Rendell irked by Flight 93 memorial delays

By KIRK SWAUGER
The Tribune-Democrat

SOMERSET September 10, 2008 11:04 pm

— Gov. Ed Rendell says he is becoming increasingly troubled by the lack of progress and federal funding toward construction of the Flight 93 national memorial.
As Rendell prepared to travel to Shanksville today for the seventh-anniversary commemoration of the crash, he said that “each year I go, it’s with mounting frustration.
“We’re no further toward construction of a memorial th an years before,” the governor said in a conference call Wednesday. “I am surely frustrated, and I know the families are frustrated.”
While the state has pledged $10 million toward the memorial and another $5 million for roads, Rendell said the federal government has not reciprocated enough.
Late last year, the federal government announced a $4.9 million appropriation for land acquisition to supplement $5 million in federal funds allocated earlier.
“There is a certain level of frustration that I’m feeling, and I’m sure others are feeling,” said Gordon Felt, president of Families of Flight 93.
“There is progress being made, certainly,” Felt said. “It’s not as if the project has stalled out.”
Forty passengers and crew are credited with thwarting a terrorist plot by forcing four hijackers to crash the plane into a reclaimed strip mine in Stonycreek Township.
Now, three years after the memorial’s design was unveiled, its timetable for completion has changed considerably.
Construction originally was to begin last year, with the memorial dedication planned for the 10th anniversary of the crash.
But developers, with less than half of their goal of $30 million in private donations, have gradually changed the schedule.
At the last federal Flight 93 Advisory Commission meeting, in early August, the National Park Service said only the initial phase of the memorial, including the sacred ground where the plane plunged, is expected to be done by 2011.
The visitors’ center and circle of trees around the site, along with a tower of wind chimes at the main entrance, will be built in subsequent phases.
“We’re getting very close to crunch time,” Felt said. “In order for us to dedicate this memorial three years from (today), we need to see an awful lot of activity.
“We can’t let up at all.”
In addition to fundraising shortfalls, a major part of the delay has been land acquisition: Specifically, an apparent stalemate between the park service and Svonavec Inc., a Somerset company that owns the ground where the plane crashed and a large portion of surrounding acreage.
The project also has been dogged by complaints spearheaded by California author Alec Rawls that the memorial points to Mecca and is a veiled tribute to the Islamic terrorists – a claim family members and developers maintain has been investigated and refuted.
“It is frustrating. You want it to move forward,” said Ben Wainio of suburban Baltimore, whose daughter died on Flight 93. “But we do have a plan in place, and we hope to be there by the 10th anniversary.
“I’m going to keep the faith that things are going to work out.”