Kenneth Feinberg, the administrator of The One Fund Boston outlined the charity’s draft distribution plan at community meetings Monday and Tuesday.
Under the plan, the highest payments will go to those who lost family members and those who suffered double amputations or permanent brain damage.
The prospect of a multimillion dollar payout may seem like a lot of money, but as Rose Bissonette, founder of The New England Amputee Association tells us, adapting to life without all your limbs can be quite costly. Take driving, for instance.
“If they want to drive again, they’ve got to have their automobile adapted,” Bissonette said. “Say that you’ve lost your right leg, or both legs, you’ve got two options to drive again. One is adjusted foot pedals that kind of swap the gas and the brake around; also there’s hand controls if you can’t use the pedals.”
If the bombing victim drives an SUV, that adaptation could involve a costly lift. And that’s just the beginning. Bissonette knows from personal experience that major changes are needed at home.
“We needed a ramp, we needed actually to put a new toilet in, we needed to change the size of the doorways, because we had a narrow hallway,” she said. “That all had to be done.”
There are also expenses that many wouldn’t expect.
“A lot of people don’t realize, we go through shoes,” Bissonette said. “We go through them pretty quick because we need the special support in them, and that type of thing.”
Bottom line: A large portion of the multimillion dollar payout will be used up adapting to life without limbs even before the victims actually start “living” again.
“That’s not gonna last them a lifetime, I’ll tell you that right now,” Bissonette said.
