Feds don’t really want to clean it up

Regarding your Thursday editorial, “A harder line on Hanford”: When the signature gatherer asked my husband and I to sign the initiative to get the measure to force the feds to clean up Hanford on the ballot I was laughing. Not laughing with mirth, but over the idea that We the People can force the feds to do anything with Hanford. My brother has worked for all the contractors on the designs to clean up since the late ’70s. My brother will tell you the government tells the contractor what specifications they will accept. Next: the contractor design team (my brother’s team of engineers) sets to work doing exactly what they have been told to design. The design is presented to the government and in the next few months soundly rejected. When the first rejection of a submitted design came back my brother was so discouraged, but one of the older engineers told him this is the game because the fed’s do not want to clean up Hanford. It is cheaper to go through all the design process than to actually clean up the Reach. They have done a few projects on the Reach, but those are emergency measures to deal with leaking tanks of waste. In six years my brother will retire and he wishes it were tomorrow because he is sick of the game!

Kathy Anderson

Everett