from the Cold War uranium extraction. He said the company is trying to get those records from the U.S. Department of Energy.

   The information may or may not be crucial to the former workers and their families. Early versions of the compensation bill included a provision that workers and their families could be eligible for the benefits, with or without work records, if the former workers are suffering from illnesses that can be traced to uranium or other radioactive elements.

   How the compensation will be allocated likely will need to be hashed out before either President Clinton or the new president signs the bills before the March 15 deadline.

   U.S. Rep. Jerry Weller, R-Morris, is planning a press conference early next week at the former Blockson/Olin site to discuss the pending agreement as well as his push to get the government and/or Olin to release documents about the uranium extraction there.

'Long overdue step'

   Regardless, Weller said he was happy to hear of the compromise.

   "This is a long overdue step by the Congress and the federal government to do the right thing for the families and workers who helped our nation win the Cold War," Weller said. "I am very saddened it has taken this long for justice to be done."

   U.S. Rep. Judy Biggert, R-Hinsdale, whose district includes Argonne, was concerned like other House members about the original Senate bill, which provided medical benefits as well as $200,000 in compensation to each affected worker who qualified. The initial House bill provided either medical benefits or a cash payment of $100,000.

   She also was concerned about how the compensation would be administered.

   "I don't want it to be a situation where a CTA bus crashes with 30 people on it, and 60 people show up at the hospital," Biggert said.

   But Biggert is pleased with the compromise, adding that "just because finding these people is going to be a tedious process, doesn't mean it shouldn't be done. These people were in the service of their country."

   THE ASSOCIATED PRESS contributed to this story.