Homer was to provide me with and refresh my memory on what
the Government in the Sunshine Act says, and I just want to
refresh my memory and perhaps yours, as well. It says that the
agency has to retain its transcript for two years. It does not say
you can't see it for two years. In fact, it says the opposite.
It must be made available for inspection upon request -- no, not
six month later like you do under FOIA, but upon request. And
secondly, what it says is that it Should be made available to the
general public. And so I'd like to just restate that if one of the
core underpinnings of the credibility of this program, which is
derived from what you do, is please post the transcripts on your
web site of your closed session with appropriate redactions at the
same time you post the transcripts of this open session that's held
here today and has been held for the last two days. I really think
you need to do it. And if you're going to meet behind closed doors
and you're going to debate process, and you're going to debate
how you're going to resolve conflict, and you're going to make
policy decisions about processing
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these dose reconstruction evaluations, and you're going to set up
foregoing review processes, these aren't things covered under the
Privacy Act. Those are policy issues you were discussing behind
closed doors. But we're locked out while you do it behind there
and I really think you need to have the light of day, sunshine
come in and let everybody see what y'all were talking about
behind closed doors. The second thing I would like to suggest is
a process for how to resolve -- what was remarkable to me just
sitting in the audience today was the debate going on over the site
profile. This was not a polite exchange. This was people gritting
their teeth at each other. What's going on here? And is that what's
going on with the dose reconstruction audits, as well? People are
gritting their teeth at each other? Is this how we're going to
resolve disagreements or questions about the scientific credibility
about what's going on? People are hunkered down in their bunkers,
firing facts or mischaracterizing each other's positions so you can
knock them down. Is it one straw man for one and one straw man
for the other? Is this
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how we're going to get to the credibility of the issues? Is that -- is
that what the tone is? 'Cause from me sitting here and the
impressions I've carried away from this meeting is that the tone
of the debate seems to be quite adversarial, and I wish it wasn't.
Because it makes me question if people are defensive about the
facts or defensive about how they interpret the science or that
people say one should not challenge whether or not it is sufficient
