Radiation Exposure Compensation Act

She later founded the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium in 2005.

Their complaints and demands for accountability were finally heard in 1990 when Congress passed the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, or RECA, due to pressure from sympathetic politicians, the downwinders, and the public.

With this act, the government provided $50,000 as a one-time compensation to claimants who passed eligibility.

Initially, the compensation was limited to former uranium miners who fell ill.

Radon can even be in your basement right now, even if there's no uranium mine nearby, so be sure to get it checked.

The communities around uranium mines were never compensated, which added to the struggle downwinders were facing.

The strict limiting qualifications to be eligible for coverage were the subject of complaints that later forced Congress to amend the RECA.

Amendments were eventually approved in 2000, and compensation was given to people who may have been exposed in specific areas around the Nevada test site.

I'm a whistleblower, and I'm a former worker at that plant.

And RECA is supposed to help the community.

It's $150,000 for certain cancers plus a medical card to pay off your bills if you have medical bills.

The big problem is we have no one in Ohio, no representatives in Ohio who has signed on to this bill yet.

We have sent them documents.

And so far, there's been no calls back.

Two years ago, we petitioned Senator Brown, and Senator Brown is the only one who's tried to help us get to RECA.

We had 10 letters from the government councils, the community commissioners, the council members, and local unions and trade unions, all wanting us to have the RECA.

If convicted, he could face up to five years in jail and $250,000 in fines or both.

People exposed to the US government's radioactive waste have only until the end of this year to apply for payouts under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act As St. Louis Public Radio's Rebecca Thiell reports, the St. Louis County Library has partnered with a company to digitize the records people need to file the claims.

More than $100 million has been paid out to Missouri residents affected by waste left over from the Manhattan Project in the 1940s.

It was a top-secret federal government program to create the world's first atomic bombs during World War II.

Well, I think about how history, sadly, is repeating itself because, you know, we have, you know, in Arizona in particular, there's the reopening of the Pinon Plain mine, which has caused a lot of controversy because of the impact on Indigenous communities.

But this this is also going on today in a different way, right, because there is pressure on lawmakers in Washington to reauthorize and expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act before the end of the year, which is coming up rapidly here.

What kind of difference would that make for the downwinders that you profile here?

It would make a big difference.

That's the Portsmouth-Piketon Residence for Environmental Safety and Security.

United States Senators James Moylan and Gabe Vasquez have introduced a bill that would expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, or RICA, coverage.

RICA helps people who have been victimized by government exposure to radiation by paying some money for their medical bills.

Veena Kali and the PRESS organization said, have been pushing to have both Pike and Scioto counties in Ohio to be included in the expanded RECA coverage.