Paying Tribute

Raising money for September 11 memorials has been fraught with emotions and politics

Five years after a group of terrorists hijacked four commercial jets and triggered the largest terrorist

attack in American history, the United States is still trying to cope with the emotional trauma of September 11, 2001.

It is also still trying to memorialize the nearly 3,000 Americans who lost their lives in the attack.

Large-scale efforts are under way to build permanent memorials at the three sites that are most identified with tragedy — the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon near Washington, and the field in rural Somerset County, Pa., where United Flight 93 crashed.

In each case, government agencies and private groups have joined forces to hold design competitions and raise money for the construction of memorials for those who died in the attacks. But, while all three September 11 memorial projects share a similar structure, each is following its own timeline — and facing its own set of challenges.

Unique Theme

The New York project has been slowed by ballooning cost projections, political battles, and a lawsuit by a group representing some of the families who lost friends and relatives in the attacks.

A permanent memorial in Somerset County has been criticized by some who believe it resembles an Islamic symbol, but is moving forward.

The memorial at the Pentagon, meanwhile, is under construction without much of the controversy that has surrounded its sister projects. It is expected to open in the fall of 2008.

Despite the differences, all three share a historically unique theme. In the wake of a massive tragedy, the money needed to build the memorials is being raised by charities operating in an environment clouded by the still-powerful emotions resulting from the September 11 attacks. As a result, those charged with raising money for the memorials are creating campaigns that must take into account the feelings of people who lost family members, the current political climate, and the feelings that still surround the 2001 attacks.

“We are dealing with the families who have lost their loved ones,” says Bob Carter, president of Ketchum, a Pittsburgh consulting company that has been hired by the nonprofit Families of Flight 93. “Everything that we do is sensitized to the fact that the families ultimately have to approve of it and be comfortable with it. The way we approach donors. The way we use images. This is very different than if you were building a memorial to Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This is immediate. This is emotional.”

World Trade Center

Emotions, as well as politics, have called into question the fund-raising efforts and even the future of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, which has been attempting to raise money to create a memorial on the site of the World Trade Center.

Talk of a memorial began almost immediately after two airplanes slammed into the the center’s famed twin towers, killing more than 2,600 people.

In 2003, a team of jurors sifted through more than 5,000 design submissions, choosing one produced by Michael Arad and Peter Walker called “Reflecting Absence.”

The memorial is expected to consist of two water-filled voids that will reside in the footprints of the original Twin Towers, surrounded by a plaza of oak trees. A planned underground museum will include artifacts, interactive exhibits, a resource center, contemplation areas, and educational programs.

But efforts to raise money to help build the memorial and museum have been slowed by escalating costs and a lack of consensus over what the memorial should be, according to those involved with the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation. In fact, those issues combined earlier this year to nearly paralyze the project.

In May, the foundation — a nonprofit group founded in January 2005 to manage the fund raising for the memorial and museum — suspended its solicitation activities when the cost estimate for the project reached nearly $1-billion.

Previous projections had pegged the project at $494-million — a number that fit well within the foundation’s original goal of raising $500-million to build and maintain the memorial.

Two weeks after fund raising was suspended, the foundation’s chief executive officer, Gretchen Dykstra, resigned her post. Ms. Dykstra cited the rising costs and the multiplicity of government agencies involved with the project for her decision.

“The foundation was told to raise the money to build and own and operate the memorial and the museum,” Ms. Dykstra said in a June speech at the Association of Fundraising Professionals Fundraising Day in New York. “But you can’t raise private money if you don’t control the cost.”

Ms. Dykstra says the project spun out of control, in part, because the foundation had little power to control the project’s direction. That role was split among a variety of government agencies and authorities — a list that included the state of New York, New York City, the state of New Jersey, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Those groups, she says, created a bloated plan and cost structure that turned off potential donors.

