Recount Affirms Slim Nod To Fund Nuke Site

BETSY BLANEY

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) — A recount Thursday affirmed the narrow margin in an election last weekend that allows Andrews County officials to issue $75 million in bonds to help a company build a low-level radioactive waste disposal site in West Texas.

Saturday results showed the measure passed by three votes, 642-639. The recount, requested by opponents of the bonds, was done by hand and retained the same three-vote margin, Andrews City Manager Glen Hackler said.

The measure gives county officials the ability to issue the bonds used to purchase Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists' assets and lease those back to the company.

The company, which was issued a low-level radioactive waste disposal license in January by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, already stores the material at the site about 30 miles west of the city of Andrews and 370 miles west of Dallas.

The waste will come from Texas and Vermont and from sites run by the federal government.

Hackler said the small margin was not a reflection of diminished support of the company's operation.