TRENTON — President Obama’s budget will propose cutting in half the program that helps low-income families and senior citizens and disabled pay their heating and air conditioning bills, according to U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), who signed a letter Friday urging the president to change his mind. The cut would drop about 500,000 New Jersey residents from the Low...
U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, seen here in this 2006 file photo, signed a letter Friday urging the president to change his mind about cutting the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.TRENTON — President Obama’s budget will propose cutting in half the program that helps low-income families and senior citizens and disabled pay their heating and air conditioning bills, according to U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), who signed a letter Friday urging the president to change his mind.
The cut would drop about 500,000 New Jersey residents from the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program program that assisted nearly 1 million state residents last year, Menendez said in a statement released Friday.
"It defies common sense to shut off the heat to seniors and low-income families,’’ Menendez said. "Cutting these resources is colder than this winter. We need to get our fiscal house in order. But we should do it responsibly.’’
Menendez, Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and 29 other U.S. Senators signed the letter to Jacob J. Lew, director of the Office of Management and Budget, asking he consider both the hardships of poor families and seniors and the benefit the program provides to the economy.
"The program helps low-income families and seniors with their energy bills, while at the same time generates $1.13 in economic activity for every dollar in benefits paid,’’ according to the letter citing an analysis by economists, Mark Zandi at Moody’s Analytics and Alan Blinder of Princeton University.
"Failing to provide basic energy assistance, for our-income families, the millions of American seeking work, and middle-income American may threaten our economic recovery,’’ according to the letter.
A spokesperson from the Office of Management and Budget did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Obama administration dedicated $5.1 billion to "LIHEAP" program, as it is known, in fiscal year 2010, according to the web site of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. New Jersey consumed about $195 million of the fund. New Jerseyans qualify if they earn no more than twice the poverty rate, or $44,700 for a family of four.