Senate Passes Bill for More than $61 Million in Additional Funds to Help Illinois Residents Heat Their Homes

SENATE PASSES BILL FOR MORE THAN $61 MILLION IN ADDITIONAL FUNDS TO HELP ILLINOIS RESIDENTS HEAT THEIR HOMES

U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) hailed Senate passage of legislation which makes more than $61 million in additional funds available to help Illinois residents pay for heating bills through the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). Under the bill passed late last night, these funds, which were set aside for use starting in October 2006, would be made available immediately to help residents pay for heating bills this winter.

"With heating bills up 41 percent in the Midwest this winter, many people face a terrible choice -- heating or eating. In some cases, the situation is so dire that residents have been evicted because they can't afford to pay for rent, food and their heating bill," Durbin said. "LIHEAP was created to assist our lowest-income families and seniors, but Illinois LIHEAP officials tell us they have serious concerns that remaining funds will not be sufficient to cover Illinois residents who have applied for payments. This bill will make the money which is so desperately needed now available now."

The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) is a federally funded program which provides heating and cooling assistance to almost 5 million low-income households, including the working poor, those making the difficult transition from welfare to work, disabled persons, the elderly and families with young children. Assistance comes in the form of block grants to state programs that help eligible households pay for home energy costs.

Illinois currently has less than $20 million in available funds remaining in its account, and Illinois LIHEAP officials say that will not be sufficient to cover the remaining eligible applications. Of the approximately 800,000 Illinoisans eligible, only 344,700 have applied for help from LIHEAP and 293,725 are receiving assistance. According to recent reports, 12 states have now exhausted their funds for the regular winter heating season while several other states like Illinois are reporting that they are running dangerously low. Last month, Durbin joined Senate colleagues in sending a letter to the President urging him to release the $101.5 million remaining in the LIHEAP contingency fund.

"Experts tell us that the top two underlying reasons for homelessness in America are inability to pay for rent and inability to pay for utilities," said Durbin. "The costs of not providing help to those on the brink of homelessness are far greater than the cost of adequately funding the LIHEAP program."

In Illinois, requests for government help to pay heating bills were up over 40 percent in 2005. In Chicago, several offices are receiving dramatically more calls from people who cannot afford to pay their heating bills. Some offices report that seniors are forgoing purchasing their prescriptions or not buying food in order to attempt to pay the energy bill.

Last year, LIHEAP allowed the states to help about 5 million people out of an estimated 32 million eligible for assistance nationwide. As part of the energy bill signed into law last summer, Congress authorized $5.1 billion annually for the program for fiscal years 2005, 2006 and 2007. However, the final spending bill for fiscal 2006, which began in October, contained only $2.16 billion for the program despite attempts by Durbin and other Democrats to increase LIHEAP funding.

The funding in the bill the Senate passed yesterday (S. 2320) will now go to the House for consideration.

http://durbin.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=252300&&