Malden - Less than a month into winter, the towering cost of energy is casting a grim shadow on the hundreds of thousands of Massachusetts residents who struggle to pay heating bills through the season. When the price of oil broke $100 a barrel for the first time in 27 years on Jan. 2, those receiving fuel assistance took another hit.
“We’re assisting low income [individuals] to pay their heating bills through the winter months,” said Marilyn Murphy, the energy director at the Tri-City Community Action Program (Tri-CAP). “Now it’s January and people are out of their benefits.”
Through Tri-CAP, which serves Medford, Malden, Everett, Winchester, Woburn, Stoneham and Melrose, people at up to 200 percent of poverty-level income can receive assistance paying their heating bills. The organization helps distribute aid from the state’s Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.
When Gov. Deval Patrick released $15 million of state funds to assist low-income families heat their homes in November, it provided a little relief. The money allowed agencies like Tri-CAP to raise the maximum heating benefit from $715 to $865.
While on the surface the numbers look encouraging, they’re not when compared with what heating a home with oil will cost this winter.
“In a normal winter it costs people around $1,500 to $2,000 to heat their homes,” said Murphy. “This year a minimum would be 3,000.”
She said it has never been harder for people to pay their heating bills.
Agencies across the state came together to lobby for the extra money. Murphy said they asked for $30 million and got half that. But, she said, organizations plan to continue to lobby for another $15 million.
“For weeks, we had every client that called us call the governor’s office” said Murphy.
In Massachusetts, Murphy said nearly 200,000 people are assisted by the heating assistance program. Locally, Tri-CAP helps around 1,500 families pay for oil heat, but most have already used up their funds. However, there is still money in the program for new applicants.
Philip Bronder-Giroux, Tri-CAP’s executive director, said the available funding just won’t cut it this year. In fact, he said funding has almost never been increased to meet inflation in the fuel assistance program’s 30-year history.
“The amount of federal appropriation has been steady since the 70s,” he said, adding that with the price of energy rising and the value of the U.S. dollar declining, there just isn’t enough keep the furnaces going.
The only year federal fuel assistance funding was higher was in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina hit. Then the maximum benefit was $1,149.
Bronder-Giroux estimated it would cost $120 million this winter to provide heat to the nearly 200,000 residents of Massachusetts who rely on fuel assistance. He would like to see President George W. Bush release the federal contingency fund.
This, he said, would provide clients with another $300, or about 100 gallons of oil.
“I think what will happen federally is the New England contingency will pressure the government into releasing some of those funds,” said Giroux.
Rep. Edward J. Markey, D-Malden., is calling on Bush now to release the $600 million in contingency funds.
“While congress recently addressed long-term oil dependence by passing fuel economy standards,” said Markey. “The President must address our short-term dependence by releasing emergency low-income energy assistance funds to offset current high heating oil prices.”
Indeed, it has not been easy for those relying on fuel assistance. Murphy said she’s been hearing people say they’re relying on space heaters, candles and their ovens to heat their homes.
“We got a call yesterday from a couple in Stoneham that said they live on $9,000 a year and they had no oil for two weeks and their pipes were frozen,” said Murphy. “People are desperate.”
Many do not know it is both illegal and dangerous to use space heaters as a primary source of home heating.
“The main factor is, people don’t understand the amount of radiant heat that they give off,” said a representative from the Medford Fire Department’s Fire Prevention Bureau. “You’ve got to be careful not to place them next to combustible materials.”
Space heaters, he said, should not be left on when the home is empty or when everyone is asleep. There have not yet been any fires in Medford due to space heaters this winter.
Rather than risk such dangers, Bronder-Giroux encourages people who have burned through their money to explore a few other options.
Citizen’s Energy, a non-profit backed by CITGO, will provide needy and elderly homes a one-time delivery of 100 gallons. Citizen’s started in Massachusetts and is now in 15 other states.
Bronder-Giroux says it is best to get started with Citizens early, as it can take four to six weeks for them to fully process an application.
The Mass Energy Consumers Alliance is an option even for middle-income families. MECA, which operates much like a co-op, offers discounts to its members to the tune of 20 cents per gallon. Any household can join. MECA also coordinates a number of yearly heating oil donations.
“It’s a great resource for anyone,” said Bronder-Giroux.
Tri-CAP itself offers a variety of programs to help keep people warm for the winter. The agency winterizes up to 120 homes per winter, installing weather stripping on windows and doors. Homeowners can request replacement heating systems if theirs suddenly break.
“If we button up your home really tightly,” said Bronder-Giroux, “you will be warmer.”
With politicians lobbying for more federal dollars and agencies like Tri-CAP helping out where they can, there are options out there for those in need. Still, Bronder-Giroux recommends everyone take a conservative approach to heating this winter.
“We hope to get to March,” said Bronder-Giroux. “I mean, it’ll still be cold. But at least people won’t freeze to death.”
