Part 3: A Feint at Oversight — OHA Investigation Summary

The chair of OHA's oversight board asked the agency he oversaw to decide what he should say in public.
- Four days before facing the public over OHA's discredited report, OHPB chair David Bangsberg, M.D. emailed senior OHA staff: "LMK if you want me to read part, none or the whole thing tues. I am perfectly happy w all of the above."
- Source: a 68-page email file obtained through a public records request — "OHA Communications to/from David Bangsberg Related to SB 283."
The statement began as an OHA template written by a policy expert, not a scientist.
- Cara Biddlecom, OHA's Deputy Public Health Director, drafted the template and copied the report's "insufficient evidence" finding — but left out the next sentence: that some studies found an association between long-term cell phone use and brain cancers.
- Bangsberg adopted her paragraph nearly word for word, repeating the same omission.
- The template also claimed "most studies found no association" — contradicted by the report's own appendix (84 studies found adverse effects vs. 82 that did not).
Ali Hamade — the lead author who had deleted the evidence — was invited to edit the oversight board's defense of his own report.
- Bangsberg turned to Hamade rather than the policy administrators Biddlecom had assembled (none with epidemiological background).
- Eight senior OHA staff contributed to drafting the response. None addressed any of the public's substantive criticisms.
Bangsberg's statement admitted the state could not rule out increased risk to children — then immediately dropped the matter.
- The key sentence: "While the available data do not prove a causal effect, neither do they exclude the possibility of a causal effect."
- This directly contradicted the SB 283 report's conclusion. By most lights, it was a call for revision, further research, and action by the Department of Education as mandated by SB 283.
- His very next sentence: "OHA recognizes the many benefits of wireless technology." No funding, no commitment, no follow-up.
Only one board member, Jessica Gomez, asked if there would be further investigation. She was told no.
- OHA's Jeremy Vandehey, director of Health Policy and Analytics, deferred to a press person and offered: "This report came from a legislative request for us to review the evidence that was out there and so on."
- The other seven board members said nothing. No one investigated the public's complaints, questioned the report's authors, or called OHA to account.
The statement was buried.
- No news release on OHA's main website. The statement was posted deep within OHPB's obscure site, among twelve documents for one meeting. The August 3 meeting video (at 9:00) is the only accessible record.
- Devra Davis (Environmental Health Trust, National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences): "Risk to children cannot be excluded. So now the question is do these people have the courage to communicate this to the public?"
OHA coached Bangsberg on how to dismiss the reporter who had exposed the report's problems in The Washington Spectator.
- More than half the 68-page email file concerns the "Response to Dan Forbes."
- Vandehey coached Bangsberg to frame his reply so it was "clear that you've considered his feedback but aren't going to continue to respond."
- Bangsberg called his own statement mere "technical clarifications" and said he had "advised OHA to move on with what I believe are more pressing priorities."
Contacted in July 2026, Bangsberg stood by the statement OHA drafted. "I have no further comment."
- OHA never revisited the report. The Department of Education never developed the recommendations SB 283 required.
- No one has informed a single parent in Oregon that the state could not rule out harm to children from wireless radiation in classrooms — and decided to move on.

A Feint at Oversight

Primary sources

The 68-Page Email File

The Removal Record

Inside the Drafts

The Investigation Timeline