Category Archives: Kenneth Feinberg
Against a backdrop of damaged fisheries and a looming oil spill trial, BP is doubling “final settlement” offers to commercial crabbers and shrimpers who have had their livelihoods destroyed by the Gulf oil spill. It seems BP has joined the rest of the world in realizing the once-thriving Gulf seafood industry is in tatters, and will remain that way for years. Although on its face the announcement of fairer compensation [...]
Read More »Thousands of BP cleanup workers and volunteers have fallen ill since spending months immersed in waters fouled by oil and toxic dispersants. Without even the most basic safety gear – like gloves, boots, body suits or respirators – workers were directly exposed to a crush of toxins, including the known human carcinogen, benzene. Symptoms range from severe headaches and shortness of breath to nausea and vomiting. Long term effects include [...]
Read More »Astonishingly, just a year after the worst man-made environmental disaster in U.S. history swept through the Gulf of Mexico, it’s business as usual on the Gulf Coast. Everything is just like it was before last year’s 200-million-gallon oil spill turned our coastal communities upside down: The tourists are back, the fishing industry is booming, the restaurants are full and all the beach chairs and umbrellas are spoken for. The Gulf [...]
Read More »Claims czar Kenneth Feinberg is nearing the first anniversary of his tenure as the administrator of BP’s $20 billion victim compensation fund – and he’s congratulating himself for a job well done. As many of you might imagine, Gulf Coast residents see things a bit differently. While Mr. Feinberg pats himself on the back, many spill victims struggle to understand why their “final settlement” claims have been denied. Others try [...]
Read More »GULF SHORES, Alabama – An oil spill victim police who police said had his claim denied threatened to kill everyone inside a local claims office. Police aren’t releasing the man’s name because he’s now in custody at a psychiatric hospital, but say the man threatened to kill himself, then open fire at a Gulf Coast Claims Facility. Police put out a “BOLO” or Be on the Lookout” radio transmission and [...]
Read More »FORT WALTON BEACH – Staff’s Restaurant has been a fixture downtown for nearly 100 years. These days it doesn’t look like it will make it to its centennial. Fifth generation family members blame the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, a long wait for claims money from BP and fewer customers for putting them on the brink of closure. “We’ve been through the Great Depression, hurricanes and economic hard times, but the [...]
Read More »BAYOU LA BATRE, Ala. – By October, Tim Nguyen found that his work in a Mississippi shipyard was no longer paying the bills. His hours had been cut back, part of the general ebb of work along the Gulf Coast after the terrible summer of BP. Mr. Nguyen went to an office of the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, which was set up to administer BP’s $20 billion fund for coastal [...]
Read More »The “Mission Accomplished” narrative scripted by BP and its allies in the Obama Administration keeps getting harder to sell as the one-year anniversary of the spill approaches. If it’s not dead dolphins washing ashore or new oil hitting our beaches or more cleanup workers getting sick, it’s those pesky independent researchers ruining everything by refusing to follow the “official” talking points. Try as they might, BP and the federal government [...]
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