Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program
LOW INCOME HOME ENERGY ASSISTANCE PROGRAM -- (Senate - February 10, 2006)
Mr. REED. Mr. President, I would like to begin my remarks today speaking about a topic that I have been involved with, along with many of my colleagues for months now. That is LIHEAP funding.
If you look at a weather map, you will see that temperatures across much of the United States are only expected to be in the thirties and forties today. Winter has finally arrived. In Providence, the high is only projected to be 19 degrees. A nor'easter is on its way up the east coast; they forecast snow that will hit here in the DC area tomorrow, all the way up to New England, and so winter has arrived.
I wanted to mention the weather forecast because we are at the end of the second week of February, and there is no new funding for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, and as far as I know, there are no plans by the majority to bring to the Senate a vote on a $2 billion LIHEAP funding proposal. This funding proposal was removed from the Department of Defense Appropriations bill conference report. It was one of a few items that was stripped out, there were many other nondefense items that were included in the Defense Appropriations conference report in December, but for some reason this was dropped. I think a reason it is adversely affecting thousands and thousands of Americans across the country, ranging from the Northeast into the mid-Atlantic, across the Midwest, out into the far West. People are struggling with rising energy prices, and today, falling temperatures.
On Monday, a bipartisan letter signed by 34 Governors urged Congress to pass $2 billion in immediate additional LIHEAP assistance. These are Governors from across the country, Governors that are of both party affiliations, Governors who are trying to respond to these conditions of both weather and extraordinary price increases.
The letter states:
LIHEAP applications are projected to increase by as much as 25 percent in some States ..... If Congress does not increase LIHEAP funding in the next few weeks, state programs across the country could run dry and the number of households unable to meet their basic heating needs could skyrocket.
I ask unanimous consent that both of these letters be included in the RECORD.
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