News Addition; News Addition Segments, updub edit master 15

Keepers in the area have complained for years about the noise, and with the airport's proximity to downtown Dallas, there has been increasing concerns about safety. Next week, the Dallas City Council will vote on whether or not to recommend repealing the right amendment, something area congressmen have been waiting on. Councilwoman Lori Palmer, who lives in the loved field area, opposes the repeal, and she's here to tell us why, begin with that question, why do you oppose this repeal of the right amendment? Well, there are really several reasons I'll talk about noise towards the end of my list, but it is the most important. First of all, I think that there's no question that if a love field is opened up to national service, that it will have a negative impact on the growth and viability of DFW Airport.

I don't think that we should risk that. Second of all, as was mentioned in the introduction, the two airports are located only 11 to 12 miles apart, and the competition for airspace among aircraft between the two airports can become a problem to say nothing about the safety concerns when you mix traffic, arriving and departing from DFW and a heavy, heavier carrier use at the same time at love field. In addition to that, we have already out at love field about 90 tenants, and the chances are very good that some of them who provide many jobs and provide nicely to the tax base will be driven out of the airport if it becomes primarily an air carrier airport again. But very important. It's only good in mind when you say 90 tenants who might move out. We have various maintenance, overhaul, aviation-related businesses. Most people think only of southwest airlines, but we have about 89 others out there that

are not air carrier-related. And finally, and very importantly is the impact of noise on a very, very large residential community, which extends to the northeast, south, and west of the airport. Love Field is an inner city airport completely surrounded by residential land use. Well, there's some people who say that DFW viability is a mood argument. DFW is going to be there. It's not going to go away. It can pay off the bonds. It's not going to be heard if Love Field has more flights out of there. Well, I think we were all surprised when Bob Crandell, who heads up American Airlines, indicated his intense interest in opening up a significant level of service at Love Field. And in saying that indicated that they might have to postpone their plans or delay their plans with respect to the new terminal out of DFW. Okay, now for our viewers, Bob Crandell has head of American Airlines and he's talking about 230 flights out of Love Field if it's opened up. But the analyst that he was talking is that he was really talking to you people on the

City Council and the Congress people to really scare you because he doesn't want to have competition out at Love Field with Southwest Airlines. He doesn't want that operation. Do you think he was really just trying to scare the politicians? I don't speculate on what Mr. Crandell's motives are. I take what he says seriously, I always have. Obviously, I think that there is going to be an effort to perhaps support a perimeter rule and not a full repeal of the amendment. A perimeter rule means that you would extend by some number of miles the distance into which an aircraft could fly directly from Love Field. Right now it's limited to Texas and the four states that are contiguous to our state. But there might be an attempt to extend that to several other cities. I can think, for example, of Wichita or St. Louis, maybe Nashville or maybe Memphis. That's called a perimeter rule. That would maintain to some extent, Love Field is a short haul airport that would not be in direct competition with DFW as a long haul airport. Say maybe 600 miles or so or something like that.

That's right. Okay, but now what about the consumer who says, wait a minute, if there was more competition out of Love, you know, right now for commercial carry Southwest as a monopoly? There was more competition. I could have more affairs. I could have more convenient flights, schedules, those kinds of things. Shouldn't they be taken into account here? I think that if you look at the history of this immediately apparent attempt to repeal the amendment in Washington, you'll find that probably what's driving it more than anything is the inequities of the inequitability of the fair structure among different airlines. And this is a national problem. This is not something unique to Love Field. Obviously, Southwest Airlines offers very low fares, and Congressman Glickman from Kansas would like to be able to have his constituents be able to fly more cheaply in and out of Love Field. Mr. Bartos would like to be able to fly in and out of St. Louis at less dollars than he pays out of DFW. Obviously, there is a consumer interest here. But I think that from the point of view of good public policy, we need to be very clear

about how we're going to balance as we do in any society, in any city, in any inner city, the objectives and the values of economic growth with the objectives and the values of environmental protection of a tremendous tax base, which are the homeowners that are making investments in our committed to living in the city of Dallas, paying their taxes within our city limits, and to deserve some measure of protection. Okay, so you live in the Love Field area, and you are opposed, and many of your constituents are. But you can lose this battle, aren't you? How is the council going to vote, Wednesday? I think the council will vote to support either an outright appeal or a perimeter rule. I will not be able to support, of course, either one of those proposals. At the same time, however, I think it is important for the council to state very strongly that it intends to strengthen its noise control program at the airport in order to offset the noise that will be inevitably created by an increase in the amount of activity in and