Tax
preparation
Assistance
for low wage
Earners at Cyber Cafe`
The
Malden Advocate - Friday, February 8, 2008
The Cyber Café @ Malden Square is again offering free tax preparation to low wage-earners so they can take advantage of the federal and Massachusetts Earned Income Tax credit (EITC), applicable child and child care credits, and file their federal and state taxes electronically. Low-income families can qualify for up to $4,700 credit on their federal taxes (MA EITC is 15% of the Federal EITC). The EITC, also called the EIC, is based on family size plus total income and helps working individuals and families move out of poverty.
For more information, to join the Coalition, or to
volunteer, call toll free: 866-833-2823 and leave a message and a return phone
number.
Office of Rep. Christopher C. Fallon,
With nearly 120 elderly Malden residents facing a federally approved 20 to 25 percent rent increase tomorrow, social service agencies and politicians were mounting a concerted effort last week to provide some relief to the tenants, most of whom are on fixed incomes.
In August, federal regulators allowed the owners of The Heritage, a 208-unit apartment building on Pleasant Street, to increase rents for most tenants by as much as 25 percent and to impose additional, smaller increases on Feb. 1. The decision allowed possible further increases in June.
Tenants say the increases pose a severe hardship.
``Terrible," said Fran Garvey, a recent cancer survivor and a resident of The Heritage for five years.
Under the plan, the rent for her studio apartment was to rise by $82 a month today, from $331 to $413. Garvey said she lives on the combined $900 she receives each month from Social Security and her pension.
``What am I going to do?" she said. ``I can't depend on my daughter; she can't support me. And I'm not working. I'm 81 years old. Am I supposed to work? You are supposed to be able to enjoy what life you have left."
In an Aug. 30 letter to the building owners, First Church in Malden Homes Inc., officials from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development said they had determined that the rent increases were needed to meet operating expenses of the 35-year-old building. The owners noted in particular the rise in their utility costs.
First Church is a nonprofit launched by members of First Congregational Church of Malden to develop the low-income building, constructed in 1971. It is not affiliated with the church.
HUD has the power to approve rents because it is the guarantor of mortgages for the project and because it provides owners with a mortgage interest subsidy.
Tenants and their advocates were able to work with management to arrive at a common strategy last week for bringing relief to the tenants facing the rent hikes. The two sides met Sept. 21 and again Tuesday.
Doreen Bushashia -- director of resident services for the management company, Braintree-based Peabody Properties -- said the first meeting was ``very, very helpful in terms of bringing the residents and their advocates, as well as the management and ownership entities, together."
``We found we have a lot of common ground," she said.
At Tuesday's meeting, it was agreed that Peabody Properties would ask First Church's board of directors to seek HUD approval to delay the rent increases by a month, according to Claire Murray, community organizer for the Local Action Committee, which advocates for affordable housing in Malden. That effort was ongoing at press time.
Murray said city leaders were being asked to consider providing financial assistance to the owners to offset revenue lost in the delay in the rent hike.
She said it was also agreed that management, tenants, and advocates would join to ask HUD to issue ``enhanced vouchers" to existing tenants, which would largely freeze their rents while providing the building with the additional revenue the owners say is needed to operate the complex.
The pending rent increases affect tenants living in units that are part of the federal housing subsidy program known as Section 236. That group includes all but 20 of the building's 208 units; 70 are currently vacant. With enhanced vouchers, those tenants would continue to pay their current rent, or 30 percent of their monthly income, whichever was higher. HUD would pay the remainder of the rent. Currently, it provides a subsidy of $80 per apartment. New tenants would pay the future rents in full.
Kristine Foye, a spokeswoman for HUD's New England regional office, said the agency would review any proposal to delay the rent increase.
But she added that the increase had been approved ``because the property really needed the money to meet its operating costs" and that the rent hike was to be implemented in stages ``to minimize the impact on residents."
Foye said that HUD had just sent a letter to the owners of The Heritage responding to their request for enhanced vouchers, a request that was pending prior to last week's tenant-management meeting.
While declining to comment on the letter, Foye said that HUD's position is that nonprofits are not eligible for enhanced vouchers.
Murray said that ownership has proposed transferring the property to a for-profit, ``limited dividend entity" whose sole stockholder would be First Church in Malden Homes Inc. She said the owners and tenants contend that the transfer would make the property eligible for enhanced vouchers.
In addition to the Local Action Committee, the senior tenants are seeking help from the Massachusetts Senior Action Council; US Representative Edward J. Markey, Democrat of Malden; state legislators; and city officials, according to Murray, who was hired by Tri-City Community Action Program, an antipoverty agency, to work on the matter with the Local Action Committee.
``Our hope is to put pressure on HUD to do the right thing for the tenants," Murray said.
She added that the rent increases put many of the tenants in a financial bind.
``These are people who moved into this building thinking it was the last place they were going to live, that they'd live out their lives here," Murray said.
``There is no place for them to go," she said, citing the long wait for placement in municipal housing complexes for seniors.
In addition to being low-income, many of the seniors are not in good health, Murray said. ``They are the most fragile part of our society."
Patricia Worthley, 93, has lived in The Heritage for 16 years. Like Garvey, she faces an $82 increase today on her studio apartment.
``Right now, I could pay it," she said. ``But what happens later on? Who
is going to take care of me?"