Nevada mayors to lobby against Yucca at conference

Diana Sahagun

Thursday, June 13, 2002 | 9:13 a.m.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman will join Reno's mayor in Madison, Wis., at the annual U.S. Conference of Mayors to help lobby for a resolution urging the Senate to postpone a decision on Yucca Mountain.

The resolution, sponsored by Reno Mayor Jeff Griffin and Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, is scheduled to be heard by a 14-member committee of mayors this weekend.

Goodman plans to help Griffin and Anderson lobby the committee members to approve the resolution, then forward it to approximately 200 U.S. mayors at the conference for a final vote on Monday.

"I'll try to show them that they're going to be affected and get their votes in the committee," said Goodman, who has also written a letter to the mayors of more than 200 U.S. cities urging them to approve the resolution.

Approval by the mayors is critical to Nevada's fight, Goodman said, with only days or weeks left before the Senate is expected to vote on the proposed nuclear waste repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

The resolution asks the Senate to postpone plans for the site because the Department of Energy "has no feasible plan for transportation of these materials to the Yucca Mountain repository ..."

The resolution also alleges that during the course of transporting high-level waste to Yucca Mountain, a single terrorist attack could result in thousands of cancer deaths and cost up to $17 billion in cleanup costs.

The resolution is the latest tactic to increase pressure on key officials to side with Nevada. This week a new website was unveiled that allows users to track how close nuclear waste could travel to their homes if the repository is approved. Goodman last month traveled to Salt Lake City for a massive media campaign to increase awareness of the dangers of transporting nuclear waste across the country.

Griffin, who is active in the mayors conference as a board member and a committee chairman, said he is confident the resolution will be forwarded to to the mayors for a final vote. While the state has its own legal fight, much can be accomplished by lobbying mayors, who then put pressure on their leaders, Griffin said.

"I think it's a lot more effective to have the mayors of America on your side complaining to your state legislature and congressional delegation to say wait a second, don't vote for this," Griffin said.

Griffin plans to cite last summer's accident in Baltimore -- in which a train hauling toxic material derailed in a tunnel -- as cause for a delay by the Senate. The accident led to a fire that shut down a portion of the city for more than a week.

"What if it were high-level nuclear waste?" Griffin said. "That's really the point I'm going to make."