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State Aid To Tech Families Pushed

July 30, 2007

By Julian Walker

Some state lawmakers want to create a fund for victims of the April 16 shooting at Virginia Tech that left 33 people dead.

Any significant action on the proposal is likely several months away — the General Assembly meets in January — but several state legislators say the idea is increasingly becoming a topic of conversation.

"I feel it's altogether appropriate, in this case, for the commonwealth to do this," state Sen. John S. Edwards, D-Roanoke, said during a phone interview yesterday. "I would strongly support this."

Edwards, whose district includes Blacksburg, the home of Virginia Tech, believes money for such a program could come from the state general fund, meaning it would be taxpayer-funded. And he said it should be administered in concert with the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund, which has raised more than $7 million in private contributions.

"I don't know an appropriate dollar figure, but as we move forward, one of my concerns would be that for Virginia Tech to move forward and for this community to move forward and put the trauma of April 16 behind us, to be involved in multiple legal actions would be very, very hard on the community and the university," said Del. David A. Nutter, R-Montgomery, who works for Virginia Tech.

Gunman Seung-Hui Cho, a Tech student, opened fire that day and killed 32 students and faculty before taking his own life.

There has been some suggestion that creating a victims fund would be a way to dissuade the families of those injured or killed in the Virginia Tech massacre from filing lawsuits.

But Edwards said a state-financed fund should be "a matter of solace for the victims and their families, without regard to fault."

Kenneth R. Feinberg, who this month took on the task of recommending how fund money should be spent, has said distribution of money from the memorial fund to families will not prevent them from filing suits.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine on Saturday met privately with members of the families of some of the Tech shooting victims. In comments to reporters, Kaine said it is too early to say how compensation will be given out.

Reached yesterday, Kaine's press secretary, Kevin Hall, said the governor's "primary focus has been making sure that the [Kaine-appointed] review panel had access to all of the information it needs to produce a thorough investigative report."

"The concept of some form of state assistance for families of those killed and the ongoing needs of many of the survivors is relatively recent," Hall continued. "The governor thinks the idea is worth discussion with legislative leaders."

Among the expenses the fund could cover would be medical costs, or tuition payments for other members of victims' families, Edwards suggested.

Asked about how history can be a guide for creating a fund, Edwards referenced the payments made in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, but said "there probably aren't many precedents for something like this."

Congress created the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund in 2001 to disburse $7 billion in taxpayer money to the families of victims of the terror attacks in exchange for waivers of their right to sue.

Virginia Senate Courts of Justice Committee Chairman Kenneth W. Stolle, R-Virginia Beach, said yesterday that there have been preliminary discussions among some legislators about compensation.

"To the best of my knowledge there have been no formal proposals that have been made by anybody," Stolle said yesterday.

One possibility discussed was expanding a state fund that compensates victims of violent crimes, he said. Under that fund, a victim may receive up to $15,000.

"The victims' compensation fund is set up to try to address an average victim of an average crime. . . . It doesn't contemplate a major catastrophe, an assault against a school, and devastation that occurred in a shooting like the Virginia Tech shooting," Stolle said. "One of the problems to be addressed is, is Virginia going to treat the victims of the Virginia Tech shootings differently than we're going to treat an innocent victim of a shooting in Virginia Beach or Fairfax?"

Other discussions focused on a different type of fund, Stolle said. "Part of it contemplated that we would use state dollars and part of it contemplated that we would use private dollars."

Contact Julian Walker at (804) 649-6831 or jwalker@timesdispatch.com.

Deputy news editor Tina Eshleman and The Washington Post News Service contributed to this report.