out of the field. We have a commitment to our citizens to reach a particular noise goal, which is a reduction of noise from where we are now at the airport, and I think we have to continue to maintain that goal and control it. Not worth people, clearly don't want this amendment repealed. Pete Garen went to Congress, claiming that he is going to fight against it. Is this going to cause another war between Dallas and Fort Worth, Love Field? Well, as you well know, only one part of the story will be told here next Wednesday. The second chapter of the story will occur in Washington, and I am not yet convinced that Congress will, in fact, repeal the amendment. I think that there are some considerable interests that will be working against that at that level, and I can assure you that community leaders that I represent, I will be in Washington testifying before the committees that are looking at this proposal to ensure that Congress is fully informed about the impact on the noise levels in the residential communities around the airport as they evaluate this decision.

All right, Mrs. Palmer, thank you very much for joining us. When people donate blood, they are tested for the virus that causes AIDS.

It's called the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. Experts think 15 to 30,000 people have it in Dallas County. Throughout the nation, there are lots of people tested for HIV. Army recruits give a blood sample when they report to boot camp. And prison inmates are checked for AIDS as well. But researchers say they need to know more. Sociologist Don Zimmerman has come to Dallas to conduct a county-wide blood test in 3,400 homes. It's been several years now that we've known about AIDS, and we still do not know just how many people are infected. If you take all the other surveys together, it will not give you a full picture of what's happening with the virus in the general adult population. And that's what this survey is focused on, and that's what this survey is all about. Zimmerman works for RTI Research Triangle Institute.

It's a nonprofit university center in North Carolina. RTI has a federal contract to test 50,000 homes nationwide. The Dallas study is a pilot project. We felt that we really needed to put this survey to a test that would really challenge our procedures. And so we looked around for a city that represented a diverse cultural environment, a complex urban environment, as well as having what we would call a high incidence of AIDS cases. Hello, I'm Katie Dowd from Research Triangle Institute. We're conducting an important study for the U.S. Public Health Service. This weekend, 45 survey teams will start knocking on doors. Now I would like for you to watch a short video tape presentation about the study. Inside each home, one person will be picked at random to participate in the survey. Let me say right away that the interviewer isn't there because we think you have the AIDS virus, but because your household has been randomly chosen to help us figure out

this deadly threat to our nation's health. You will never ask or make any attempt to find out your name, and we will keep no record of your address. In fact, this study is so anonymous, we won't be able to give you the results of your blood test. All information that could be used to identify you, or where you live, will be destroyed. I can read the questions while you mark your answers, or you can complete the questionnaire by yourself. How would you like to... There are 45 questions to answer concerning drug use and sexual history. Then, a technician will take a sample of blood. They'll prick fingertips of people who are scared of needles. I'm authorized to pay you $50 for your participation. Here is your payment. We have to bring AIDS and HIV infection out of the closet, and see it for what it is. And we have no idea where it is right now. I mean, we know where some AIDS cases are, but we do not know how far this virus has percolated or permeated the rest of the population.

I don't think that there's any way that they can have a valid survey given the climate of Dallas County, because for one thing, people are not going to put themselves at risk for the U.S. government when the government has done virtually nothing to help them. William Weber and his president of the 650-member Dallas Gay Alliance, his group wants gay men to boycott the study. They're the ones who stand to lose the most if this survey is somehow statistically flawed and, as we believe it will be, and then the state legislature can say, we'll see the problem's not so bad as we thought it was. We don't have to vote any more money, or the city council can say, see, it's not a problem in Dallas. Why should we worry about it any more? The initial concept of life. John Zimmerman met with the gay alliance board in June. With him was Merv Silverman from San Francisco. Silverman heads the American Foundation for AIDS Research. If you want to own AIDS, you can do that, but wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, I'm

trying to say, I'm trying to say, and that's not that, I've had people say, and I've heard quotes out of Dallas also, that this is a gay problem, this is not everyone else's problem. I think as long as it's perceived that way, and even more so in Texas, as only a gay problem, that's only a concern for Gays, I think the funding, the support, the public support is not going to be there. I can sympathize with your point of view, but you're going home tonight at midnight to San Francisco, and I'm going home tonight in Dallas, Texas. If it screws up, there are no protections, no federal, no state, no city, no county. See, that's our problem, but we can't put our people at risk when there is no protection. There is no effort or notion in this survey that targets the survey towards gay men. It's not who you are, it's what you do.

