Soil Cleanup Planning 305 to make, based on review and determl ned that the decisions were his with all parties concerned with Enewetak cleanup and tion “ the islands were not yet cehabilitati on. Although all the data on all consulta reached where decisions had to be made available, he point had been so that soll cleanup operations could commence. since Two major ¢ hanges which affected soil removal had occurred the project began. First, based on Field Command’s studies, experience factors, and radiological considerations, estimates of the columes of soil to be removed had increased significantly. Second, new guidelines for transuranic contamination limits had been proposed by the EPA which had been interpreted by the Bair Committee to require soil cleanup criteria to be lowered significantly; -e., from 400 pCi/g to 160 pCi/g for food-gathering islands and from 100 pCi/g to 80 pCi/g for agriculture islands. The factors which had not changed were the charter from the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) to do the job with the same amountof Service resources, and in the same amountof time. The planned completion date was still 15 April 1980. The Director, as DOD Project Manager, would balance resources against requirements, exercising responsible stewardship of Service resources assigned to the project and realizing that cleanup of radiological contamination could become an endless task. The decisions that were made must go beyond immediate results and stand the test of time—30 years in the future—when the impact of poor decisions would be felt by a people who had already suffered greatly. Any such decisions would certainly reflect adversely upon the United States. In making these decisions, the Director, DNA needed the participation and advice of all conferees, as well as their understanding that all the decisions wouid not, in every case, please everyone. Manyfactors had to be balanced: the people’s benefit, the funds, the time available, the lack of some data, and most ofall the fact that soil cleanup must begin as soon as possible. 86 BG Tate reemphasized that the primary goal of the conference was to dele rmine where to begin soil cleanup and to whatlevels it should be carti ed out so that the JTG could start moving soil on | June 1978. He dese ribed the constraints as follows: a. Optimize benefit to the dri-Enewetak/dri-Enjebi. b. Stay within $20 million MILCON funding appropriated by Congress. Ensurethat soil cleanup decisions did not delay the planned 15 April 1980 completion date. d. Minimize changes in Service/DOE-allocated manpower and equipment resources. t.