Tag: low-income

Stimulus Funds for Home Weatherization

  • A fan is sized to the front door so they can de-pressurize the house. This helps them see where air is escaping - and where insulation may be needed. (Photo by Julie Grant)

The government stimulus package
included billions of new dollars
for home weatherization programs.
The money is used to help low income
folks make their homes more energy
efficient. But some critics say
it’s not a good use of federal tax
dollars. Julie Grant reports:

Transcript

The government stimulus package included billions of new dollars for home weatherization programs. The money is used to help low income folks make their homes more energy efficient. But some critics say it’s not a good use of federal tax dollars. Julie Grant reports:

Chris Graham spends his days checking the energy efficiency of people’s homes.

Today he’s at Sandra Richards’ in Mogodore, Ohio.

Graham: “Hi Sandra.”

Sandra: “How are ya?”

Graham: “Wonderful. And you?”

Sandra: “Better.”

Graham: “Better?”

Sandra is 55. Her house is clean and neat. She was a nurse for many years, but today she’s sitting on the couch, watching TV. A broken foot spiraled into problems with her knee and hip – and other health problems.

“I mean I’ve just had so many things go on in such a little time. I was working 12 hour days, and one month later, I couldn’t work at all.”

Sandra qualified for the home weatherization program because she doesn’t have much in the way of income anymore.

Chris Graham says he’s been to a lot of homes where people are far worse off. They can’t get around, they don’t have money coming in, and their houses get cold in the winter.

Graham heads to the basement.

“The first thing we have to make sure is that the heating unit is not in terrible, dilapidated shape. And that it does not have more than a specified amount of carbon monoxide in the flu gasses.”

He turns on the furnace and sticks a probe into the flu pipe.

(sound of a tester)

Grant: “Looks like a receipt came out.”

Graham: “It kind of is. It tells you exactly what was going on there.”

Looks like Sandra’s furnace is running pretty well. 81% efficiency.

But Graham sees evidence of carbon monoxide on her old water heater.

“It’s 17 years old and it just plain needs changed. It’s got burnt, scorch all over it. So we’re gonna do that.”

That could cost more than $1,000.

But the home weatherization program can afford it these days. The stimulus packaged included $5-billion for this kind of work – compared with less than a quarter of a billion dollars last year. The new money has to be spent within two years.

And some people think that’s just too much money – too fast. Leslie Paige is with a taxpayer watchdog group called Citizens Against Government Waste.

“There’s always a lot of waste in government spending anyway, but when you spend it quickly and there’s very little oversight, that’s almost a prescription for seeing a lot of that money go for waste and fraud and losing to abuse.”

That kind of criticism is shocking to David Shea. He’s director the Community Action Council of Portage County, Ohio – the organization that hires inspector Chris Graham.
The weatherization program has been around since 1976 and Shea says they have to report their spending in about a hundred different ways.

“It’s not like money is being thrown out at agencies and just say, ‘oh go out and do it.’ There are volumes and volumes of written regulations that have been around for a long time. We do so much sophisticated reporting; they know how every dollar is being spent. Always. Always.”

Shea’s office used to have one crew out weatherizing homes around the county. Since the stimulus money’s come in, he’s hired a second crew. But there are so many people wanting their services, the waiting list is still years long.

(sound of a fan)

Back at Sandra Richards’ house, inspector Chris Graham has sized a big fan into the front door. He’s depressurizing the house – so he can see where air is escaping. Graham says she’s going to need some doors sealed and new insulation in the attic.

He says Sandra will feel more comfortable, so she won’t need to turn up the heat in the winter. That means she’ll save on energy costs, and will use less fossil fuels.

That’s the whole idea of this project – to use less energy in the future, and to help millions of families that couldn’t afford to improve things on their own.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

Saving Energy: Simple Changes, Big Impact

  • Jack Brown is an Outreach Technician for Community Resource Project, helping to spread the word about weatherization services that families may be eligible for. In his 23 years at Community Resource, Brown says he’s assessed about 5,000 homes. (Photo by Amy Standen)

Solar panels and wind turbines get most of the buzz, but it’s far easier and cheaper to save energy than it is to make more of it. Now, President Obama’s economic stimulus package
is pouring billions into energy-efficiency programs. As Amy Standen reports, it’s shining a new spotlight on some of the simpler ways we can all reduce our energy use:

Transcript

Solar panels and wind turbines get most of the buzz, but it’s far easier and cheaper to save
energy than it is to make more of it. Now, President Obama’s economic stimulus package
is pouring billions into energy-efficiency programs. As Amy Standen reports, it’s shining
a new spotlight on some of the simpler ways we can all reduce our energy use:

Sure, I’ve thought about buying solar panels to put on my roof. There’s a perfect spot on
the south-facing slope – maybe we could power the whole house. But there are some
easier things we could do first – like insulate the attic or weather strip the doors. And yet,
somehow I never quite get around to them.

