You Say You Want an Evolution

Dear God,

Those of us in the PR Department at Entergy Vermont Yankee go to great lengths to try to convince the legislators, the Department of Public Service, and the people of Vermont and neighboring New Hampshire and Massachusetts that VY is on the leading edge of the next great wave of global warming antidotes and that we, the staff, take seriously our obligation to protect the health and safety of the community around us. But items like this one from our HR Department make it hard for those of us in PR to keep much of a poker face while we say all of that good stuff that we need to say.

The item:

At nukeworker.com the VY Human Resources department posted a job for "Supervisor, Radiation Protection." It's a well-paying job, too--"Salary: $76,000 - $114,000" and applicants don't even need a college degree. Apparently, what's more important in the Radiation Protection department at Vermont Yankee than a knowledge of either radiation or protection is knowing how to juggle "conflicting priorities" (like health vs. profits?) and "function within the budget" (yep; health vs. profits). Furthermore, while a thorough understanding of the topics at hand is not a must, what we'd really like in an applicant is someone with "at least 5 years experience in PR Operations."

And why would our Supervisor of Radiation Protection need more expertise in PR than in Radiation Protection? So that he or she can help with the gargantuan job of convincing people that we're protecting them from radiation poisoning when we're not? Quoting from a Reformer article of 9/14/2007:

[A]nother Chernobyl or 9/11 situation may not be necessary to affect the health of residents near Vermont Yankee. All reactors routinely emit over 100 radioactive chemicals found only in atomic bombs or nuclear reactors into the air and water. These chemicals enter the body through breathing and the food chain, where they kill and injure cells. Each chemical can cause cancer and is especially harmful to infants and children.
The radioactive cocktail includes Strontium-90, which attaches to bone; Cesium-137, which disperses throughout soft tissues; and Iodine-131, which seeks out the thyroid gland. While levels of these chemicals that enter bodies are relatively low, a blue-ribbon National Academy of Sciences panel concluded in 2005 that there is no safe dose of radiation.

Windham County, where Vermont Yankee is located, has no obvious characteristics that place it at high risk for disease. Compared to other Vermont counties, Windham has about the same proportion of elderly, minorities, foreign born residents, educational level, income, and poverty level. The county has no unusually great concentration of polluting industry. It also has access to world-class medical care in Boston.

But in the past quarter century, Windham death rates for infants, children, and young adults are 13% to 37% above the rest of the state. A total of 244 deaths in county residents under age 35 occurred during this time. Because the youngest are at greatest risk for health problems from radiation exposure, this patterns raises questions.

The county death rate from cancer, for people of all ages, was 5% below the rest of Vermont two decades ago, but now has risen to a level 10% above – even though current death rates in Windham for all other causes are 1% below the rest of the state.

There are many contributing factors that can account for deaths in young people and from cancer. But none are apparent to explain the high rates in Windham County. A thorough investigation of potential reasons should be undertaken by health authorities, and emissions from Vermont Yankee should be one of these.

Would we want someone with PR experience to help us deflect public concern from VY's consistently bizarre allocation of monetary and personnel resources? Do we want help making sure that VY can continue to brag about providing well-paying jobs (and apparently we do provide well paying jobs, even to high school graduates) while hoping against hope that the public won't ask whether the folks we've hired to protect our workers and the public from radiation poisoning are, indeed, qualified to protect them?

To borrow some choice words from my buddy Philip Baruth, who slammed me when I used the word "evolution" to describe the gradual disintegration of our condenser's ability to keep river water from leaking in where it's not supposed to be, "VY’s language [in this job posting] is exceptionally upfucked, even for VY." Exceptionally "downfucked," actually, is what I'd say about HR's language in this job posting.

But ... you know it was probably just a typo in that job posting. In which case, don't you know it's gonna be (scooby doo) all right? And don't you wish that the staff at the nuclear power plant near you were a little better at paying attention to what keys they're pushing when?

Amen,

Fake-Rob