OKLAHOMA CITY - The head of the Oklahoma City bombing memorial said Friday a North Carolina congressman was off-base when he said the memorial struggles to attract both visitors and private funds.
Kari Watkins, executive director of the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum, responded to comments by Rep. Charles Taylor, R-N.C., in a letter in which she said Taylor's assertions are wrong and that he "could learn a lot from this private-public partnership."
In a statement released last week, Taylor, chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the Interior Department, expressed concern about the potential cost of a memorial to the victims of United Flight 93, which crashed in a Pennsylvania field on Sept. 11, 2001.
Taylor said the cost of land and structures around the site could rise to between $75 million and $100 million and that he did not want to embarrass the victims' families "with a memorial that is only partially funded."
Taylor said organizers of the Oklahoma City bombing memorial had expected it to attract one million visitors a year and raise substantial nonfederal money. "In reality, they are having less than 50,000 visitors per year and are unable to raise a great portion of the expected private money," Taylor's statement says.
"They are now requesting millions of dollars in taxpayer funds to step in and replace unmateralized pledges," the statement says.
Watkins said the memorial is seeking $2 million in federal funds, the balance of a $5 million authorization approved by Congress three years ago.
"We know budgets are tight. We appreciate that and we respect that," Watkins said. "We're just asking Congress to finish what they promised to do."
Watkins said the memorial never expected one million visitors a year but has never had fewer than 200,000. "Often we have 50,000 visitors a month during the summer," she said.
She also said the memorial has successfully raised private funds and has never had to write off a major pledge that was not fulfilled.
A total of $17 million in private money was raised to build the memorial along with $5 million in federal funds and $5 million from the state. Last year, the memorial completed an endowment campaign consisting of $5 million in federal funds, $5 million from the state and $8 million in private funds.
Watkins said Taylor was spreading misinformation about the memorial when "he ought to be holding this place up as a model.
"There's a lot of things we did right that he's not taking a look at," Watkins said. "It's a perfect place to show how the people and the government can work together at a site where an American citizen tried to bring down the government by blowing up a federal building."
Last month, hundreds of bombing survivors and members of victims' families gathered at the former site of the Oklahoma City federal building to observe the 11th anniversary of the April 19, 1995, attack that killed 168 people and injured more than 800 others.
On Thursday, Taylor's panel approved $5 million in federal funds to buy land for the Flight 93 memorial. He had held up funding for two years, saying he wanted assurances that sufficient private donations would be raised and a federal bailout would not be necessary.
Taylor's press secretary, Debra Potter, did not return a telephone call from The Associated Press seeking comment.