“If you’re going to sell something, and we were selling the memorial and the museum, you have to be sure that you can trust what it is that you are selling. And you have to be sure that you can trust that you can deliver what it is you’re telling people that you’re going to deliver. And a private board cannot be asked to assume risk without that control,” Ms. Dykstra said in her June speech. “Without that authority and without independence, I felt the job was impossible. There were too many cooks in the kitchen, and this woman’s job was not in the kitchen.”

Officials have since scaled back the project, though it still includes major aspects of the design by Mr. Arad and Mr. Walker. The new plan reduced the projected cost to a more manageable $510-million, $340-million of which has been raised from government and private sources.

In August, the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation announced that it had awarded the first construction contract, to build the memorial’s foundations and footings.

Joseph C. Daniels, the foundation’s acting president, says the contract offers a signal to donors that the project is again moving forward and that the cost issues have been resolved.

The World Trade Center Memorial Foundation expects to raise the remaining money needed for the project — with the goal of opening a completed memorial and museum by September 2009.

But the memorial and museum still face controversy. A group called the Coalition of 9/11 Families objects to elements of the plan and wants to preserve the footprint of the original World Trade Center at the site. The organization went to court to block construction, and while it has failed so far, the group has not given up.

Tom Rogér, a World Trade Center Memorial Foundation member who is a vice president at Gilbane Building Company, in Connecticut, says the lack of consensus over the direction of the memorial project is understandable given the complex issues that surround it.

“The closeness to the emotional impact of the event tends to affect the ability of the participants to reach consensus,” says Mr. Rogér, whose daughter died in the attacks. “With 9/11 there has been a continuing attempt by various public officials to hijack the process for their own interests. Also, the New York City location of the World Trade Center memorial brings a whole set of complicating issues that most memorials don’t have.”

Pentagon Memorial Foundation

James J. Laychak has faced a significantly less daunting challenge as chairman of the Pentagon Memorial Foundation, the nonprofit organization that is working to raise $32-million to build and maintain a permanent memorial adjacent to the Pentagon.

Compared with the World Trade Center Memorial, the Pentagon Memorial is much smaller in scale and more straightforward in its design. The project, coordinated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, will feature 184 benches, one for each person killed in the Pentagon attack, centered over a pool of water. Each bench will bear the name of a victim on its front and the memorial will be spread over a 1.9-acre park adjacent to the Pentagon.

The memorial is simple in design and contained in cost — factors that have made it an easier sell to donors than the project in New York.

“We were lucky in that it was very well defined from the beginning,” says Mr. Laychak, whose brother died in the attack on the Pentagon. “It allowed us to make some clear decisions. It allowed us to focus on what we need to do. We could go forward with the traditional fund-raising efforts.”

Since starting its fund raising in April 2004, the Pentagon Memorial Foundation has raised more than $11-million. Mr. Laychak, an associate partner at Accenture consulting company, says that, although the nonprofit organization is only about a third of the way toward reaching its overall goal, it has gained momentum since ground was broken on the project in June.

The organization has been seeking gifts from companies and wealthy people, and relies heavily on its Web site to attract small gifts. It has received donations of $1-million or more from the Anheuser Busch beer company and from the government of Taiwan.

To coincide with the anniversary of the attacks and the beginning of the construction effort, the group plans a direct-mail appeal soon. “It’s easier for people to give when they can see activity and progress being made,” he says.

Even so, the Pentagon Memorial Foundation has faced challenges as it has attempted to raise money and awareness for the project. The memorial has had to state its case in an environment in which the World Trade Center and the Flight 93 disaster have drawn more attention. But Mr. Laychak says the organization has been able to connect with donors.

“A lot of it is being able to personalize the story and tell them what it’s all about,” he says. “Because we’re not professional fund raisers and we’re family members, it’s easier for us to make a connection.”

Jan C. Scruggs, president of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, draws parallels between the Pentagon Memorial effort and his organization’s effort to build its memorial in Washington during the early 1980s.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial design was unveiled in 1980, roughly five years after the end of the Vietnam War, at a cost of $8.4-million.

