Low-income heating program delayed by government shutdown

The federal government’s shutdown is holding up funds for a low-income heating program as winter approaches.

Catch up quick: The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) is a $4 billion program that helps about six million U.S. households a year pay for heating and cooling bills and weatherization projects. 

• Roughly 80 percent of LIHEAP funds are used in the winter months, Reuters noted, with states typically receiving allocations in late October or November before distributing the money to qualifying households through December. 

What’s happening: Several states, including New York and Pennsylvania, have warned over the past week that the shutdown is blocking their access to the funds, and have called on officials to maintain the program’s operations without interruption. 

• “Thanks” to the shutdown, “hundreds of thousands of vulnerable New Yorkers are about to be left in the cold,” said Governor Kathy Hochul, with Pennsylvania Rep. Madeleine Dean adding that the situation is “unacceptable.”

Between the lines: Emily Hilliard, press secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, which administers LIHEAP, said that once the government reopens, the agency “will work swiftly to administer annual awards.”

• Yes, but: While some states can operate using leftover budgets from last year, even if the government reopens soon, the earliest the funds would be released would be December, says Mark Wolfe, executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association (NEADA).
• “It takes at least four to six weeks to get the money out,” he notes. “State plans have to be approved… They have to announce to the states how much they’re going to get. All that takes time.”

Of note: NEADA is calling on utilities to suspend the practice of disconnecting service for households that don’t pay their bills until funds are released, TIME reported. But “until then, the delays will be hard felt.”

The big picture: The dilemma comes as most of LIHEAP’s staff was laid off in April, and as the Trump administration has considered cutting the program entirely. (Committees in both the House and Senate, however, have since moved to fund it through next year.)

Looking ahead: As of November 2, the government’s impasse shows no immediate signs of ending, as both Republicans and Democrats hold their ground. 

• “A $500 grant for energy assistance might not sound like a lot to a middle-income family, but for a low-income family, that’s what allows them to buy heating oil to get the furnace started,” Wolfe adds.