Monday, February 9, 2009

Collins Zeroed Out LIHEAP?

From CQ.com this morning:

Unlike the House bill, the Senate version does not include additional funds for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which helps low-income families pay utility bills. The House bill has another $1 billion for the program.
Um, I thought Sen. Collins favored more money for LIHEAP? (Or is keeping poor people from freezing insufficiently stimulative?)

UPDATE: Gerald reads more carefully than I do: Why on earth did Collins demand a $3.3 billion cut to home weatherization programs?

Why on earth would she characterize a program that will create jobs, stimulate the economy, benefit her own constituents and protect the environment as "bloat"?

UPDATE UPDATE: A source tells us that LIHEAP and weatherization funding had been stripped from the bill that originally surfaced in the Senate. (The CQ article was ambiguous on this point.)

So it's not quite fair to say, based on what we know, that the junior senator demanded cuts to those programs.

On the other hand, she's championing a version of the bill with no LIHEAP funding and $3.3 billion less in weatherization--while rejecting the version that includes those funds as "bloated."

So draw your own conclusions.

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