LIVERMORE FALLS — During the morning hours a call for help went out. An emergency fuel assistance fund for people in three towns was depleted.

By early evening, the board of the Good Neighbor Tri-Town Fuel Assistance Program learned that it would be receiving $10,000 next week from Maine Community Foundation. The money will come from the Harold P. Dudley fund. Dudley is a former Livermore Falls resident and the fund is for heating assistance in the area, Good Neighbor program Vice Chairwoman Louise Chabot said.

She had applied for assistance in early January and sent a followup email Tuesday. After explaining the dire circumstances the program is facing, Chabot said, she was told they would cut a check next week for $10,000. The program usually only gets $5,000 from the foundation, she said.

The board is hoping to keep the momentum going because they know more money will be needed by the end of winter.

The Program’s board will hold an emergency meeting to try and come up with ideas to replenish the fund at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 26, in the Community Room at the Androscoggin Bank at Jay Plaza.

“Anybody is welcome to come,” program Chairwoman Debbie Kendall said Tuesday.

The group was pleased about a successful Belgian waffle breakfast benefit that made $650 for the fund earlier in the month.

But Kendall said that feeling turned to despair when they learned they had already used more than $19,000 to provide people in need with 75 gallons of emergency fuel.

“Yesterday I received word that all our emergency funds are gone except for the Wausau fund,” Kendall said.

She learned that a woman with two children, one with cancer, was turned away because no money was available.

The Wausau fund was set up for former Wausau employees who lost their jobs when the mill closed in 2009. Start-up funds were donated by the unions that had served those workers. The money cannot be used to help others.

Kendall said she was taken aback, as were others on the committee, to learn how quickly the fuel funds went.

The last statement she had, the group had about $17,000 to help people in the tri-town area.

Once the cold hit, the money went fast, Kendall said.

The high cost of fuel is not helping their program or other programs around the state, she said.

On top of that, the federal funds for the Low Income Home Energy Assistant Program were significantly reduced this year. Even with the nearly $10 million in additional funds announced last week, bringing the total Maine received to $39.9 million, it falls short of the $56.5 million the state received in 2010-11 for LIHEAP.

In addition, eligibility requirements were tightened and that left out many people who had previously qualified.

The Good Neighbors fuel assistance fund is supported by fundraising and donations. It is truly an emergency program, Kendall said.

Western Maine Community Action in Wilton administers the fund for the organization.

The agency makes sure that those applying for emergency funds from the area don’t qualify for any of the other heating assistance programs before tapping into the Good Neighbor fund.

The emergency program gives 75 gallons of fuel to help families get by. It could be in oil, kerosene, wood and electricity, Kendall said.

“We have served 75 households since Nov. 1” in the tri-town area, Judy Frost, program manager for community services at Western Maine Community Action, said.

dperry@sunjournal.com

What: Donations for the Good Neighbor Tri-Town Fuel Assistance Program.

Why: Help replenish emergency fuel fund.

Where: Good Neighbor Tri-Town Fuel Assistance
C/O Tri-Town Ministerial Association Fuel Fund
P.O. Box 183, Livermore Falls, ME 04254

Copy the Story Link