Every cold day is a struggle for the 50,000 families in Maine who need help heating their homes each winter. High fuel costs leave too many Maine people with an impossible choice: stay warm, buy medicine, or go hungry.

The ever-increasing price of heating oil only makes matters worse. That’s why this year MaineHousing updated its Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) so more resources will be available to help families stay warm.

Oil dealers voluntarily participate in LIHEAP. For the business, they provide a discount off their regular rate, and the state pays them in advance for the oil they deliver throughout the winter to LIHEAP customers. It’s a good deal for everyone. Oil dealers get customers and the money (nearly $25 million in LIHEAP payments), and low-income families get the oil they need to heat their homes.

This year, MaineHousing made a small change to one of its discount options. Oil dealers who chose to participate agree to take seven cents off the retail price of a gallon of oil, up from three cents last year, or they can offer either of the other two discount options that are identical to last year. The discounts are similar to those that oil companies routinely provide neighborhood associations, organizations, and other groups.

While the discount increase is not significant for the oil dealers – LIHEAP accounts for only 3 percent of their oil deliveries – it makes a huge difference for LIHEAP families, providing them with enough oil for an additional week of heating.

The Maine Oil Dealers Association and some oil dealers may have lost sight of LIHEAP’s purpose. The association has attacked the new discount rate. The lobbying group has forgotten that LIHEAP helps families with an average annual income of $13,000, half of whom are elderly or households with children younger than two.

In modifying the plan this year, we met with many individual oil companies, listened to them, brokered a compromise on what was acceptable, and held public hearings. We also surveyed oil dealers, and 80 percent of the respondents said they would participate with the new discount. Our discount plan is significantly less than the plan we initially proposed because of the oil industry input.

As one participating oil dealer put it: “MaineHousing compromised. What’s the problem?”

We care about oil companies and we value their service to Maine’s most vulnerable people. If we did not, we would obtain the lowest oil prices by putting the LIHEAP contract out to bid and selecting the lowest bidders to serve the state. That would limit competition to five or 10 of the state’s largest oil dealers. Because we have a long and productive relationship with Maine’s oil dealers, we chose not to do that and instead offered the program to any dealer who wants to participate and provide the discount.

Our dealer surveys and the LIHEAP contracts that have come in for the 2007-08 heating season show that most of our 400 LIHEAP oil dealers will continue participating in LIHEAP.

No customers should worry about receiving the LIHEAP oil they need to stay warm.

We must balance the need to help families stay warm with the reality that their needs outstrip available resources. Our decision to increase the discount rate puts more oil in furnaces, keeps families warm, and stretches taxpayer money.

Dale McCormick is the director of MaineHousing (the Maine State Housing Authority).