Why is that? Well James Sweeney directs the Precourt Energy Efficiency Center at
Stanford, and he has a theory.

“Energy efficiency turns out to have low salience to people.”

Which is to say, it’s maybe… a little bit boring?

“It’s very boring.”

But if your eyes start to glaze over at the mere mention of the word “efficiency,” consider
the compact fluorescent light bulb.

“The easiest thing everyone can do is change their lighting.”

If everyone in the U.S. traded in their old incandescent light bulbs for compact
fluorescents, we’d cut electricity use by about 2%.

Which, maybe, doesn’t sound so impressive – until you consider the fact that all the solar
and all the wind power combined in the entire country amounts to point .4% of our total
energy use. That’s 0.4.

“The cleanest energy is the energy you don’t need in the first place.”

That fact has not been lost on the Obama White House. The American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act is pouring approximately 20 billion dollars into efficiency projects.

Five billion of that will fund what’s called the Weatherization Assistance Program, which
helps low-income families weatherproof their homes. To qualify, a family of four must
make less than $44 thousand dollars a year.

(sound of someone giving directions – “Take 25 and go to El Paso Road”)

That stimulus cash funds local non-profits like Community Resource Project, in
Sacramento, California. Since January, Community Resource’s budget has tripled, from
1.3 to 4.5 million dollars a year. They’re buying new trucks, hiring at all levels, and
going to more and more homes.

(sound of knocking at a door)

Like this one – a five-bedroom stucco ranch house in a newer suburban development
outside of Sacramento.

(sound of door opening)

“Hello, how are you doing?”

At the door is TinaMarie Dunn, a family friend who’s showing us around today. She
gives a squeeze to two-year old Anaya, one of ten children who live here.

“Look Anaya, say cheese!” (Anaya: Cheese!)

Dunn says utility bills here can hit $500 dollars a month. She says the house just doesn’t
work right.

“When the heat is on, downstairs is hot, downstairs is cold. When the air’s on, the
upstairs is cold, the downstairs is hot.”

Community Resource’s Dana Gonzalez walks into the kitchen, and pauses to take a look
around.

Standen: “So when you walked in, what was the first thing you saw?”

Gonzalez: “It’s funny. You see this door shoe and you see, actually the bottom rubber
is gone.”

He points to a two-inch gap under the front door.

“And if you put your hand here, you can actually feel the air. Anytime they kick on
their heat and cool, that’s definitely affecting their house, and in the long run, affects
their bill.”

Community Resource will spend about $1500 here, aiming to cut monthly utility bills by
as much as 20%.

They’ll weather strip the doors, patch up holes in the walls, install CFL bulbs. We’re not
talking solar panels or radiant heating – just small, mostly inexpensive adjustments that
cumulatively, have a huge impact.

The White House says these efficiency projects will create thousands of jobs, but there’s
also concern that the huge cash infusion is a recipe for fraud and mismanagement.

Department of Energy officials have called for extra vigilance in the disbursement of
weatherization cash. But, they say, the benefits, both environmental and economic, far
outweigh the risks.

For The Environment Report, I’m Amy Standen.

Related Links

Home Deconstruction vs. Demolition

  • The deconstruction method can preserve many of a house's resources in order to decrease waste from demolition. (Photo courtesy of Buffalo ReUse)

Every year, cities across the country spend millions of dollars tearing down condemned
houses and hauling away tons of debris to landfills. But progressive engineers and
community activists have found a way to reverse that wasteful process. A demolition
method called “deconstruction” uses human power instead of the wrecking ball to
preserve and reuse everything from floor joists to the kitchen sink. Joyce Kryszak puts
on her hard hat and takes us to one deconstruction site:

Transcript

Every year, cities across the country spend millions of dollars tearing down condemned
houses and hauling away tons of debris to landfills. But progressive engineers and
community activists have found a way to reverse that wasteful process. A demolition
method called “deconstruction” uses human power instead of the wrecking ball to
preserve and reuse everything from floor joists to the kitchen sink. Joyce Kryszak puts
on her hard hat and takes us to one deconstruction site:



This is not your typical demolition site. There are no wrecking balls or back hoes carting
away splinters of this once grand two-story home. Instead there are walls, lying
everywhere, and workers are taking them apart. A neat stack of harvested hemlock
beams grows on the vacant lot next door. There are cabinets, doors, books, furniture,
and dishes scattered all around them. There’s even a pile of dusty wine bottles retrieved
from the cellar. Deconstruction technician John Markle is covered in the dirt and grime
of the 100-year-old colonial. That’s because he’s taking this house apart with his
bare hands:


“Yeah, you won’t see a wrecking ball on our job site, but you will see a telescopic
forklift…And as you can see right there, we cut the house literally into big pieces,
and just take it apart, piece by piece.”


