The Community Action Agency of Talladega, Clay, Randolph, Calhoun and Clebourne counties has completed roughly 75 percent of the 187 homes budgeted to be weatherized in its initial share of the funding, and the three-year goal should be easily reached in time for the organization.
Bill Anderson, weatherization coordinator for the group, said the quick expansion of the program has not, however, been an easy task.
“We have never done anything like this before,” Anderson said. “It’s been a learning process, but we have become better at it as we go along. We have had to hire a lot of people to even have a shot at accomplishing what we have.”
Jim Plott with the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs said the $71.8 million in additional funding from the American Recovery and Investment Act is a welcome change from the usual maximum funding of about $3 million.
“People fill out applications and submit them to their area Community Action Agency,” Plott said. “Then the agency reviews the applications and determines which ones have priority and meet the eligibility requirements. A lot of the work involved is ventilizing and caulking, but the first thing is to check for potential health hazards.”
The contractors will make sure the attic is properly ventilated and make sure no gas leaks will be sealed up in the weatherization process.
So far, Alabama has received half of the expected funds, with the other half expected to be paid out later this year. This money will help the 16 organizations throughout the state helping with weatherization to complete their three-year plans of updating more than 6,600 homes.
Repairs and upgrades to improve energy efficiency have been made to 733 Alabama houses, and state officials say the pace of completion is accelerating.
“Alabama has already exceeded 10 percent of its goal, which is well ahead of much of the nation,” said Doni Ingram, director of the ADECA. “A recent report in the New York Times found that many states had yet to reach two percent of their goal.”
Weatherization is a federally funded program, directed statewide by ADECA and administered at the regional level by community action or service organizations. Congress appropriated stimulus funds to the program to support jobs in the construction industry and to help more low- and moderate-income families cut their utility bills. Specially trained contractors are hired to make structural improvements that will increase the energy efficiency of houses selected for weatherization.
According to Ingram, hundreds of contractors have now received training and reports from regional weatherization agencies indicate that the number of families receiving services is increasing each month.
Stimulus funding is enabling the regional agencies to provide weatherization for a backlog of eligible recipients and to provide service to new clients. The program is designed to benefit low- and moderate-income residents, with priority given to the elderly, those with handicaps or households with small children. Eligibility standards were broadened and the scope of individual projects was expanded because of stimulus funding.
In Alabama, 3,320 houses are scheduled to be weatherized using the first half of the stimulus funds. Once the state receives the remainder of the funding, the total number of houses scheduled for improvement will be doubled to 6,640, about 10 times the annual average in prior years.
Toney Pitts, housing and weatherization coordinator for the Community Action Partnership of Huntsville, Madison and Limestone counties, said the stimulus program has had a positive impact.
“It’s a good program,” Pitts said. “We do a lot of improvements that families couldn’t afford to have done on their own, and it makes a difference. You can walk in many houses after weatherization and just feel the difference.”
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