On May 1, 2008, the Las Vegas Review-Journal attributed to Nevada State Governor Jim Gibbons' spokesman, Ben Kieckhefer,[72] the Governor's decision to direct the state to charge Steve Fossett's family for the $687,000 expense of the search for Fossett.[73] Kieckhefer later played that early report down, when he told the Tahoe Daily Tribune that Nevada did not intend to demand an involuntary payment from Fossett's widow, but that such a payment would be voluntary: "We are going to request that they help offset some of these expenses, considering the scope of the search, the overall cost as well as our ongoing budget difficulties."[74] Hotelier Barron Hilton, from whose ranch Fossett had departed on the day he went missing, had previously volunteered $200,000 to help pay for the search costs.[73][74]