“In one sense, one does not need grandiosity in order to define success,” Mr. Scruggs says. “Had we tried to do something really big, big, big, it may have taken years longer and would have run into fund-raising problems.”

The people behind the Pentagon Memorial have taken a similar approach, he says.

“There are so many competing causes out there, you have to make a compelling case,” Mr. Scruggs says. “The Pentagon Memorial did that. They did it effectively and they kept it simple. People at the Pentagon understood it. The people of America understood it. Corporate America understood it.”

Flight 93 National Memorial

Still, even the simplest memorial projects can provoke controversy, especially when they are conceived in the wake of a traumatic event. That has been the case with the planned Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, a memorial that is designed to pay tribute to the 40 people who took control of a hijacked plane headed toward Washington and crashed it into a rural field in southwestern Pennsylvania.

The development of the Flight 93 National Memorial has been coordinated by numerous entities — the Families of Flight 93, the Flight 93 Federal Advisory Commission, the Flight 93 Memorial Task Force, the National Park Service, and the National Park Foundation.

The memorial design, which includes a massive tower, wind chimes, and symbolic, indigenous trees, was conceived as a way to allow visitors to observe the crash site and pay tribute to the victims, according to its architect, Paul Murdoch.

Yet the project was delayed for a time over criticism that the design resembled an Islamic crescent — a likeness that led some to view the memorial as a testament to the hijackers rather than the passengers who died.

The design has since been adjusted to allay those concerns, but the project — while moving forward — is moving slowly.

Mr. Carter, of Ketchum, says the deliberate pace is necessary, given both the sensitivity of the project and the number of stakeholders who are involved in its planning.

“When you consider all of the entities that we have, we’re doing remarkably well in building consensus,” he says. “It is time-consuming. But we’re okay.”

The project is expected to cost about $58-million, and private sources are expected to provide $30-million. About 27 percent of the goal has been met so far — a measure Mr. Carter says is on target. The fund-raising effort includes a direct-mail campaign, a major-gifts campaign, and a push to solicit corporate donors.

The family of Chris Sullivan, the founder of the Outback Steakhouse restaurant chain, has donated $2-million and Federal Express has given $1-million to the project. But while the campaign itself is traditional, the behind-the-scenes effort is anything but. Mr. Carter says the fund raising must be conducted with sensitivity, and that each organization involved in the drive has been consulted about each step to be sure everybody is comfortable.

“We have to adjust timelines. There’s no question about that,” Mr. Carter says. “When we do materials, when we do approaches, those things have to be vetted out among the various groups. It just takes time.”

Sara J. Bloomfield, director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, in Washington, says that approach is necessary, given what’s at stake when developing high-profile memorials.

“It’s a unique kind of fund raising when you are doing things in the name of dead people,” she says. “It’s very sensitive, very emotional. When in doubt, you err on the side of caution.”

And that approach is likely to continue even after the three memorials are built. Campaigns to raise money for the memorials’ maintenance will have to be handled with the same sensitivity that is needed to build the memorials.

For the Holocaust Museum, that means black-tie galas and golf tournaments are out of the question, Ms. Bloomfield says. Fund raising, instead, must be respectful and not celebratory — in keeping with the tone of the memorial itself.

“We’ve been very sensitive to the way donors get recognized,” she says. “A donor is a partner. While obviously you want to try to accommodate your donors as partners, I don’t advocate trying to be what you aren’t for people.”

Mr. Scruggs, however, says the fund raising should come easy for the September 11 memorials once each project has a clear and articulated vision. That has already happened with the Pentagon Memorial, Mr. Scruggs says, and he expects the Flight 93 and World Trade Center memorials to reach that point soon.

“Raising the money was the easiest part of the project, really,” he says, recalling the effort to build the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. “The most difficult part was the internal politics and the national politics.”

Rebecca Gardyn contributed to this article.