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RALEIGH (AP) — North Carolina's effort to help thousands of mental patients and prisoners sterilized against their will decades ago moved forward today  as state officials announced its first hire to lead a program to determine how to compensate victims.

Charmaine Fuller Cooper, named the first executive director of the North Carolina Justice for Victims of Sterilization Foundation, will help develop criteria to determine whether patients or their descendants qualify for financial restitution or other assistance, according to the Department of Administration.

More than 7,600 people were sterilized by choice or coercion under the state's so-called eugenics program between 1933 and 1973. Then-Gov. Mike Easley apologized in 2002 for the state's role in the sterilizations. Activities to help victims have been slow due to financial constraints and political obstacles.

"I'm excited about this opportunity and see it as a turning point to bringing justice to so many families and individuals affected by this tragic moment in North Carolina history," Cooper said in a statement. "I aim to give them a voice so nothing like this ever happens in state government again."

North Carolina was one of more than two dozen states that ran such programs after social reformers began advocating for the approach a century ago as a way to prevent people considered mentally disabled or otherwise genetically inferior from having children. The state was the first to consider compensation to victims.

The foundation's biggest challenge may be finding funds to actually offer compensation. While the General Assembly — with support of Gov. Beverly Perdue — provided $250,000 back in August to start the foundation, there's no money set aside yet for actual payments.

Depending on the rules set the state could need tens of millions of dollars annually, and it's unlikely lawmakers can fund a sizable amount this year as a budget shortfall could reach several hundred million dollars.

Perdue added momentum to the issue during her 2008 gubernatorial campaign by pledging to compensate victims if elected.

It took several months before hiring Cooper, executive director of the reform-minded Carolina Justice Policy Center in Durham and a former employee for several agencies working with the poor on criminal justice issues. Now board members must be chosen and a foundation charter written.

"I guess a snail's pace is better rather than no pace," said state Rep. Larry Womble, D-Forsyth, who has been the chief legislative advocate to address wrongs from the sterilization program. "I know that people are saying this is a time of recession but at the same time the state was responsible for it and the state ought to pay for it. It was a miscarriage of justice."

North Carolina's program targeted the poor and people living in prisons and state institutions, among others. While officials obtained written consent from patients or their guardians, many didn't know what they were signing and were essentially coerced, state historians have said.

A House committee last year recommended a bill that would have given $20,000 to victims of the program, but it went no further. The delays are more acute because less than half of those sterilized are still alive, according to Womble.