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 17, 2002 3:34 PM Comments of the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance January 4, 2002 Mr. Kenneth L. Zwick, Director Office of Management Programs Civil Division U.S. Department of Justice Main Building, Room 3140 950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, D.C. 20530 Dear Mr. Zwick: With this letter, I would like to submit to you comments on the Interim Final Rules for the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001, published on December 21, 2001. My comments concern the definition in the Rules of the term "collateral source compensation." Awards from the New York State World Trade Center Relief Fund ("Relief Fund") should be excluded from that definition, based on their similarity to payments from private charitable organizations. I urge you to clarify the Rules in this regard. Governor Pataki set up the Relief Fund within several days of the September 11th terrorist attacks to assist the families and dependents of the victims of the attacks. The Fund, when viewed literally, is a fund of the State of New York, created pursuant to authority in the New York State Finance Law (§11). The New York State Department of Taxation and Finance is the custodian of the Relief Fund. However, the Relief Fund is not supported by tax revenues or fees collected by the State. The Relief Fund consists solely of monetary gifts from individuals, businesses and even foreign governments. The monies in the Relief Fund are being used to pay awards to the families of the victims of the attacks and will not be paid out for any other purpose. The Relief Fund thus has a purpose which closely resembles that of the private charitable organizations soliciting donations and providing financial assistance to victims. The same is true as to its income, which comes strictly from donations. As with private charities, the Internal Revenue Code allows donors to claim a deduction in computing their federal income tax for the contributions they are making to the New York State World Trade Center Relief Fund. Yet, because the Relief Fund is a fund of the State of New York and not a private charitable entity, the awards made by the Relief Fund do not fall within the express terms of the specific exception in section 104.47 of the Interim Final Rules which excludes from collateral source compensation "charitable donations distributed to the beneficiaries of the decedent, to the injured claimant, or to the beneficiaries of the injured claimant by private charitable entities" (emphasis added). An award from the Relief Fund is not like other payments being made by the State to the families or beneficiaries of victims of the attacks. An individual injured in one of the attacks or the survivor of a victim killed in one of the attacks does not have a legally enforceable and vested right to compel the New York State World Trade Center Relief Fund to pay a benefit. In contrast, the estate of a state employee killed at the World Trade Center has the legal right to compel the payment of a death benefit by the State because the right or entitlement to that death benefit existed prior to the victim's death. While the latter clearly should be considered to be a collateral source for purposes of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, awards from the Relief Fund should not. Thus, as you further examine the issue of "collateral source compensation," I urge you to treat payments from the New York State World Trade Center Relief Fund not as payments from the State of New York, but rather as payments from a charitable organization. I appreciate your consideration of this issue. Very truly yours, Comment By: New York State Department of Taxation and Finance Albany, NY September 11 Email: Date The local time and date when the message was written. 2002-01-17 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 dojN002557.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. 2002-01-17