I don't care what the person's lifestyle is. I want to know how many people are putting themselves and other at risk, whether they're in lily white suburbs and our family men and work for large corporations and are f**king on the weekends, not telling anybody about it, or somebody who is upfront about doing that and feels comfortable about doing that. Homosexual conduct is a crime in Texas, and many gay men have lost their jobs, insurance and housing. That's why they're worried about the survey. They feel the project will target them because addresses won't be picked totally at random. Researchers will divide the county into 5,600 districts and will use public health records to find out if each district is a high-risk, low-risk, or medium-risk area for HIV infection. Researchers already think 30% of the population lives in high or medium-risk areas. They want 66% of their blood samples to come from these districts.

What makes an area high-risk? Researchers will look for drug abuse, venereal disease, hepatitis B infections and people who already have AIDS. 83% of the AIDS cases in Dallas County so far have been homosexual men. Researchers also think neighborhoods with a high percentage of never-married men, age 30 to 44, are potential high-risk districts for HIV. As long as there's the fear of discrimination, people are not going to participate. As long as there is the reality of discrimination, people won't participate. I think this is nothing more than another attempt to spend lots of money, taxpayers' money that could be spent better on other programs and to stonewall what needs to be done. I think it's truly unfortunate that the survey has been mixed together with a lot of other issues and a lot of other agenda concerning AIDS, concerning funding, concerning political issues in Austin that certainly we don't have anything to do with and certainly

don't change in the context of this survey and potentially will prevent Dallas County being the very first place in the world to actually know what the hell is going on here with this epidemic. Research Triangle Institute first tried to do this survey in Washington, D.C. in 1988. Black leaders told RTI to leave town because they felt the survey would target African-Americans. Zimmerman went to Pittsburgh next. The project was small but successful, 263 people gave blood. That's an 85% response rate. These statistical results were kept a secret. Zimmerman has come to Dallas looking for at least 1,600 people who will cooperate. First, there will not be any lists of addresses used by Research Triangle Institute field staff at any time in the main survey or the non-respondent follow-up survey. Second, all individuals in the survey.

Zimmerman worked with a panel of 29 community leaders appointed by the County Commissioners Court. They helped write the survey questions and improved security with the addresses. After major changes in the project, the advisory panel accepted the survey last June. William Wabren of the Gay Alliance was on the panel. He was the only member to vote no. Five other gay leaders on the panel did support the plan. The project was approved but the fight was far from over. Because of the survey, because of the vote today, we will ask our members of the community who are contacted about the survey to not only say no, but hell no. We believe that it's our responsibility to do whatever we can to get the facts of the survey out to the people in Dallas County. I'm part of the solution. I'm part of the solution. Be part of the solution. Support the HIV household survey. Survey officials unveiled a series of videotaped endorsements late in August. People who participate in this survey will not have to worry about anonymity.

I will guarantee them secrecy. It goes back to the old saying, you know, we stand upon it, we fall and we're all in the same boat. We might try that over the shoulder so that the person actually gets the view from their TV screen as if they're looking down at their own arm. The Dallas Gay Alliance produced videos of its own and got equal time on some local stations. They want to send their agents into your home to take a sample of your blood. They want you to tell them about your sex habits and drug abuse. That's none of their business. This survey is no solution. The Alliance also distributed 20,000 flyers at events like the Gay Freedom Parade and leaflets tell people to lie about their homosexuality if they are picked for the survey. Gay people are at very adept at lying about their lifestyle.

They've had to to survive. But that isn't trying to sabotage the survey. Well, no, I don't think so. Asking people to lie in the survey is not asking them to sabotage it. No, that's not sabotage. That's just giving the government what it's due. If the government didn't make us criminals, we wouldn't have to lie. Can gay men sabotage the survey by staying away, by saying no? I think only partially. I mean, again, the survey has to do with behavior and the kind of behaviors that transmit AIDS. The AIDS virus are not just found within the gay community. Other groups are worried about how they'll be counted too. Hispanic leaders spoke to the community advisory panel. There is no assurance that an adequate sample of Hispanic households will be included so that meaningful conclusions can be reached. Apparently, the sampling approach is not designed to secure a particular statistical representation of the Hispanic population.

