Thermal insecurity

Low-income Mainers have begun receiving the grim news: Reflecting steep cuts in the Low Income Heating Assistance Program, federal fuel aid awards this year will fall far short of last year’s figures.

A disabled Topsham widow who relies on LIHEAP to help heat her mobile home called the newspaper last week to report that she’ll receive less than half of last year’s allocation. With heating oil prices hovering around $3.50 per gallon, this year’s LIHEAP check will buy her approximately 150 gallons, perhaps enough to keep her furnace running through the end of December.

Oil prices have risen. Her fixed income hasn’t. Market forces and a Congress afflicted with a severe case of compassion constipation conspire to place her at extreme risk. And she’s far from alone. Thousands of Maine households don’t have cash or fuel reserves to keep their homes heated this winter.

Maine’s congressional delegation and Gov. Paul LePage’s administration continue to advocate for increased LIHEAP funding. The image of pampered elected officials engaging in protracted partisan bloviation rather than addressing a looming crisis should light every reasonable American’s pilot light, but those political efforts might produce a stopgap measure to prevent vulnerable Mainers from freezing. So they are worth pursuing.

Meanwhile, the local Habitat for Humanity affiliate offers more direct aid through its weatherization program. Volunteers help residents make the most of each dollar spent on heating and energy by providing free tips about insulation, storm window installation and other forms of energy conservation.

As political leaders dither about the nation’s energy policy and annually use LIHEAP funding as a foil for ideological dueling, Habitat for Humanity’s weatherization efforts in Maine represent sound, practical problem-solving that yields immediate and long-term benefits to individuals and society as a whole.

To learn more, call 386-5087.

Cut now, pay later

Proponents of federal debt reduction argue vociferously that our children and grandchildren will suffer in the future by having to pay debts amassed now.

But will we better serve our children by shortchanging them now in the name of reducing their future encumbrance?

For decades, Congress has failed to fully fund mandated special education programs. Since June 2004, two Maine governors and four legislatures have ignored a telling voter mandate to fund 55 percent of the total cost of public education and 100 percent of special education costs.

In October, Congress again cut federal funds for special education, disadvantaged youth programs, teacher improvement programs and career and technical education.

Government’s irresponsible approach to public education funding poses as great a threat to our children as the federal debt. The U.S. lurches perilously close to a society in which educational inequality will leave average Americans academically and vocationally unprepared to do much other than wage war, even though war contributed mightily to our current debt load.

Have we learned nothing?