Nerve gas depot looks to high schoolers for future

August 6, 2006

BY JEFFREY McMURRAY ASSOCIATED PRESS

RICHMOND, Ky.-- It's not the type of job easily filled with a classified ad.

The federal government will thoroughly examine each prospective worker's background. The positions expire in a few short years. And, oh yeah, the work involves handling some of the world's most deadly materials.

Around 2010, Blue Grass Army Depot will likely be the nation's final chemical weapons depository to begin disarming its stockpile of mustard gas, sarin and other agents as mandated by an international treaty.

But officials are quickly realizing there are advantages to going last--particularly when it comes to hiring practices. While sites in Utah and elsewhere resorted to out-of-state job fairs because they couldn't find enough skilled homegrown workers to fill the slots, Blue Grass is trying a different approach for its estimated 900 openings.

Recruiters plan to go after high school students and possibly some even younger to talk up the lucrative employment, offer early training and get graduates immediately started on a high-tech career.

"When you looked at the skills this project was going to need, it was obvious that's not what was here," said Dave Easter, spokesman for the depot. "You were going to have to go back to late elementary, early middle school to get those kids interested."

Groundbreaking for the eventual disposal facility is scheduled early next year. Under the terms of the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, arms stockpiled at eight sites across the country must be destroyed by 2012.

Currently the deadliest materials at Blue Grass are housed in earth-covered "igloos," surrounded by a double barbed-wire fence and several acres of forest. Only the access road is under construction now, and even the drivers who carry truckloads of gravel must undergo strict federal background checks.

One drunken-driving conviction or another brush with the law and a prospective worker is crossed off the list.

Community groups around Richmond, a college town 20 miles south of Lexington, adamantly insisted on local hiring, not just for these jobs but to build a more skilled work force in an area with room to improve.

Today the city is getting a weapons disposal plant, they reason. Tomorrow, perhaps another high-tech business could follow.

"We've got the infrastructure, the quality of life, the cost of living, the Southern hospitality, and by the way, we've got 500 people looking for work who are immensely qualified, incredibly viable and very productive," said Chris Haynes, manager for Bechtel Parsons Blue Grass, a contractor in charge of the project.

Recently much of the early opposition to the weapons destruction has been muted, largely because unlike other sites that use incinerators, Blue Grass plans a "cold" neutralization of the weapons by mixing them with liquid chemicals.

One Bechtel Parsons official talked up the hiring needs during a Baptist women's group meeting. Others have made frequent trips to the city's vocational-technical school and were welcomed with open arms.

When a Bechtel Parsons manager asked the school's principal, Doug West, whether he had any titanium welders, West's immediate reply was: "No, but I can get some."

Not all communities with a weapons stockpile have enjoyed this sort of recruiting success.

Brenda Mugleston, who has worked 13 years at the destruction site in Tooele, Utah, said the early hiring there was total disarray.

Although recent high school graduates, some from outside the area, are a major part of the Utah work force, Mugleston said many aren't prepared. She says more training would help but remains skeptical about whether recent graduates should work in the business under any circumstances.

"A lot of them would quit within a few days," she said. "They're putting those kids at risk. They're way too young and don't know what they're dealing with."

Craig Williams, director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group, a watchdog organization in Berea, Ky., has been a vocal opponent of some of the government's destruction practices, but he says he supports the hiring approach in Richmond.

"You're not going to get some kid out of high school walking in and being the chief safety manager," Williams said. "Their safety culture is quite impressive, even at the current level where they're just building roads."

Bechtel Parsons' goal is to fill more than 75 percent of the positions from Richmond and the surrounding counties. West says if early enthusiasm is any measure, that will be no problem.

"If they're good-paying jobs, obviously they'll be in line," he said. "Everybody will want to go to those. It's just natural. It looks good on a resume, doesn't it?"