Some call for preschool nuclear evacuation plans

MIDDLETOWN, Pa. -- If an accident or terrorist attack at a nuclear power plant required an evacuation, plans already exist to get school children and nursing home residents out of harm's way.

But preschools and day care centers around nuclear plants aren't required to have evacuation plans, and child-care officials say many don't.

The father of a child who attends a nursery near the Three Mile Island nuclear plant has petitioned the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to require child-care facilities within 10 miles of a nuclear plant to file emergency plans.

Critics say the lack of such plans could be problematic -- or dangerous -- if there is an accident or attack.

"I was dumbfounded to find out that our most vulnerable population was left out of the planning," said Larry Christian, the New Cumberland parent who filed the petition last fall with Eric Epstein, member of a nuclear watchdog group. "It angered me quite a bit."

The petition has drawn the support of state Attorney General Mike Fisher, state Rep. Bruce Smith, R-Dillsburg, Lancaster County's Emergency Management Agency and Harrisburg Mayor Stephen Reed.

Smith, whose district includes areas within the 10-mile evacuation zone around TMI, said the NRC needs to update its rules.

He noted that day care programs for children are more prevalent now then they were in 1979, the year a portion of the core of Three Mile Island's reactor melted.

No action

The NRC has taken no action on the petition, which the nuclear industry and the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency oppose.

"We just don't think that the NRC ... or state government should be establishing rules that usurp a parent's right," said PEMA Director David M. Sanko.

Instead, PEMA is encouraging private child-care centers and nursery schools to voluntarily develop emergency plans and file them with local emergency officials.

Epstein, member of the group Three Mile Island Alert, called Sanko's position "irresponsible" and "pre-9/11."