donates $5,000 to start $100,000 campaign
San Antonio billionaire Red McCombs today opened his own wallet and tapped his muscular list of donors to raise money for Andrew Oberle, the UTSA grad student who was badly mauled by chimpanzees at the Goodall Institute in South Africa, 1200 WOAI news reports.
"I will open the drive by the McCombs family foundation by giving $5,000, and we hope to reach our $100,000 goal pretty quickly," he said.
McCombs, 85, who made his fortune in the oil, auto, land development, and communications industries, is one of the most generous philanthropists in Texas. The former owner of the San Antonio Spurs and Minnesota Vikings gives freely to many causes. The McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin is named in honor of his frequent donations to the college.
"We are going to try to raise $100,000 very quickly, from the very generous people in San Antonio," McCombs said.
Oberle, 26, was attacked and badly mauled by two chimpanzees as he was working at the Institute last week.
McCombs says the money will go to pay for Oberle's medical expenses, and 'anything else he needs.'
The fund will be managed by the United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County. Donors have already raised $20,000 independently to help Oberle.
Officials in South Africa say the incident was caused by 'human error' and the chimps involved will not be put down.
