Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Department of Justice Emails Description An account of the resource The Department of Justice received more than 11,000 e-mails in response to the agency's public solicitation for comments upon its plans to distribute the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001 established by Congress to benefit the victims of September 11 and their families. These e-mails have been organized here by date. September 11 Email September 11 Email: Body The basic content, as unstructured text; sometimes containing a signature block at the end. Monday, January 21, 2002 12:57 PM Victims Compensation Fund I am the surviving spouse of a TWC victim, . She worked on the floor of WTC Tower 2 for the . The victims compensation fund as proposed in the interim final regulations is an insult to her memory and an invitation for many surviving families to sue, rather than to accept the crumbs being offered. The idea, seemingly created unilaterally by Mr. Feinberg, that each life is worth only $250,000 is absurd. Given the awards granted in litigation with respect to non-economic loss, quite often in the millions of dollars, it is an insult to us and the victims to offer such a pittance. I appreciate the fact that Congress provided for collateral offsets, but they should apply, if at all, to economic losses, not grief, suffering, loss of companionship, etc. There are no monetary offsets to ease that pain. The regulations indicate that the award would not be subject to income tax, but do not address estate tax issues. Is the award payable to the estate, and therefore subject to immediate estate taxes, or is it payable to the families ? In calculating the collateral offset amounts, many of us have offsets that are not easy to quantify. I will receive 50 % of my wife's salary, indexed for inflation, until the earlier of my remarrying, or my death. How do I, or you, calculate the amount of the offset ? Without knowing how to make the calculation, how are we expected to make an informed decision ? Even if we assume that I will not remarry, do I include the payments for my full actuarial life expectancy, or only for the time period for which you gave credit for her anticipated earnings ? Those families that will receive nothing, such as most uniformed service situations, and those where earnings were greater than $231,000 are virtually being invited to litigate rather than participate in the fund. It seems illogical that Congress intended that to be the result. There is no dollar cap in the Act itself, and accordingly there seems to be no basis in law for its arbitrary imposition. Allowing an appeal for unusual circumstances is not the same as removing this unilateral restriction. I look forward to the promulgation of final rules and regulations that will address these and other issues, such as the use of inappropriate tables. Individual Comment New York, NY September 11 Email: Date The local time and date when the message was written. 2002-01-21 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource dojN002168.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. email Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-01-21