BANGOR – The two words Maine Community Action Association President Matthew Smith hears most when he asks those at the forefront of helping Maine families get heating fuel assistance are “fear” and “desperation.”

“People are fearful and they are desperate,” Smith said in a telephone interview Thursday, hours after a news conference during which he released a series of federal and state recommendations aimed at helping families make it through this winter – and the many more to come.

With the cost of heating fuel up from $1.06 a gallon during the 2002-03 heating season to a projected $5.04, an increase of about 375 percent, it is clear to Smith and the 10 regional community action programs that make up the statewide association that something has to be done, and now.

The association’s recommendations were borne out of a couple of brainstorming sessions and were refined by e-mail, Smith said. Members formally adopted them last week.With 80 percent of the state’s households heating with oil, the impact of the spike in oil prices will be felt far and wide, he said.

As Smith and other MCAA members see it, the Legislature and the U.S. Congress “need to take decisive action before we begin to see ‘death by hypothermia’ as a standard phrase in our local newspapers.”

Smith hopes the recommendations – and supporting data – will spur some action when they reach the mailboxes of state and federal lawmakers.

“The realization has got to come first,” Smith said, adding that the impending home heating crisis is a difficult one to convey.

“It’s not spectacular like a flood or fire. There’s no visual to it. This is a disaster that will be happening to thousands and thousands of families in their homes.”

Among other things, the association is urging Congress to boost funding for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, better known as LIHEAP, from the current $2 billion to $25 billion, a figure Smith notes is roughly equivalent to the fivefold increase in heating oil prices since 2002.

“It’s not a huge amount of money when you look at other [federal] programs, like the military, for example,” Smith said.

In addition to beefing up LIHEAP funding, MCAA members believe that income eligibility limits must be increased so that more households, including “working poor,” can benefit and that benefits should be allocated on a sliding scale, “so the less you make, the more benefit you get” and vice versa.

“We’ve got to reach further up the income scale because there are households that are not eligible, yet they are in great need,” Smith said.

On the state side, MCAA is calling upon the state to set aside $20 million to address the high number of “no heat” emergencies many expect will hit the state this winter.

“What happens to folks when the LIHEAP benefit is gone and their own money is gone and it’s the dead of winter?” he asked.

But those measures will help families make it through only this winter.

The MCAA also is recommending a number of long-range steps, including increased federal funding for weatherization and state funding for helping families convert from oil heat to wood heat.

Another suggestion calls for funding wood-based heating pilot projects

“We think Maine is a great place to test alternatives [to oil],” Smith said. “We have some of the oldest housing stock in the country and long, cold winters. We think this is a perfect place to experiment.”

dgagnon@bangordailynews.net

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