Because of these concerns, researchers will not release a detailed analysis of their results. The only figure that Dallas County is going to get from this is what is the prevalence of AIDS in Dallas County? Not where it is, not that it's in the black community, not that it's moving to the Hispanic community, not that it's heavy into the drug community. Or that it is saturated into the gay community, they only get one number. There will actually be a great deal more information available from the survey. Some of the things that we would like to provide, we can't because of decisions made by the community advisory panel they've told us that they didn't want particular kinds of information. Despite the opposition, Zimmerman says he can conduct a valid survey up to half of the people who say no to the interview team will be re-contacted in December to see if they'll reconsider. We think if we can make this survey work here in Dallas, then that is good evidence that we can make this survey work in other cities in America.

The time for studies has passed, the time for action is now. Even as the survey began, the gay alliance was staging a media event. We know that during the life of this survey, that 90 Dallas County residents will lose their lives to AIDS. And so what we're doing here, dropping at the doorstep of the agency responsible for those AIDS deaths, the Dallas County Health Department, 90 bodies to symbolize the number of persons who will die during this survey. Webern offered a bounty to people who take the HIV survey forms away from field researchers and send them to him instead. He says the resistance will continue while the research teams are on the streets. The door has now been open for an avalanche of legislation so that states can begin to restrict

this abomination called abortion, which is nothing more than killing precious little babies. And now the church has come out and taken a stand saying by your very being here that you will no longer kill these little babies unless you come over our dead bodies. Amen? That's exactly what we're saying and we are lambs led to slaughter. We've been requested to leave by the owner of the property.

Those of you remaining at this time will be sent to arrest. You're in violation of criminal statutes in Texas for criminal trespass, do you understand? If you refuse to leave, you'll be arrested, do you understand? Yes. Okay, when you leave? Yes, sir. Thank you. Well, we got a total of about 35 tactical officers working today, but not all of them are at this location because there is another protest going on at another location right now. We are here to save the lives of little babies. And to do that, we are putting our lives between the babies and those who would kill them. The abortionists do not wish for us to continue to do this and so they are having this arrested charges of trespassing. However, the law provides that those who trespass in order to save a life are not guilty of trespassing.

And so we believe that the arrests that are being carried on at the order of the baby killers with the cooperation of the police are illegal arrests. I resent it and as a taxpayer, I resent what it's cost in the city of Dallas to take care of this. Sir, if you can't help out if you walk up to them, no. You're going too fast. Well, sir, we have a job to do. We have to perform it. It would take a lot easier if you do it quickly. Going way too fast. If you were doing it one at a time, I would walk. You have to go way too fast. If you don't walk up there, we won't have to put you up there, Daniel. God bless you, Bob. When people donate blood, they are tested for the virus that causes AIDS.

It's called the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. Experts think 15 to 30,000 people have it in Dallas County. Throughout the nation, there are lots of people tested for HIV. Army recruits give a blood sample when they report to boot camp. Some prison inmates are checked for AIDS as well. But researchers say they need to know more. Sociologist Don Zimmerman has come to Dallas to conduct a county-wide blood test in 3,400 homes. It's been several years now that we've known about AIDS, and we still do not know just how many people are infected. If you take all the other surveys together, it will not give you a full picture of what's happening with the virus in the general adult population.

And that's what this survey is focused on, and that's what this survey is all about. Zimmerman works for RTI Research Triangle Institute. It's a nonprofit university center in North Carolina. RTI has a federal contract to test 50,000 homes nationwide. The Dallas study is a pilot project. We felt that we really needed to put this survey to a test that would really challenge our procedures. And so we looked around for a city that represented a diverse cultural environment, a complex urban environment, as well as having what we would call a high incidence of AIDS cases. Hello, I'm Katie Dad from Research Triangle Institute. We're conducting an important study for the U.S. Public Health Service. This weekend, 45 survey teams will start knocking on doors. Now I would like for you to watch a short video tape presentation about the study.

Inside each home, one person will be picked at random to participate in the survey. Let me say right away that the interviewer isn't there because we think you have the AIDS virus. But because your household has been randomly chosen to help us figure out this deadly threat to our nation's health. We will never ask or make any attempt to find out your name, and we will keep no record of your address. In fact, this study is so anonymous, we won't be able to give you the results of your blood test. All information that could be used to identify you, or where you live, will be destroyed. I can read the questions while you mark your answers, or you can complete the questionnaire by yourself. There are 45 questions to answer concerning drug use and sexual history. Then, a technician will take a sample of blood. They'll prick fingertips of people who are scared of needles. I'm authorized to pay you $50 for your participation. Here is your payment. We have to bring AIDS and HIV infection out of the closet, and see it for what it is.

