LIHEAP fuel assistance has problems

To the Editor:

I hear talk of LIHEAP fuel assistance being cut. Repairs should be considered before any cutting is done. The program has two serious problems:

1. People can apply on the basis of their income for the previous three months. This allows the proprietors of ski resorts, summer camps and campgrounds as well as charter boat operators and others to wait three months and then apply as if they were indigent. Requiring income verification for the previous 12 months would close this loophole.

2. The program, unlike food stamps, has no asset limit. If Bill Gates, for example, vacationed in Antarctica for three months he’d be eligible for the program regardless of his wealth. (I’m assuming he can’t cash customer’s checks there.) An asset limit could be used to adjust the program. If necessary, the limit could be lowered so only the very needy qualified.

More generally, asset limits and tax rates are like adjustable wrenches and shouldn’t be thrown out. I was surprised that when the abominable tax reform was thrown out by referendum that no mention was made that it would have killed our state’s graduated income tax, which can and does serve as a corrective to income discrepancies.

And correctives are needed. Married couples especially get short shrift on both the earned income credit and the Maine income tax. Since Governor King left office the federal/Maine discrepancy on a married couple’s standard deduction has grown to $1,850.

The media should be covering these issues, not me.

Ben Hull

Norway