A Stimulus Boost for Winterization

BY MAC McLEAN
BRISTOL HERALD COURIER
BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn. – Wanda Hooker’s kitchen window made a loud sucking sound as two contractors checked it and the rest of her 37-year-old mobile home for leaks.
“You can feel the air coming through right here,” said Howard Hoard, who works for the Upper East Tennessee Human Development Association’s weatherization program.
He was conducting a blower door test of Hooker’s home, on Oct. 6, which involves depressurizing the interior space with a large fan that blows air outside the front door. The drop in indoor pressure makes any leaks in the walls, windows or doors easily detectable.
Those leaks allow hot air to escape the home, and can wreck the structure’s overall energy efficiency. The leaks also cause super-high utility bills in winter, creating a financial hardship for residents like Hooker, who is severely hearing impaired.
When Hooker had problems paying her high utility bills this spring – her March electricity bill was twice her July bill – she sought help through the development association’s weatherization program.
“She’s losing a lot of heat,” said Charles Spence, who was hired to check Hooker’s home for leaks.
Spence said installing a new set of windows could cut Hooker’s winter utility bills by 25 percent. But it also would cost her about $300 a window, he said, which is a price Hooker and other low-income residents who benefit from the weatherization program cannot normally afford.
Over the course of a year, Program Director Pauletta Sensabaugh said, the weatherization program helps 200 families who live in Sullivan and the seven other Northeast Tennessee counties her agency serves. But this year will be dramatically different, Sensabaugh said, because her weatherization program and several others like it in the Mountain Empire are set to receive a huge funding boost from the federal stimulus package.
“We’re doing over 1,000 homes,” Sensabaugh said, adding that her agency plans to finish the work by the end of October 2010.
At least one-fourth of the homes targeted for the project should be inspected by the end of December, she said.

The boost
President Barack Obama wants to expand the country’s 33-year-old home weatherization program so it can help 1 million low-income families a year, according to a U.S. Department of Energy fact sheet. To reach that goal, the U.S. Congress, through passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, made a few changes in how the program operates, changes that let more and more families qualify for assistance.
The program’s maximum income requirements were increased, from 150 percent of the federal poverty guidelines – $16,235 a year for an individual and $33,075 for a family of four – to 200 percent of the guidelines. The new threshold – an annual income of $21,660 for an individual and $44,100 for a family of four – means 15,000 more Sullivan County residents qualify for weatherization assistance, based on U.S. Census Bureau income records.
The stimulus package also reduced the amount of time a person must wait to apply for weatherization program assistance, from 30 years or work that was done before September 1979, to 15 years or work that was done before September 1994.
Combined, the U.S. Department of Energy reports, the changes mean more than 38 million homes across the nation are now eligible for weatherization assistance.
The stimulus package hopes to help those families by providing a $5 billion boost to the 58 state governments, U.S. territories and Native American tribes that manage weatherization programs.
Tennessee’s share is $99.1 million over the next two years, said Michelle Mowery-Johnson, spokeswoman for the state’s Department of Human Services, which supervises its weatherization programs.
The department is funneling about $81.7 million to the 18 nonprofit agencies that normally handle weatherization projects across the state, she said.
UETHDA’s share is $7.24 million. Sensabaugh said that is more than 10 times the program’s normal annual operating budget of $500,000 to $700,000.
Mowery-Johnson said that total also is more that the previous year’s budget for the whole state, which is normally about $6 million.
The Human Services Department also is setting aside part of its stimulus package allocation, about $17.3 million, to train new weatherization program auditors, such as Hoard and Spence, and the contractors who do the work auditors recommend. The department already has certified 239 auditors and 340 contractors this summer, Mowery-Johnson said.
Some of the contractors have submitted bids on the 55 projects Spence and other UETHDA weatherization program staff advertised on the Department of Human Services’ Web site two weeks ago.
The projects include replacing the windows in Hooker’s 37-year-old mobile home. The list also includes a series of repairs Spence recommended for the Tallmans, a Blountville family he visited the same day he checked out Hooker’s home.

The Tallmans
Almost 10 years ago, Alena and Steven Tallman moved in to the three-bedroom double-wide off Cross Community and Ramey roads that they share with their three children. Working with his father, Steven Tallman installed a new set of windows at the front of the house after a severe hailstorm blew them out a few years ago. The two men also repaired other storm damage on the house and installed a wood-burning fireplace the Tallmans now use to keep warm during cold winter evenings.
“We do what we do to try to stay warm,” said Alena Tallman, who stays at home to look after her children while her husband drives a delivery truck for Advanced Auto Parts.
But it’s getting harder and harder for the Tallmans, who pay electricity bills that range from $150 to $325 a month. A home their size, Spence said, shouldn’t have electricity bills any higher than about $125.
“When you’re poor and broke you can’t afford to do things,” Alena Tallman said, admitting neither she nor her husband have been able to keep pace with the maintenance needed to keep their 10-year-old mobile home in the best of shape.
The back windows leak cold air and need to be resealed or replaced, Alena Tallman said, because they often frost over on the inside of their metal and glass panes.
There’s a leak in the bathroom, she said, which lets the cold air from under the house seep inside just as easily as it lets water collecting on the floor drain outside.
Spence recommended repairing the bathroom floor and replacing the back windows, which alone could cut the Tallmans’ winter utility bills by 5 percent to 10 percent.
Improperly sealed windows and water-damaged floors are two of the most common problems Spence said he sees in the mobile homes he inspects through the weatherization audit.
Mobile homes, he said, also have problems with faulty ventilation systems in their kitchens and bathrooms, leaking pipes and heating ducts and animals that crawl under the buildings and damage floor insulation.
“The list goes on and on,” Spence said. “You never know what you’re going to run into when you work on a mobile home.”
But one thing Spence does know is that about 40 percent of weatherization program applicants live in mobile homes, especially if they come from UETHDA’s more-urban locations, including Bristol, Tenn., and Kingsport.
Smith said he’s not surprised by this statistic, given that mobile homes are about the only structures that are affordable for the region’s poor and limited-income elderly.

Southwest Virginia
Mobile homes also are a frequent occurrence among people who turn to weatherization programs on the other side of the Virginia-Tennessee state line.
“About 50 [percent] to 60 percent of our homes are mobile homes,” said Fred Gross, director of People Incorporated’s weatherization program, which is also getting a boost from the stimulus package this year.
People Inc. serves low-income families in Bristol, Va., Washington County, Va., and Buchanan County, Va., and is one of four Southwest Virginia weatherization projects receiving stimulus money. The others are managed by the Clinch Valley Community Action, the Mountain Community Action Program and the Rural Areas Development Association. All total, they’ll receive almost $3.5 million this year.
Shea Hollifield, deputy director of housing for the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development, said they might get even more money next year.
Hollifield’s agency is receiving a $94.1 million boost from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. But rather than hand over the entire allocation at once, she said, the money will make its way to programs in two stages.
The first is based on the state’s normal funding formulas, which take into account a region’s overall climate, the number of low-income residents and the number of people who have high utility bills. Hollifield said the second stage will be given to weatherization programs based solely on how well they spend their first chunk.
“We’ll do as many jobs as we can with whatever funds become available,” People Inc. Director Mike Rush said. Rush estimates the stimulus boost will helps his agency reach 500 homes this year, which is five times the number it normally serves.
The program also is busy creating jobs, Ross said.
People Inc. already has doubled the staff that normally runs the weatherization’s administrative functions, he said. It also is looking for a few extra contractors to handle the workload as its 400 extra weatherization projects start coming in.

gmclean@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2518