Record home energy assistance program funds available – Spectrum News 1

MASS. – For some families, Covering energy costs is a month-to-month battle.

Sydney Fuller-Jones, a native Californian who has lived in Massachusetts since the 1980s, said that’s been the case for her family for more than a decade. 

While she’s the proud mom of twins and has a good job working for more than 20 years as a research analyst for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Fuller-Jones said that when she suddenly became a widow in 2011, her finances changed drastically. Without a second paycheck coming in from her husband, the 59-year-old said she learned very quickly that she’d need help paying her bills. She also knew, with the cost of child care, that she wouldn’t be able to afford taking on a second job. 

“They say that I could feed a family of seven. On my paycheck? Who can do that? Not me, being a single parent,” Fuller-Jones said. 

In order to cover some of the bare necessities, like heating and electricity, Fuller-Jones said she started looking for help and found the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

LIHEAP helps families cover a variety of energy costs including electricity, oil and natural gas bills.

Fuller-Jones told Spectrum News 1 that without it, she would’ve spent the last decade making some tough choices.  “There were times that, you know, I had to decide to, are we gonna have heat,” said Fuller-Jones. 

Congress took steps to ensure LIHEAP would help a record number of applicants in 2022, because of the pandemic, by including money for the program in the massive COVID relief package that they approved last spring. Now, there’s nearly double the funds available this year than there were in 2021. 

“For LIHEAP, the average probe normal appropriation was around $3.3 billion. These congressional leaders had the wisdom to put in an additional $4.5 billion dollars. So it is close to $8 billion in total,” said Gene Sperling, a senior advisor to President Joe Biden. 

A portion of the $8 billion will go to all 50 states and $307.5 million will go to Massachusetts. This year’s allocation to Massachusetts means that the state is getting twice the annual funding for the program.

“This historic amount of funding to help households cover home energy costs in Massachusetts means no family or senior has to go cold this winter,” said Senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren in a joint statement issued on Monday. 

Several more Massachusetts lawmakers have also told Spectrum News 1 that the program is vital for their constituents.

“LIHEAP has been important to me since I first served in the state legislature because we have a cold days, snowy days, like today. We also have high cost of energy in the best of times, never mind following a pandemic and what that’s done to our global markets. So this is critical to families at home,” said Rep. Katherine Clark (D-MA 5th District) during a White House conference call on Friday. 

“Families in Massachusetts oftentimes have to face this difficult challenge between putting food on the table or heating their homes,” said Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA 2nd District). 

Fuller-Jones said that anyone who is struggling to pay their energy bills shouldlat least check to see if they qualify for LIHEAP assistance.

“No hesitation at all. There’s no embarrassment. No, not none of that,” Fuller-Jones said. 

Some lawmakers believe that continued funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance program will be vital in the years to come. They expect climate change will bring on more extreme weather, including increasing heat in the summer months and winter storms. They believe that these conditions will also increase our demand for energy and, in turn, the need for financial assistance to cover increased costs. 

Original Source: https://spectrumnews1.com/ma/worcester/politics/2022/01/12/more-money-than-ever-is-available-for-massachusetts-families-who-need-help-paying-energy-bills-