CUB Signs Letter Calling for Greater Energy Assistance and Weatherization Funding
Posted on July 31, 2017 by Samuel Pastrick
Tags, Energy
Early on the morning of July 31, 2017, CUB joined 34 state Attorneys General, Consumer Advocates, Utility-Regulatory Commissioners, and Community Services Administrators in submitting a letter to key U.S. Senators representing the Senate Committee on Appropriations and its Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services. The letter encourages stable or increased funding for the federal Low-Income Energy and Weatherization Assistance Programs (LIHEAP and WAP).
This particular funding battle started back in March when the Trump Administration released its budget preview for 2018. These previews or “skinny budgets” are a typical part of the federal budget-making process, and signal the President’s fiscal priorities for the coming year.
However, Mr. Trump’s 2018 skinny budget stood out to CUB (and MANY others) because of its uncharacteristic brevity and hatchet-like approach to domestic spending. For CUB, as a residential utility customer advocate, what we found most appalling was the outright and entirely unjustified elimination of two vital anti-poverty initiatives in LIHEAP and WAP.
These federal programs funnel billions of dollars to the states each year depending on the needs of their low-income populations. In 2017, LIHEAP and WAP combined for over $35 million in energy assistance and $7.4 million in weatherization funds to Oregon, accounting for almost 60 percent of the state’s energy services for low-income people.
Low-income energy assistance and weatherization programs are vitally important, because they not only offer economically vulnerable people with needed resources to stay safely in their homes, they also provide culturally and geographically diverse states like Oregon significant flexibility in how to distribute the funds.
For instance, Oregon’s Department of Housing and Community Services (OHCS) serves as a grant-making clearinghouse for low-income energy services. Each year, OHCS doles out millions in LIHEAP and WAP dollars to Oregon’s Community Action agencies, resting on the knowledge that on-the-ground organizations understand the most efficient and culturally sensitive ways to serve the residents of their communities.
What this means is that were the federal government to fully defund the LIHEAP and WAP programs, not only would low-income Oregon families suffer, Community Action organizations across the state, which provide critical services well beyond utility billing and weatherization assistance, would also see possibly irreparable economic harm.
Thankfully, on July 13, the equivalent House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services passed a spending bill that includes $3.39 billion in LIHEAP funding for 2018, the same figure as 2017. The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development forwarded a separate spending measure earlier in July that, among other things, would slash Department of Energy (DOE) spending on Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) by roughly half in 2018. The WAP program lives or dies by EERE funding levels. And while the President’s budget proposal would have eliminated WAP funding altogether, the recent House proposal maintains funding consistent with recent years.
Now it’s up to the respective Senate Appropriations Subcommittees to do their part by not just passing, but enhancing the House versions. Of course, in today’s ever-divisive political climate, that’s so much easier said than done – especially since any spending compromise would need to eventually make its way through the White House to the President’s desk. Stay tuned to CUB’s blog for future updates on this issue and more.
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09/05/22 | 0 Comments | CUB Signs Letter Calling for Greater Energy Assistance and Weatherization Funding