LANSING – A program designed to reduce heating and cooling costs for low-income residents by funding weatherization upgrades to their homes would see stable funding under a bill unanimously approved Wednesday by the House Appropriations Committee.

HB 4544 would require, beginning with the current 2014-15 fiscal year, that the state’s weatherization program to receive at least $6 million from the federal Low-income Home Energy Assistance Program, but no more than 15 percent of total funds from that program as long as the total amount of federal funding for the program for the state was at least 90 percent of what it was in the preceding fiscal year.

If the state receives less than 90 percent of the amount the federal government appropriated in the previous fiscal year, then the state would have to spend at least $5 million on weatherization. There is no current minimum in place and in the 2013-14 fiscal year that ended September 30, the state spent no money on weatherization out of the $180.3 million it received from the federal government for the LIHEAP program.

Of the $180.3 million, $77.3 million went to emergency energy relief, $46.75 million for the Home Heating Tax Credit, $40 million for the Michigan Energy Assistance Program and $16.3 million for administration in the departments of Human Services and Treasury.

Typically at the end of the fiscal year, DHS contacts the outside agencies that administer weatherization programs to see if they can spend a lot of money in a short amount of time, Kate Birnbryer White, executive director of Michigan Community Action, said. That’s a difficult task, Ms. White said. Absent regular funding, the organization may have to lay off its contractors that perform the weatherization work, and re-hiring them could be a challenge, she said.

The proposed funding would enable weatherization of at least 2,000 homes, White said.

“That’ll be 2,000 homes, maybe more, that will have lower energy bills,” she said. “Their homes will be safer and more comfortable.”

The committee adopted, on a 26-1 vote, an amendment that requires property owners to match at least 25 percent of the cost of weatherizing the home unless the owner’s income is up to 150 percent of the federal poverty level. Some local programs already require a match (Macomb County requires a 40 percent match), but others have none.

Rep. Al Pscholka (R-Stevensville) said the amendment is designed to have owners of rental properties contribute to the weatherization upgrades instead of benefitting from a full federal subsidy.

“I think they ought to have some skin in the game,” he said. “They ought to be able to put 25 percent of the cost up.”

Several members questioned why rental properties should see any assistance at all, but White and Rep. Joseph Haveman (R-Holland), the committee chair, said it is not the rental property owner who sees the benefits, but the tenant in the form of lower energy bills.

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