Community radiation monitoring program

The Community Radiation Monitoring Program began its ninth year in the summer of 1989, continuing as an essential portion of the Environmental Protection Agency's long-standing off-site monitoring effort. It is a cooperative venture between the Department of Energy (DOE), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the University of Utah (U of U), and the Desert Research Institute (DRI) of the University of Nevada System. The objectives of the program include enhancing and augmenting the collection of environmental radiation data at selected sites around the Nevada Test Site (NTS), increasing public awareness of that effort, and involving, in as many ways as possible, the residents of the off-site area in these and other areas related to testing nuclear weapons. This understanding and improved communication is fostered by hiring residents of the communities where the monitoring stations are located as program representatives, presenting public education forums in those and other communities, disseminating information on radiation monitoring and related subjects, and developing and maintaining contacts with local citizens and elected officials in the off-site areas. 8 refs., 4 figs., 4 tabs.