I have just returned from a
trip to Washington, 75 degrees
for the whole time I was there,
and I had full 1 hour meetings
about the Fort McClellan patient
group at 3 places, the House,
the Senate, and the VA Secretary's
office.

The excuse for holdback at the
VA agency itself was they had
received wrong and incorrect
information that the Monsanto
civilian class actions were still
in progress. They are not. I
have sent down the required proofing
documents to put that issue to
rest and from there, right now,
we have no high level opponents
in the Fort McClellan pursuit
for medical justice.

The only questions floating between
the 3 parties are which order
and ranking the Fort McClellan
implementation should be done.

I did get commitments for
various parties to pick up one
or two parts of the McClellan
Bills. We have asked the VA
Secretary point blank for the
national health registery in
our name, which he is empowered
to do without going through
Congress. We think this will be
better and faster and then
leave the more complicated
implementations to The Hill.

VDBC Commission hearings are
about to resume as early as
January 24th at the House and
the Senate has also indicated
several are coming up on their
side of the Capitol also.

It has been agreed that the
Fort McClellan project does
NOT have to wait to be
implemented with the entire
VDBC report, but instead, can
be and should be, isolated
as a standalone implementation.
This verification came from
a Senate legislative attorney.
So we are on our way and in
the cue and holding, and waiting
for LIFTOFF !!

New patients are still entering
the group, many via this website,
and they are processed in as fast
as I can make it happen when
not travelling.

My only advice right now to those
standing by, we will be watching
the Bills emerge like OnStar stuck
in a dashboard, and we are directly
in touch by email with the VA
Secretary's Office in the event
that any other questions or issues
comes up prior to public announcements.

We have a doctor now as a VA
Secretary, and I am throwing my
trust to the wind in his direction
and believe he will do the right
thing on this matter.

REPLY:

As you have seen, we are still working
in Washington to activate our national
health registery and national study
on our Veterans population.

The larger part of the active contamination
zone ran from the years 1955 to 1977
and we are using that for now, as our
cutoff date.

Water and soil contamination in
the rental housing market in downtown
would be your most likely source
after 1977 (which was airborne
prior to that year).

The fact they are taking so long
on doing this implementation tells
me that they do for sure, have
a blur on the years and defining
actually what the risks were
even after 1977.

As "official" announcements on
the Fort McClellan occur, it will
be posted on www.VA.gov since that
is where most of our work with
the VA Secretary is going on.

I am new to this discussion board. I actually just discovered the problems in Anniston, Alabama - stumbled onto it, as it were. I went back to college to earn my AA degree and Paralegal certificate & was online doing research for an essay I am writing about gender-integrated Basic Training vs. gender-segregated Basic Training. I was shocked when I started reading about Monsanto and what happened in Anniston. I have an important question: I went to Basic at Ft. McClellan from Feb. to Apr. 1980. Does 8 weeks in PCB zone constitute a danger and how do I find out whether I was exposed? Is there a blood test or something to detect PCB in the body? I have a 15 yr old daughter and I'm worried about the possible ramifications to her much more than myself. Please could someone give me information - I'm scared.