LIHEAP Heating Assistance: Criteria for Varying Benefits

NOTE: LIHEAP directors have historically operated the program in response to a Congressional mandate to "assure that the highest benefits go to households with the lowest incomes and the highest energy costs in relation to income, taking into account family size." In order to tailor their benefits to the needs of the households, states have used any or all of the criteria listed below in establishing benefit levels. In its 1994 reauthorization of the LIHEAP program, Congress broadened the purpose of LIHEAP as, in part, to "provide assistance to low-income households in meeting their home energy costs, particularly those with the lowest incomes that pay a high proportion of household income for home energy." 

Congress also encouraged program administrators to consider "energy burden" and "energy needs" in establishing benefits, and it defined these as follows: "Energy burden" was defined as "the expenditures of the household for home energy divided by the income of the household." The phrase "highest home energy needs" was described as "taking into account both the energy burden of such household and the unique situation of such household that results from having members of vulnerable populations, including very young children, individuals with disabilities, and frail older individuals." 

The table below shows typical criteria states use to vary benefits; for more specific information on use of energy burden and energy need in benefit levels, see LIHEAP Clearinghouse Memorandum 510.