By Lisa Myers, NBC News Senior Investigative Correspondent
After 9/11, the federal government set aside $1 billion in insurance funds to protect New York City, and to compensate workers who became ill or injured after working at Ground Zero. Today, thousands of workers say they are sick, and they can't understand why so few of them have gotten any payments.
Workers like Mike Valentin.
Before working for two months at Ground Zero, Valentin, a New York City Police Officer, says he was in perfect health. Today, he has lung disease and an inoperable tumor on his windpipe, conditions he blames on the toxic air at Ground Zero.
“My doctor says that this is something I'm going to live with for the rest of my life,” Valentin said.
There's no compensation fund for him, like there was for families after 9/11. But Valentin and 10,000 former workers want New York City to pay, claiming they weren't adequately protected on the smoky "pile."
“I wore an American bandana around my face for the first few weeks, then eventually we got a paper mask,” said Valentin, who is now suing the city and who is represented by the Napoli Bern Ripka law firm.
The federal government created a $1 billion insurance company almost four years ago to pay legitimate claims, and to protect New York City. But Valentin's case, and thousands more, have not been heard.
"I just need my family taken care of, that’s all I want. I'm not looking to drive a Mercedes Benz, you know? I just want my family taken care of,” Valentin added.
So far, the World Trade Center insurance fund has paid out only $300,000 in benefits, to six workers with bone injuries. And yet it's spent $100 million on legal fees--mostly to challenge workers' claims in court.
New York City officials say they did adequately protect workers, with masks and other equipment. And, they say, since Congress set up an insurance fund, the city must carefully weigh each claim, which takes time, lawyers and money.
Michael Cardozo is the New York City Corporation Counsel, the city’s top legal officer. “This is ten thousand individual people with very different and complex facts that all have to be sorted out," Cardozo said. “I would certainly prefer to be able not to fight with the people who came out heroically to help clean up Ground Zero. I'm charged, of course, with a duty, and the city must defend itself,” Cardozo said.
But lawmakers who set aside those billion dollars say the little guy has been neglected.
"The problem is this fund has erred far too much on the side of not helping the workers, and dispending money," said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.
City officials are now lobbying to turn the insurance company into a compensation fund, to better serve the workers who endured the harsh conditions at Ground Zero. At a House hearing today, Cardozo and other panelists urged Congress to create a true compensation fund to aid the Ground Zero workers.