Markle does have some help. A crew of seven is busy carefully lifting off walls, pulling
apart beams and setting aside the spoils of their painstaking work. With a standard
demolition, about fifteen tons of usable building materials and supplies would have gone
to a landfill. Instead the materials are resold to builders, and at a discount to low-income
families so they can make repairs to their own homes. Dave Bennink is a deconstruction
consultant from Seattle. He’s spent the last fourteen years teaching communities this
sustainable method. And Bennink loves his job:


“We’re creating jobs, we’re keeping things out of landfill, we’re saving energy,
saving resources and we’re helping lower-income families…I mean, how could you not
like it every day.”


And he says the idea is slowly catching on. Bennick has clients in 21 states. Some of
them are private developers. Some are local governments. Right now, he’s working in
Buffalo, New York. He says when city officials learn they can deconstruct a house for
about the same cost as a demolition, in about the same time, the idea sells itself:


“I think they’re looking to make responsible choices, but they’re still looking to
make good decisions with the taxpayers’ money. So, when I can offer them both, I
think that’s more and more appealing.”


But sometimes a good idea needs a push. Michael Gainer is a former teacher and
community activist who needed little convincing. He sought out Bennink to help his city
get a deconstruction not-for profit business started.


Gainer is pretty young and strong, but he was still struggling to open the huge overhead door
that’s slipped off its tracks. This warehouse is where they keep all their salvage and then later sell it . And there’s plenty to choose from:


“We have a pretty big selection of doors, sinks, clawfoot tubs…”


And all of that from only a few months in the deconstruction business. The not-for profit
has already salvaged several houses on private contracts and has contracts with the city to
deconstruct about a dozen houses that were slated for demolition. And all with little to
no start-up money. Gainer says they’ve gotten a few grants, but so far they haven’t seen a
dime. They keep going with contracts and proceeds from sales. He pauses from telling
story to pull back a hair that’s strayed from his pony tail. His bandaged fingers leave a
smudge of dirt on his face. Gainer says the work isn’t easy, but he was eager to dig in:


“You know you gotta get out there and do it though. You gotta do the work. You
know, we talked about this for a year and I was about going bonkers, because I said,
I’m tired of talking about stuff. Let’s just go to work and get it done.”


Gainer is even more eager about the impact on the community. They’ve trained and hired
five, full time employees, a few part-timers, and are paying them all a living wage. They
get full medical coverage too, including the volunteers who pitch in. Gainer says it’s
possible because they’re not just throwing away resources:


“I was looking at wasteful expenditure of a hundred to two hundred million dollars
in a city to throw things in a landfill, and I’m like, this doesn’t make any sense. My
goal is to divert money from wasteful demolition and put young people to work,
improving their community.”


But Gainer says he’d really prefer not to take apart houses. His crew spruces up and
boards up abandoned houses that could still be saved. And he says if someone comes
along who has the vision to rehab it, they’ll help with that too.


For the Environment Report, I’m Joyce Kryszak.

Related Links

Safety Concerns About New Rat Poison Pill

  • The EPA has rescinded some safety constraints on rodenticides. Some fear this may harm children, because they might now be more likely to ingest rat poison. (Photo by Geovani Arruda)

Plaintiffs in a case before a New York Federal Court accuse the
Environmental Protection Agency of being too soft on protecting children
from poisonous rat pellets. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jenny
Lawton reports:

Transcript

Plaintiffs in a case before a New York Federal Court accuse the Environmental Protection
Agency of being too soft on protecting children from poisonous rat pellets. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jenny Lawton reports:


The poisonous pellets aren’t just tough on rats. Some environmentalists say they’re
injuring young children as well. The Natural Resources Defense Council says more than
fifty-thousand children in the U.S. below the age of six have been sickened by rat poison
this year. In 1998, the EPA made a rule that required manufactuers to put a bitter taste
and a special dye in the pellets to keep children from eating them.


But three years later, the agency rescinded that mandate.


It said it had come to a “mutual agreement” with the rodenticide industry that those precautions
might be making the pellets less effective. But critics say that has put kids back in harm’s way.
Especially those living in low-income areas where rat infestation is a common problem.


Although the EPA won’t comment directly on the case, an agency report from 2001 argued that
when rodenticides are used correctly, and children are supervised around them, fewer accidental
ingestions happen.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Jenny Lawton.

Related Links

Riders Pay With Recyclables

The city of Seymour, Indiana had two problems: it’s low-income residents
needed public transportation, and like most cities across the nation, it
needed to reduce the amount of waste heading to landfills. Working with
state and federal government agencies, the city solved both problems,
with one solution never before tried in any U-S city: a public bus that
accepts recyclables as fare. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Janet
Babin reports: