Bass Speaks Out On Use of Red Cross Donations for Victims
WASHINGTON – Rep. Charles Bass (R-NH) said during a House committee hearing yesterday that he does not think the Red Cross clearly explained to Americans how their donations following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to the “Liberty Disaster Fund” would be used.
“Dr. Healy you are tenacious in your spin,” Bass told Bernadine Healy, the former Red Cross director, when she testified that the donations were always meant to cover all aspects of the attacks, not just aid for the victims.
“The Red Cross raised a huge amount of money in the [aftermath] of September 11. I don’t care what it says on the back of an envelope, if you asked Americans, they thought [their money] was going to the victims.”
Healy, who resigned last week as a result of the controversy over the donations, testified before the Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. Subcommittee Chairman Jim Greenwood, R-PA, asked Healy how the $564 million donated to the Red Cross’s Liberty Disaster Fund is being distributed.
The subcommittee held the hearing to examine what the money in the Liberty Fund is being used for and why it has not been going directly to the victims. When the committee questioned Healy about why some of the Liberty Fund’s money is going to administrative costs she testified that the Liberty Fund was set up to provide for “the events of 9/11 and their aftermath.”
“That is absolutely the commitment that we have made and I know that commitment will continue,” said Healy. The money donated to the Liberty Fund will be “held separately apart so there will be no question about how it will be used.”
But she said the Red Cross cannot give out all of the money it has received in donations to the Liberty Fund only to the victims’ families because the organization must also cover all costs of disaster relief, such as ensuring enough frozen units of blood are on hand in case America is attacked again.
“This is an evolving issue,” said Healy. “We have obligations that go beyond what happened at the World Trade Center. If there were another disaster tomorrow we would offer the same services we have offered” to New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC.
Healy said if, in the future, it appears the nation is no longer threatened by terrorist attacks, the Red Cross can decide at that time to liquidate the Liberty Fund’s account and give all of it to the victims’ families.
Two women whose husbands died working in offices in the World Trade Center testified before the subcommittee that they have not received enough money from the Red Cross and other charitable organizations to support themselves and their children. New York resident Elizabeth McLaughlin and Russa Steiner, of New Hope, Penn., said they have had to go through so many rules and regulations to receive charitable funds that they are discouraged.
“I don’t think contributors to the various September 11th funds thought that their donations would be caught up in so much red tape and become a source of frustration to the families,” McLaughlin said. “There are too many people that need help. Isn’t that why the charities were set up in the first place?”
McLaughlin’s 29-year-old husband, Rob, was a partner with Cantor Fitzgerald and the sole source of income for her and her 9-month-old son, Nicholas.
Steiner said she is worried about funding the education of her three college-age children because her husband of 32 years handled all of their finances, paid completely for their education so far, and kept the details about their personal finances on a laptop computer that he had brought to work with him on September 11th.
“Americans thought they were helping people like Mrs. McLaughlin and Mrs. Steiner and only a small amount of those funds have gone to people like them,” said Bass at the hearing.
According to the Red Cross web site, $29 million is budgeted from the Liberty Fund for “telecommunications such as the toll-free nationwide hotlines now being operated by the Red Cross to provide immediate help to callers, information systems, database management, contribution processing, public information and communication, expanded audit services, accounting services and around-the-clock activation of the Red Cross Disaster Operations Center.”
Bass questioned spending money from the fund on managerial allocations like these and said he did not believe Americans their contributions would be going to pay a Red Cross phone bill rather than directly to the victims. “The fact is this is a good example of how this and other organizations are trying to work their way out of a very embarrassing situation,” said Bass.
