Thursday, February 03, 2011

"Independence" day

The Telegraph reports on the State of Mississippi's motion against Ken Feinberg's Gulf Coast Claims Facility and its practice of coercing BP oil spill victims to surrender their legal rights in exchange for minimal up front payments.
The attorney general claims that people are signing "seemingly very low settlements" that bar them from later legal action, because emergency relief money has not been paid quickly enough.

"This scheme is another device for BP [through the fund] to entice claimants to sign a release and to improperly leverage those releases by intentionally underpaying interim claims," he claimed. "BP is withholding interim claim payments to increase financial hardship on claimants."

The oil spill fund has an independent administrator, Kenneth Feinberg, who also oversaw payments to victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It has received 468,000 claims and paid out $2.7bn to 170,000 claimants. BP won't comment on the fund, because it is not in charge of the process.


Okay stop. All that stuff the AG says about BP's "enticement scheme" appears to be undermined by the follow-up paragraph implying that the claims process and its administrator are "independent" of the oil company itself. It's one way to do "balanced" reporting. It's also a falsehood.

Kenneth R. Feinberg, the administrator of the $20 billion fund to compensate victims of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, should not claim that he is fully independent of BP, a federal judge overseeing litigation against the company ruled on Wednesday.

Judge Carl J. Barbier of Federal District Court in New Orleans, who is overseeing federal litigation related to the spill, issued an order in response to protests by lawyers for plaintiffs suing BP. They have said Mr. Feinberg’s statements that he is independent and that settling claims through his fund is superior to lawsuits are improper.

Judge Barbier took no substantive action to change the way Mr. Feinberg runs the fund, but said he must make clear to potential litigants that he is “acting for and on behalf of BP in fulfilling its legal obligations.”


It's important to know that Feinberg is "acting for and on behalf of BP" so that in the future when we have to write stories like this one.

ORANGE BEACH, Ala. — Ken Feinberg opened his latest criteria for final claim payments to public comment for the next two weeks.

And business leaders and elected officials across southwest Alabama say they’ll give it to him.

Despite saying he would double what was lost for most in oil-drenched 2010, Feinberg’s latest guidelines drew ire Wednesday from those who have long been critical of the process.

"I’ve really only drawn one conclusion: The game continues," said Orange Beach Mayor Tony Kennon. "He has taken the final payment and structured it from the very best-case scenario and presented that to a group of people who have not been paid and are desperate and more likely to take it. It’s double what he dictates as our loss, not what may be our true loss."


We don't feel obligated to throw in some language describing Feinberg's "independence" the way the Telegraph reporter does.

Here is a handy rule of thumb for the Ken Feinberg reporter's style guide. When writing about any significant claim Feinberg makes regarding the GCCF payment mechanism or the methodology on which it is based, make sure to stress the nature of Feinberg's employment. Take this BBC article as an example of how one gets this right.
The Gulf of Mexico will have largely recovered from the BP oil spill by the end of 2012, the administrator of the $20bn (£12bn) pay-outs fund has said.

Attorney Kenneth Feinberg said that compensation to those who lost revenue from the disaster would be based on this prediction.

Meanwhile, a judge has ruled that Mr Feinberg make clear to claimants that he is not independent from BP.


It's important when reporting the official bullshit to include a conspicuous statement indicating to the reader that they are indeed grappling with bullshit.

Need more positive examples? Okay sure. Here's the Times-Picayune's David Hammer reporting yesterday on Feinberg's 2-3 year recovery bullshit.

Feinberg used a report this week from John Tunnell Jr. at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi as the main basis for assumptions about when Gulf fisheries would recover. Tunnell's report warns that his assessment was inherently inexact, but predicted that blue crabs, shrimp and fin fish catches should generally recover to pre-spill levels this year. He said some oyster beds would take six to 10 years to fully recover.

Tunnell was paid $225 an hour by BP to serve as a consultant to Feinberg's operation.


Neither Feinberg nor his lone expert consultant upon whose dubious opinion the GCCF payment formula is based can be described as "independent." We're not even sure what Tunnell has presented can be described as science.
The report, however, quickly drew criticism from spill victims and from environmentalists who said it underplayed the damage caused by BP’s runaway well.

This is not a scientific report — it’s an opinion,” said Ian MacDonald, a professor of oceanography at Florida State University and a member of the National Wildlife Federation’s science advisory panel. “It doesn’t propose any methodology by which its assumptions and predictions could be tested.”

Dr. MacDonald added, “We can’t use these early rosy scenarios as an excuse to not do what’s necessary, which is once and for all establishing a health monitoring method and restoration program for the entire Gulf of Mexico ecosystem.”

Another marine expert, James Cowan, a fisheries scientist at Louisiana State University, said the report “suffers from way too much lumping,” by which he meant lumping together so many species that significant impact on some species might be glossed over.


When we read that fund claimants are being schemed out of their legal rights and coerced into accepting compensation that doesn't begin to reflect their loss, it's important to know that bullshit is being employed to back these schemes up. It's also important to know that the purveyors of this bullshit are not allowed to claim "independence" from the oil company who employs them.

This is basic stuff and I'm grateful to find so many examples of reporters getting it right today. On the other hand, something tells me we'll be reading plenty of ledes about "independent claims administrator Ken Feinberg" during these next 2-3 years of Gulf Coast recovery anyway.

And on the other other hand I have to wonder what took everybody so long. Take a moment to re-read both these AZ posts from way back in July regarding Feinberg's readily apparent conflicts of interest and the general lack of interest in those conflicts from the people we generally expect are paid to be skeptical about such things.

At the time there was plenty "independence" flying about. Also "hope", "compassion", "fairness". All sorts of good stuff.

Oil spill claims administrator Ken Feinberg offers hope to victims

Pledging his independence from the federal government and BP, Feinberg said he plans to establish a centralized claim center, beef up a staff of adjusters and be a constant, visible figure for Gulf Coast residents.

"This is an independent, private program," he said. "I'm not beholden to the Obama administration. I'm not beholden to BP. I'm an independent administrator calling the shots as I see them.


Feinberg isn't allowed to say things like that anymore and presumably no one will print it either but we'll remain on the lookout for that.

Also, even though it isn't correct to write "Indepenent claims administrator Ken Feinberg" anymore it is still perfectly within bounds to write, "Obama-appointed claims administrator Ken Feinberg". That one, we can document.
On Wednesday, the Obama administration revealed that Feinberg would take charge of a $20 billion escrow fund to compensate people and businesses harmed by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

"I'm confident he will assure that claims are administered as quickly, as fairly and as transparently as possible," President Obama said in a speech at the White House

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