Survivors of mass shootings are calling for nonprofit organizations such as the Colorado Healing Fund to distribute all of the money raised in the aftermath of the Club Q attack to victims and families of the shooting.
Gov. Jared Polis and Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers have touted the Colorado Healing Fund as the best way for donors to help victims of the Nov. 19 shooting, which left five people dead and 18 injured at an LGBTQ+ nightclub in Colorado Springs.
But victim advocates have criticized the organization for taking a 10% cut for operational costs.
"Victims and survivors across America from other mass shootings receive 100% of what is donated for them, so why should Club Q survivors receive any less than that?" said Tiara Parker, who survived the 2016 massacre at an LGBTQ+ nightclub in Orlando that killed 49 and wounded 53.
"We are here to speak as one voice. We have one message: Give the Club Q victims 100% of the funds donated to them," Parker said during a news conference Sunday at the Hyatt Place hotel in downtown Colorado Springs.
Parker was shot three times — in her hip, abdomen and arm — during the attack at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. Her cousin did not survive the shooting. She honors her cousin's life by traveling across the country to fight for tougher gun restrictions and advocate for victims.
"From Orlando to Denver, there are nonprofits that seek to exploit mass murder," Parker said.
These nonprofits, she said, try to "cash in on unfathomable pain and trauma we experience." She and others who spoke at the news conference called out the Colorado Healing Fund by name.
"Nonprofits are tricking you into believing that when you give your hard-earned wages that every penny will go to the victims, but they do not," Parker said.
Attempts to reach the Colorado Healing Fund on Sunday were unsuccessful. But earlier this month, the nonprofit's executive director, Jordan Finegan, told The Gazette that the group's 10% cut "allows us to sustain our nonprofit organization, so that we’re able to be here to support people after a tragedy happens."
As of Sunday afternoon, the group had collected roughly $345,000 in response to the Club Q shooting, according to its website.
Katie Medley, who survived the 2012 Aurora theater shooting that killed 12 and injured 58, called for nonprofits to equitably distribute the donations they collect.
"The first step to do right by victims and survivors is to create a centralized victim fund, but that hasn't happened here yet," Medley said. "There is no centralized victim fund for Club Q victims like there was for Orlando and for other mass shootings across the United States. The Colorado Healing Fund and its affiliate Colorado Gives 365 is not the way forward."
Amy Cook, who also survived the Aurora theater shooting, said victims of mass shootings are revictimized when they do not receive 100% of donations from nonprofits.
"Nothing has changed since Aurora," Cook said, "when victims had to get up off of their knees in grief and fight these nonprofits from diverting donations away from victims who rightfully deserve them."