Editorial: Whistle-blowers get treated deplorably

Sunday, May 28, 2000 | 9:36 a.m.

Disturbing allegations were raised last week that the Department of Energy, instead of protecting workers who had raised safety concerns at its nuclear weapons plants, actually reimbursed the legal bills of DOE contractors who were found to have retaliated against these workers. In fact, what especially upset members of the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations is that five years ago then-Secretary of Energy Hazel O'Leary pledged a policy of "zero tolerance for reprisals" against workers by their DOE-contractor employers.

In one of the cases the House panel heard, the DOE paid $500,000 in legal costs for a contractor that fired pipefitters who raised safety concerns at the Hanford nuclear site in Washington. In another instance, a company at the Rocky Flats plutonium plant outside of Denver retaliated against an employee who voiced his concerns about the safety of bomb fuel that was stored there. So what was the DOE's reaction? The agency reimbursed the contractor, Kaiser-Hill, $220,000 in legal fees for challenging the claims of the whistle-blower.

The DOE relies so heavily on contractors (about 11,000 DOE employees oversee 110,000 contract workers) that it seems to have forgotten that the agency is supposed to be running the store. There is no excuse for a government agency to reimburse the legal bills of its contractors that are engaging in reprisals against whistleblowers. Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson should demand an end to this sorry practice of having taxpayers foot these legal costs.

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