And we have no idea where it is right now. I mean, we know where some AIDS cases are, but we do not know how far this virus has percolated or permeated the rest of the population. I don't think that there is any way that they can have a valid survey given the climate of Dallas County, because for one thing, people are not going to put themselves at risk for the U.S. government, when the government has done virtually nothing to help them. William Weber, and his president of the 650-member Dallas Gay Alliance, his group wants gay men to boycott the study. They're the ones who stand to lose the most if this survey is in somehow statistically flawed, and as we believe it will be, and then the state legislature can say, we'll see the problem is not so bad as we thought it was. We don't have to vote any more money, or the city council can say,

see, it's not a problem in Dallas. Why should we worry about it anymore? The initial concept of... Don Zimmerman met with the gay alliance board in June. With him was Merv Silverman from San Francisco. Silverman heads the American foundation for AIDS research. If you want to own AIDS, you can do that. Wait, wait, wait, wait. I'm trying to say, I'm trying to say, and that's not that. I've had people say, and I've heard quotes out of Dallas also, that this is a gay problem. This is not everyone else's problem. I think as long as it's perceived that way, and even more so in Texas, as only a gay problem, that's only a concern for gays, I think the funding, the support, the public support, is not going to be there. I can sympathize with your point of view, but you're going home tonight at midnight to San Francisco, and I'm going home tonight in Dallas, Texas. If it screws up, there are no protections, no federal, no state, no city, no county. See, that's our problem. We can't put our people at risk when there is no protection.

There is no effort or notion in this survey that targets the survey towards gay men. It's not who you are, it's what you do. I don't care what the person's lifestyle is. I want to know how many people are putting themselves and other at risk, whether they're in lily white suburbs, and are family men, and work for large corporations, and are putting on the weekends and not telling anybody about it, or somebody who is upfront about doing that and feels comfortable about doing that. Homosexual conduct is a crime in Texas, and many gay men have lost their jobs, insurance, and housing. That's why they're worried about the survey. They feel the project will target them because addresses won't be picked totally at random. Researchers will divide the county into 5,600 districts, and will use public health records to find out if each district is a high risk, low risk,

or medium risk area for HIV infection. Researchers already think 30% of the population lives in high or medium risk areas. They want 66% of their blood samples to come from these districts. What makes an area high risk? Researchers will look for drug abuse, venereal disease, hepatitis B infections, and people who already have AIDS. 83% of the AIDS cases in Dallas County so far have been homosexual men. Researchers also think neighborhoods with a high percentage of never married men, age 30 to 44, are potential high risk districts for HIV. As long as there is the fear of discrimination, people are not going to participate. As long as there is the reality of discrimination, people won't participate. I think this is nothing more than another attempt to spend lots of money, taxpayers' money, that could be spent better on other programs, and to stonewall what needs to be done. I think it's truly unfortunate that the survey has been mixed together

with a lot of other issues and a lot of other agenda concerning AIDS, concerning funding, concerning political issues in Austin, that certainly we don't have anything to do with, and certainly don't, can't change in the context of this survey, and potentially will prevent Dallas County being the very first place in the world to actually know what the hell is going on here with this epidemic. Research Triangle Institute first tried to do this survey in Washington, D.C. in 1988. Black leaders told RTI to leave town because they felt the survey would target African Americans. Zimmerman went to Pittsburgh next. The project was small but successful. 263 people gave blood. That's an 85% response rate. These statistical results were kept a secret. Zimmerman has come to Dallas looking for at least 1,600 people who will cooperate. First, there will not be any lists of addresses used by Research Triangle Institute field staff

at any time in the main survey or the non-respondent follow-up survey. Second, all individuals in the survey. Zimmerman worked with a panel of 29 community leaders appointed by the County Commissioners Court. They helped write the survey questions and improved security with the addresses. After major changes in the project, the advisory panel accepted the survey last June. William Wabren of the Gay Alliance was on the panel. He was the only member to vote no. Five other gay leaders on the panel did support the plan. The project was approved but the fight was far from over. Because of the survey, because the vote today, we will ask our members of the community who are contacted about the survey to not only say no, but hell no. We believe that it's our responsibility to do whatever we can to get the facts of the survey out to the people in Dallas County. I'm part of the solution. I'm part of the solution.

