Posted: Thursday, May 18, 2000 - 9 PM
$6 Million Allocated To Worcester Families
Earlier: White House Urges Solution To Firefighter Fund Dispute
Discuss It Now: The Worcester Fund
Telegram & Gazette Statement
WORCESTER -- The Worcester Telegram & Gazette Charitable Foundation tonight announced that it is immediately allocating $6 million to the families of the six Worcester firefighters who died Dec. 3 in a horrific warehouse fire.
"We, like thousands of people around the country, were deeply moved by the tragic heroism of Worcester's fallen six, and created the Firefighters Fund to help their families and express our sorrow," said Harry T. Whitin, a Foundation trustee and editor of the newspaper.
The Foundation has asked Flagship Bank, custodian of the fund, to establish six $1 million accounts, each for the benefit of one of the families of the fallen firefighters. This is the bulk of the money donated to the fund started by the newspaper on the night of the fire with an initial contribution of $6,000 from the Telegram & Gazette. Subsequently, the fund grew to more than $6.4 million with more than 43,000 contributions being recorded.
The fund was set up as part of the pre-existing tax-exempt public charity, the T&G Charitable Foundation. That arrangement allowed individuals, companies and foundations to make tax deductible gifts - and in the case of corporations, to match employees' gifts - that they otherwise would not have been able to make. But the public charity structure also led to a delay in the distribution of the money while the Foundation worked to meet IRS requirements for the distribution of non-profit funds.
While the Foundation continues to work to meet IRS requirements, the Foundation concluded it could wait no longer in fulfilling the wishes of donors who believed the funds would be directed to the families of the firefighters.
"We regret the controversy that has arisen around the distribution of the money," Whitin said. "Our intention from the beginning was to have this money benefit the families, and we are pleased to be able to set the distribution in motion now. I would also like to thank the tens of thousands of individuals who united to make this good result grow from such a horrible event."
The Foundation will continue to work with the families and their representatives to distribute the remaining money in the account and any additional funds that may come in for appropriate public charitable purposes.
As always, the goal will be to ensure that the needs of the families are met and the intentions of the donors are honored.
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