The Trump effect in RI: Heating aid on chopping block

March 27--PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Disabled Vietnam veteran Calvin Drayton is one of the tens of thousands of Rhode Islanders who would lose heating aid if President Donald Trump has his way and eliminates a Reagan-era program to help poor households pay their energy bills.

Drayton, a retired 69-year-old Central Falls resident who has a neurological condition, has received annual grants through the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program for the past 15 years. His payment last year was about $700.

Drayton, who lives on an income of $1,500 a month, has learned to make the grants last. He keeps his thermostat at 64 degrees and lowers it whenever he leaves his house. But he has no idea how he would be able to afford his heating bills without the help.

"It would be devastating," he said.

Defunding LIHEAP is among the range of cuts to social services programs put forward by the White House as part of the so-called "skinny" budget to help pay for an increase in military spending.

The budget document gives only a brief explanation of the proposed cut to the program that was funded at $3.39 billion in the federal fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.

"Compared to other income support programs that serve similar populations, LIHEAP is a lower-impact program and is unable to demonstrate strong performance outcomes," it said.

Joanne McGunagle, board chair of Rhode Island Community Action, which represents the agencies that distribute the funds across the state, reacted with shock.

"This isn't a hand-out," said McGunagle, who is also CEO of Comprehensive Community Action Program in Cranston. "This is a basic human need. You need to have shelter and you need to have warmth."

That is especially true in New England, with its harsh winters, but the program is also used for cooling during hot summers in the South. Advocates say it frees up money that can be spent on medications, food and other necessities.

LIHEAP has been targeted for cuts in the past, but this is different, said U.S. Sen. Jack Reed, the Rhode Island Democrat who has helped lead efforts in past years to restore funding.

"The signal that's being sent isn't that we have a temporary problem. It's that, 'This is going away,'" he said. "But what's not going away are low-income people who need the help."

LIHEAP was created in 1981 in response to rising energy costs. Funding peaked at $5.1 billion in the 2010 fiscal year, at the height of the economic recession. It dropped steadily in the years afterward and was level-funded from fiscal 2015 to fiscal 2016.

Rhode Island's share of the money has declined from $34.4 million in 2010 to $26 million last year -- a 25-percent difference. Likewise, the number of families that have received aid has gone down from 36,424 to 29,772.

The average amount of aid has also dropped from about $600 to $532 in 2014, the most recent year for data.

Eligibility for the program is determined by income. In Rhode Island, the state Department of Human Services requires a household income to be no more than 60 percent of the state average for its size to qualify. The maximum income for one person is $28,533. For a family of four, it's $54,871.

There are 141,113 households in the state that meet the eligibility requirements. That means that only 21 percent of eligible families actually got help this past winter.

"This lifesaving program is already underfunded," said Camilo Viveiros, coordinator of the George Wiley Center, a Pawtucket-based antipoverty group. "Now you're talking about slashing it."

Supporters of the program also point to another cut contained in Trump's preliminary budget proposal that would hit LIHEAP beneficiaries. The White House document also defunds the U.S. Department of Energy's $213-million Weatherization Assistance Program, which was created in 1976 under President Gerald Ford and pays for insulating homes for low-income families to stem energy consumption.

In Rhode Island, funds from the program are given only to households that qualify for LIHEAP. The state received $1.1 million in weatherization money last year that went to 1,284 families. Improvements through the program reduces future energy costs by an average of $264 per household, according to Reed's office.

Reed and U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, wrote to Trump in February urging him to fund LIHEAP. Their letter quoted from a 2011 national survey of 1,800 LIHEAP households that described them as "among the most vulnerable in the country."

Nine in ten have a family member who is a child or an elderly or disabled person. One in five have a member who is a veteran. Two-thirds of respondents said they would have kept their homes at unsafe or unhealthy temperatures or had utilities or heating fuel deliveries discontinued if not for LIHEAP.

A 2014 study concluded that eliminating LIHEAP would decrease the number of low-income energy-secure households in the nation by 17 percent. A 2006 study found that the program is associated with better health for children.

Reed and Collins are working to round up support in the Senate to keep the program funded. In the meantime, people like Robert Hemenway, a 66-year-old who lives in the Cranston house he grew up in, must contemplate the thought of going without.

Hemenway, who has epilepsy and other health problems that prevent him from working, received an $840 grant this past winter. He said that if LIHEAP were eliminated, "I'd have to hire someone to start chopping up the furniture" for firewood.

"I wouldn't be able to pay for heat," he said. "I wouldn't be able to live here."

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