Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2001 | 11:19 a.m.
Copyright 2000 Las Vegas Sun
The Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce will consider for the first time formally opposing the storage of high level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, the Sun has learned.
The 6,500-member organization of local businesses has stayed out of the fight for two decades.
But the battle has intensified in recent weeks amid a federal investigation into alleged bias on the part of the Energy Department and its chief Yucca Mountain contractor in the site-selection process.
"Obviously, stopping nuclear waste is important to the community," chamber President Pat Shalmy said Tuesday. "With the changes that have taken place in Washington, it seems to be a hot topic again."
Shalmy said the chamber's 25-member board will vote on a Yucca resolution at its Jan. 31 meeting.
A similar resolution was passed by the chamber's ally in the casino industry, the Nevada Resort Association, in September 1991.
A lively discussion of Yucca Mountain surfaced at a chamber retreat attended by Shalmy last weekend.
As a result, Shalmy said, he asked board member Phil Peckman, chief operating officer of the Greenspun Corp., owned by the Greenspun family, who also own the Sun to introduce the resolution at the next board meeting.
Peckman said storing deadly nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, could result in an economic disaster for the community.
"We (the chamber) need to be opposed to the dump, and I hope we will be," Peckman said.
Shalmy said the timing is right for the chamber to take its first public stance against the Yucca Mountain project.
The DOE has been accused of bias in favor of the project, as the agency gears up to decide whether to recommend the Nevada site to President-elect George W. Bush.
Yucca Mountain is the only site under study to accept 77,000 tons of deadly radioactive waste from nuclear plants around the country.
A team of investigators from the DOE's inspector general office are expected in Las Vegas next month to probe whether federal laws were broken during the site-selection process.
The DOE is prohibited from taking sides in the process, but documents obtained by the Sun last month showed the agency might have been collaborating behind the scenes with the nuclear industry to promote Yucca Mountain to Congress.
Sun stories on the DOE's alleged bias prompted prominent chamber member Stephen Cloobeck to organize a communitywide campaign against the dump.
Cloobeck, president and chief executive of Diamond Resorts International, a company that runs several time-sharing condominium projects on the Strip, has arranged a public meeting at 1 p.m. Thursday at the Clark County Commission chambers to discuss the campaign.
Cloobeck said Las Vegas stands to lose billions of dollars if a nuclear accident were to occur along the routes leading to Yucca Mountain. Those routes travel through the heart of city.
Cloobeck welcomed the Chamber of Commerce into the fight.
"That's absolutely fantastic," he said. "It's nice to see them stepping up."
Gov. Kenny Guinn, who is supporting Cloobeck's effort, said he was pleased to hear about the chamber's resolution.
"I think the more people we can get involved, the better it is for us," Guinn told the Sun this morning. "This is a good step for them to take."
Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, the state's Yucca Mountain watchdog, also praised the chamber's action.
"I think it's a tremendous boost in the fight," he said. "The opposition really seems to be materializing."
Having the chamber in the battle will help the state raise money from private funds to spread its message of opposition around the country, Guinn said.
"What this will do is help us get more financial support from the business people," he said. "We need that kind of support so that we can gain financial strength."
Guinn said the state of Utah now has become an ally in Nevada's fight against a repository at Yucca Mountain.
Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt has proposed creating a state office similar to Nevada's nuclear projects agency to oppose the storing of nuclear waste in his state, Guinn said.
Leavitt, Guinn said, also is concerned that high-level nuclear waste headed for Yucca Mountain is slated to come through Salt Lake City.
Guinn said he talked with Leavitt over the weekend about coming up with a joint strategy to fight nuclear waste.
The two Republican governors chatted during a visit to Bush's Texas ranch.
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