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. Thursday, January 31, 2002 3:23 PM 9-11 Victims' Compensation Dear Mr. Feinberg: Thankyou for the opportunity to comment about the law governing victims' compensation for the September 11th tragedy. I understand that I am late to this, however, an editorial in the Washington Post by &nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp has promted me to share my opinion. First, let me say that I am not related to anyone who lost a loved one that day. I have many ties to NYC - my husband and I traveled many times through the Twin Towers and had a first date in the Windows restaurant. We feel great sympathy for the families and we, as well as our children, donated money to organizations helping these families. What has me concerned is the apparent sense of entitlement and growing dissatisafction on the part of many of the victims' families about the governments attempt to "compensate" for their loss. On many levels, this is disconcerting and sad. What I cannot fathom is, no amount of money can "compensate" for the loss of a loved and if it were me, any monetary payment would be welcomed as I begin to make peace with the loss. Why do these families want to prolong their grief- as in lawsuits - to inflate their compensations? If , as so many families state, it isn't "about the money" then why are they complaining and threatening if the guidelines are not changed to suit them? As I reviewed many of the comments, there were several issues that I felt compelled to respond to. In no particular order: 1) Definition of "kin" - It seems that there are several groups of people who do not agree with the definition of family member for beneficiary purposes. I agree that gay partners should receive any compensation due their partners. Since they cannot legally marry, if they can prove that they were in a "marital" or otherwise, familial relationship, that should fulfill the definition. As for fiances - the fact that they were not married does not entitle them to the same rights as those married. Sure, there is likely the same loss and perhaps people cohabitating feel they should be viewed the same way, and I find it rather interesting that there was no urgency to "make it legal" for cohabitators yet when it comes time to "collect" the goodies associated with legal status, then, it becomes and urgent matter for them. There has to be some reasonable way to define family member which is consistent with other types of governmental entitlements or legal terms. 2) Issue of "justice" and "non-economic" collateral - In some of the comments, people reference the cap on "pain & suffering" awards. First of all, the issue of the collateral source rule does not have the same application here as in other crimes. The government - who is making the award - is not responsible for the loss. It is only out of generosity and sheer magnitude, that these victims have a hallowed status among others in the government's eye for justice. We did not compensate other victims of other tragedies (Oklahoma etc) to anywhere near the degree. Most Americans would be happy to see victim's families receive a fair compensation; we just do not like the unappreciative comments. Since no amount of money would be adequate, there again has to be a reasonable way to calculate the awards. It seems that people do not like the way that their family member were "valued" compared with others. One woman had the nerve to state that her husband was an ivy league educated MBA and the implication was that he should have a different amount of compensation than the firemen because they had a "choice" to go in an risk their lives and her husband was only going to work. What did she think those firemen were doing? It was the firemen who chose to go in and save others lives. Surely, it is not a penalty to deduct the value of life insurance policies. The fact that some people planned better for a catastrophic financial loss should be of great comfort to those whose family members did so. Instead, some believe that they are being punished. There will be no way to assuage everyone's feelings about the issue of value and compensation and fairness. It seems to me that the only way to view this tragic "pay-off" is to keep it equitable as the same loss was experienced by each of the families. That there may be huge disparities among the future losses (of income, companionship etc) cannot be compensated for......... I wish you much luck and wisdom in sorting this out. I think you have made a fair and reasonable attempt in enacting these guidelines. As a very patriotic American, former New Yorker, current Washingtonian, I am deeply outraged at this attack and feel deep sympathy for the families. We all cried billions of tears for this loss of life. It seems, though, that we must quickly determine what is a fair compensation and move forward. I hope that the victims' families can try to view this law as an unprecedented outreach by our government and our citizens to, in part, allow them to also move on with their lives with some measure of financial security. Do not allow greed to taint this outpouring of generosity and collective spiritual support. I wish everyone peace. Individual Comment September 11 Email: Date The local time and date when the message was written. 2002-01-31 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 dojP000309.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. 2002-01-31