Be part of the solution. Support the HIV household survey. Survey officials unveiled a series of videotaped endorsements late in August. People who participate in this survey will not have to worry about anonymity. I will guarantee them secrecy. It goes back to the old saying, you know, we stand upon it, we fall and we're all in the same boat. We might try that over the shoulder so that the person actually gets the view from their TV screen as if they're looking down at their own arm. The Dallas Gay Alliance produced videos of its own and got equal time on some local stations. They want to send their agents into your home to take a sample of your blood. They want you to tell them about your sex habits and drug abuse. That's none of their business. This survey is no solution. The Alliance also distributed 20,000 flyers at events like the Gay Freedom Parade.

And leaflets tell people to lie about their homosexuality if they are picked for the survey. Gay people are at very adept at lying about their lifestyle. They've had to to survive. But that isn't trying to sabotage the survey. Well, no, I don't think so. I don't think so. Asking people to lie in the survey is not asking them to sabotage it. No, that's not sabotage. That's just giving the government what it's due. If the government didn't make us criminals, we wouldn't have to lie. Can gay men sabotage the survey by staying away, by saying no? I think only partially. I mean, again, the survey has to do with behavior. And the kind of behaviors that transmit AIDS. The AIDS virus are not just found within the gay community. Other groups are worried about how they'll be counted too. Hispanic leaders spoke to the Community Advisory Panel. There is no assurance that an adequate sample of Hispanic households will be included so that meaningful conclusions can be reached.

Apparently, the sampling approach is not designed to secure a particular statistical representation of the Hispanic population. Because of these concerns, researchers will not release a detailed analysis of their results. The only figure that Dallas County is going to get from this is what is the prevalence of AIDS in Dallas County? Not where it is, not that it's in the black community, not that it's moving to the Hispanic community, not that it's heavy into the drug community, or that it is saturated into the gay community. They only get one number. There will actually be a great deal more information available from the survey. Some of the things that we would like to provide are we can't because of decisions made by the Community Advisory Panel. They've told us that they didn't want particular kinds of information. Despite the opposition, Zimmerman says he can conduct a valid survey. Up to half of the people who say no to the interview team will be re-contacted in December to see if they'll reconsider. We think if we can make this survey work here in Dallas, then that is good evidence that we can make this survey work in other cities in America.

The time for studies has passed. The time for action is now. Even as the survey began, the gay alliance was staging a media event. We know that during the life of this survey, that 90 Dallas County residents will lose their lives to AIDS. And so what we're doing here, dropping at the doorstep of the agency responsible for those AIDS deaths, the Dallas County Health Department, 90 bodies to symbolize the number of persons who will die during this survey. Webern offered a bounty to people who take the HIV survey forms away from field researchers and send them to him instead. He says the resistance will continue while the research teams are on the streets. Deep inside the Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant, Southwest of Fort Worth, you'll find Edna Otney and Matt Thero.

They work for the Environmental Group, known as Case, the Citizens Association for Sound Energy. Why is this leaking oil? I mean, is that supposed to be leaking oil? Otney and Thero are inspecting the plant. They're here several times a week. This could be a spill from when they service the feed water pump, but possibly it's a leak. Most of the time, I don't see the oil here. Case inspectors follow the quality control officials from Texas utilities to be sure the plant is thoroughly checked. In an office or a desk, things can look great on paper. And it can look like all the requirements are met. And when you come out into the field sometimes, the drawing may show a line, a pipeline.

And in essence, you get out in the field, it's not there. So when you're out in the field, you see the real configurations, the real hardware. Okay, Edna, what we're going to do next is we're going to go verify that two design changes have been implemented. I don't know the status. They may not have been implemented yet, but we're going up there to check. Nowhere else in America to environmental watchdogs get to perform independent inspections like this inside a nuclear power plant. But nowhere else in the nuclear industry has there been an environmental fight quite like the fight at Comanche Peak. The troubles go back to the 1970s when reactor parts were beginning to arrive. Several opposition groups were raising safety concerns. Then employees like electrical foreman Joe MacDall began to blow the whistle on construction problems.

