1. Discuss why Rebecca Long has an ethical responsibility to take some action about her suspicion of illegal dumping of toxic wastes.

2. For each of the three alternative courses of action, explain whether the action is appropriate.

3. Assume that Rebecca sought the advice of the vice president, finance and discovered that he knew about and approved of the dumping of toxic wastes. What steps should she take to resolve the conflict in this situation?

Yukon Mining Company extracts and processes a variety of ores and minerals. One of its operations is a coal-cleaning plant that produces toxic wastes. For many years the wastes have been properly disposed of through National Disposal, a company experienced in disposing of such items. However, disposal of the toxic waste was becoming an economic hardship because increasing government regulations had caused the cost of such disposal to quadruple in the last six years.

Rebecca Long, director of financial reporting for Yukon Mining, was preparing the company’s financial statements for the year ended June 30, 1998. In researching the material needed for preparing a footnote on environmental contingencies, Rebecca found the following note scribbled in pencil at the bottom of a memo to the general manager of the coal-cleaning plant. The body of the memo gave details on the increases in the cost of toxic waste disposals:

Ralph—We’ve got to keep these costs down or we won’t meet budget. Can we mix more of these wastes with the shipments of refuse to the Oak Hill landfill? Nobody seems to notice the coalcleaning
fluids when we mix it in well. Rebecca was bothered by the note. She considered ignoring it, pretending that she had not seen it. But, after a couple of hours, her conscience would not let her do it. Therefore, she pondered the following three alternative courses of action:
Seek the advice of her boss, the vice president, finance, of Yukon. Anonymously release the information to the local newspaper. Give the information to an outside member of the board of directors of Yukon whom she knows because he lives in her neighbourhood.