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 2:49 PM Victim Compensation Fund Dear Mr. Feinberg, My name is . I am the mother of two small children, ages 5 and 10. My husband, , was taken from us as a result of the unspeakable horror that occurred on September 11, 2001. was only 39 years old, just entering the prime of his life. He was a wonderful husband and father, working very hard, commuting from our home in South Jersey to New York City every day, to make sure we enjoyed a comfortable existence. We took great comfort in knowing he was always there for us. No amount of compensation could ever restore the life we shared with or remove the devastation we experience every day because of his absence. However, without financial assistance to replace the income we all depended on, our suffering will be even worse. There is great confusion and debate as to the extent of the compensation being offered to the victims' families from the Victim Compensation Fund and I have recently been advised that strong (and costly) legal representation will be the only way for victims to receive an equitable distribution. I hope you will agree that this should not be the case. In this highly litigious society, and I have never been the type of people to rely on litigation to gain a competitive edge or to become unjustly enriched. I firmly believe that the goal of the compensation offered by the Fund should be to allow each victim's family to continue living in roughly the same manner to which they were accustomed before September 11, 2001, no more, no less. Obviously, this is no easy task. However, I am very concerned about a number of issues related to the interim final rules that appear to run contrary to the intent of the Fund's purpose. First and foremost, if the Fund is supposed to present a favorable alternative to costly, uncertain and time-consuming litigation, it is incomprehensible to me that a claimant would have to waive the right to litigate before knowing the exact amount to which he or she would be entitled under the Fund. I personally believe that for many claimants, a lot of confusion would be eliminated, and perhaps the need for legal representation removed, if each was to receive a calculation showing the amount of award and precisely how it was determined under the rules. Then, having been given a reasonable amount of time to evaluate the award, the claimant would chose whether to accept it and waive the right to litigate, appeal the determination on the basis of extraordinary circumstances, or reject it, thereby opting for litigation. Concerning the method of calculation, I cannot personally speak to the inequities of using national economic statistics, as opposed to area-specific data, nor to the use of caps and offsets, except to reiterate that whatever methodology is used should have the result of allowing each claimant family to continue to exist in roughly the same manner it did before September 11, 2001. I believe this was the intent of the Fund and I pray that you will do whatever is necessary to achieve this result. Sincerely, Individual Comment Sewell, NJ 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 dojN002181.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