When I first worked there, I started noticing that some of the construction practices were not normal construction practices. And that we weren't really following the procedures, the nuclear regulatory procedures. I had been given procedures to read as to how we did things and how things were supposed to be done. And we weren't following those procedures. The problems were similar to those at other nuclear plants. Inadequate pipe supports, bad hardware, improper welding and sloppy procedures. But at Comanche Peak it seemed like everything was going wrong. We weren't following the engineering drawings. We would find that maybe something wouldn't fit and we would engineer it ourselves. And then we would go get the engineer and then he would come out and say yes or no or whatever. But many times we would just go ahead and build it before it was engineered by the engineering department. Workers say that Texas utilities tried to cover up the problems.

Some employees who spoke up were harassed or fired. There was an atmosphere of you better keep your mouth quiet. If you see a problem just go with the flow. They really tried to suppress that information getting back to the NRC. Some information was getting to the NRC, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Comanche Peak was earning a reputation as the most troubled facility in the nation. Juanita Ellis joins us. You live near the Comanche Peak plant which in our into construction 80 miles from where we speak. You are President of the Citizens Association for Sound Energy, cases the acronym. And you're fighting to ensure that the plant is constructed safely. Does that mean that you're willing to stand? You're willing to allow the plant to continue, but you want assurance that it's safe? Is that your position? No sir, at this point in time we don't think that anybody can go out and find all the problems much less correct them at the plant. Juanita Ellis and Case became the vanguard of Comanche Peak opponents.

Other groups disbanded and put their trust in Ellis. We gradually got hold of us and we got into it more and more and it just changed our life completely. The fight consumed Juanita Ellis and her home. The living room filled up with documents. The dining room furniture was stacked on the porch. The kitchen became a mix of pots and pans and legal briefs. There's too much work that needs to be done and there's not enough hours of the day to do it. It may be a little crazy, but I don't think it's bad. At government hearings, Case was winning. The utility company was ordered to reinspect the plant and rebuild defective sections. Some observers thought Case could keep the plant from ever opening. But Texas utilities made a dramatic announcement in 1988. Teo Electric also recognizes its own shortcomings and assuring the NRC that they fulfilled NRC regulations. It was bureaucratic language, but it meant that Juanita Ellis could come inside and inspect the plant for herself.

We felt that Teo had changed their attitude and that's one of the things that it concerned us mostly. They had changed their attitude and for the first time there were signs that they were ready to admit that yes there were problems and yes they were going to go fix them. Ellis had been trying to prevent the plant from opening, but she agreed not to fight Comanche Peak's license application in return for several concessions. Case inspectors can go into the plant with 48 hours notice for the next few years. Texas utilities has a policy of open door. Case attorneys are teaching plant supervisors how to handle future whistleblowers. You've got to make sure that that employee knows that he is not in trouble for raising the concern, that he did the right thing by coming to you within the chain of command. Case got a seat on the Plants Operations Committee for at least five years and gets to attend closed door safety reviews with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. One of our problems in the hearings process was that we had no good way to take the next logical step which was to monitor the implementation of the plan that they had come up with.

And the plan for the most part looked good. This gave us the way to be able to monitor the implementation of it and be sure that they were carrying out what they said they were going to do. Texas utilities paid $10 million in the settlement. Four and a half million went to Case to cover legal bills, salaries and expenses. Alice got $176,000 in back salary and $35,000 for expenses. Three case board members received wages and expenses totaling $35,000 but the group won't reveal exactly who got what. Five and a half million dollars was divided among 50 whistleblowers. I think it's a bad precedent to set for environmental groups to do that. I think it's a bad precedent set for whistleblowers to do that. And I think the reason for that, the reason I feel so strongly about it is it's because of the appearance of buyout that that gives number one to the group that takes the money and quits after such a long, long struggle. Betty Brink of Fort Worth is president of Citizens for Fair Utility Regulation. It's one of the groups that dropped out of the fight and put its faith in Juanita Ellis.

And under that turn out to be misplaced, trust? It did. I'm sorry to say. I had hoped that they would stay the course as we had intended. And I think that they could have denied the plan a license that they'd done so. I feel strongly that they had made such tremendous strides in uncovering safety problems at the plant and making Texas utilities correct them. That I was totally dumbfounded when they pulled out. We have done nothing to betray anybody's trust. Our goal is, as it always has been, to try to make this plant as safe as possible before it goes online. In the settlement, Texas utilities agreed to finish billions of dollars of repair work and pay $150,000 a year for a case to hire technical experts who will evaluate the repairs. To look over our shoulder out here, you have to take a number. Everybody wants to observe the way we live in the fishbowl.

