WTC-fund 'vampire' stays on

WTC-fund 'vampire' stays on

By SUSAN EDELMAN

March 29, 2009 --

Christine LaSala, who announced she was quitting last year as head of the city's $1 billion fund for World Trade Center claims, quietly stayed at the helm -- but with a cut to her $350,000 pay, The Post has learned.

LaSala, president and CEO of WTC Captive Insurance Co., withdrew her resignation several months later after "voluntarily" slashing her salary to $234,500 in 2007, a spokeswoman said.

"She's like a vampire," a stunned congressional staffer said.

LaSala, 58, who also gets health coverage for herself and a daughter, according to her spokeswoman, remained "with the support" of the WTC Captive's board of directors, composed of city officials and others appointed by Mayor Bloomberg.

Under LaSala's leadership, the insurance fund has spent more than $191 million on lawyers and overhead since 2004 to fight 9,000 claims by 9/11 responders seeking compensation for illnesses blamed on toxic exposure. It has paid $320,000 to five workers for orthopedic injuries.

"I guess it's to be expected that an insurance company that never pays insurance claims would have a CEO who resigns but never leaves," Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan) told The Post.

Maloney said she wants to ask LaSala -- who's set to testify before Congress for the first time Tuesday -- how the fund "can give its executives exorbitant salaries and gold-plated health insurance while the sick workers they're fighting have neither."

LaSala's pay cut took effect in January 2007, two months after The Post revealed her $350,000 salary. That far exceeded the salary of the city's highest-paid employee, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, who makes $250,000.

WTC Captive manages $1 billion that Congress gave the city to pay claims from the Ground Zero cleanup. The fund dipped to $941 million as of Dec. 31.

Until recently, interest on bond investments covered the expenses. The fund lost $14 million on investments in the last half of 2008, but still came out ahead $700,000 for the year, records show.

Christine LaSala...her name will be mud in future history texts.

As the people take back their country and the globe, slime such Christine LaSala will have their names denegrated so badly that her offspring will disown her.

Vampire is a good description of her actions

& Congress better expose her, when she testifies this Tuesday.

Sickening, that she & her daughter get healthcare, but she is fighting 9.11 first responders, who are trying to get their own.