By Haley Kosik/WJEZ News

Governor Bruce Rauner announced the suspension of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP).

This will leave senior citizens, people with disabilities and families with children without vital utilities such as refrigerated food, gas or electricity to cook, turn on lights, wash clothes, take a warm shower or heat/cool their homes. Without simply amenities, this could lead to eviction of the members of those households.

Rauner’s position on the need to strengthen the safety net, which provides assistance to help the working poor climb out of poverty, has the Illinois Association of Community Action Agency’s support. The IACCA strongly believes that suspending the State LIHEAP Supplemental Funding will further weaken the safety net.

Low Income Households spend 21-30 percent of their income on utilities while typical middle class families spend 4-6 percent of their income on utilities.

LIHEAP serves less than 40 percent of the eligible population. Families who are helped by LIHEAP will fall deeper into poverty when state funding is eliminated for the program. Over 150,000 households statewide will not be served once the state funds are suspended from serving these households.

Illinois started to run out of both federal and state funding in March for the LIHEAP program. Thousands of household who are eligible have not been served due to the program running out of funding early.
Those households who have been disconnected will be without utilities until the fall.

Federal LIHEAP dollars are allocated to the state of Illinois in mid to late November. There is a three month lag between receipt of federal funding and when the program starts in September. The state funding covers that lag and ensures that families begin to get served in September.

The suspension will be in effect on July 1st, 2015.