Comanche Peaks Manager is Austin Scott, a retired Navy admiral who used to command a nuclear submarine. Scott says it's been no problem having environmentalists inside his plant. And our sea is here. Cases here. So we're quite used to being observed. Case inspectors have been inside the plant for 16 months. Edna Ottney worked as an inspector at other plants before coming to Comanche Peaks. When I first entered nuclear power almost 10 years ago, it was, I was in awe. And I wondered how could they possibly construct it, not lose control. But believe it or not, it is a good system and it all falls together. Matt Therro is an intern. He's just out of high school. Oh yeah, I get a kick out of it. I love it. It's a lot of fun. The plant manager says Ottney and Therro haven't changed many things inside.

Well, I don't see much difference. They're here. They're sitting on our meetings. Ask questions. We see them from time to time out in the plant. But I haven't noticed anything significantly different. They go in to the plant under the supervision and care of Texas utilities. They're not independent. They're not independent by any means. They're there at Texas utilities pleasure, if you will. And they see what Texas utilities wants them to see. I think that I'm making a difference. I hope I'm making a difference. I am very much pro safety and pro quality and everything, not just nuclear power. Case inspectors admit they can't cover the entire plant. So they pick areas where they suspect problems. There's a lot of corrosion. Whenever they're in the plant, opting in Therro checked small things too. We have found a lot of the fire extinguishers have not been tested or service. If the power goes off, the emergency lights click on.

And four of these are not working. We have a generic concern with this and we found a lot of them. So we check them as we go through. Under the settlement agreement, when case inspectors find a problem, they're supposed to bring it to the company first. It's a controversial point because some people, like whistleblower Joe MacDoll, don't trust Texas utilities. When you have the interveners inside, being paid by the utility, you diminish the possibility of everything being exposed on the table. Congress is investigating MacDoll's situation. He was not included in the case settlement. Instead, he says the construction contractor, Brown & Root, paid him not to talk to the nuclear regulatory commission. I felt that I could not talk to anybody.

The contractor, Brown & Root denies the charge, but MacDoll isn't satisfied. The nuclear industry needs to be regulated. And it has to be just 100% safe. Not 99.9, but 100% safe. And all of that in order to obtain that 100% safety factor, it has to be public. We can still go public with anything we think needs to be made public. The fact is that most of the time, it's not really news that somebody's doing their job. What is news is that Texas utilities says reactor number one will be ready to operate this fall. Nine years past due, $8.3 billion over budget. The reactor itself is still covered with plastic. There are still questions about wiring in the plant. And safety valves failed a test earlier this year. But Austin Scott says the big problems are being fixed quickly. All the safety related stuff has been looked at and looked at and looked at. You just never get to the point,

at least I don't, where I say, that's it. That's perfect. We're constantly going to be working. We're going to continue to tinker with this thing throughout its life. Not everyone is so optimistic. A group of inspectors from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission wrote an anonymous safety memo last week. In it, they say Texas utilities still has trouble spotting potential problems at Comanche Peak. The inspectors also say that favorable safety reports that were written by their supervisors are incorrect and invalid. We lost our ability to provide cooling water to the reactor core itself. Part of getting ready for startup is practicing what to do when disaster strikes. All this is how much radio activity is going to be spewed out.

And you can slap it up here based on which way the winds blow. Texas utilities passed the disaster test in August. The company doesn't call Comanche Peak a nuclear power plant and most local residents don't seem worried. At the Visitor Center, the control room model is a popular spot for civic group tours. But Betty Brink says she won't give up the fight. She's asking the Nuclear Regulatory Commission or the courts to reopen the license hearing. So far, no luck. I think any of us who are involved in these movements, if you will, have to be very careful not to let the movement consume us. Because once that happens, I think you lose your sense of perspective. And I think Juanita lost hers. Juanita Ellis continues to monitor the flood of paperwork from Comanche Peak, despite the criticism of her and her group. I think it's undeserved, and it hurt a lot. It still does sometimes when I stop and think about it.

Most of the time I don't have time to think about it. I think that we are having an impact, though it's much more subtle, but T.U. for the most part has been responsive to our concerns, and they tried to address them. And we're able to see that things do get fixed. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.