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EOW, Fall Back
It is Weatherization Month: October 2019
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Weatherization Assistance Program reduces energy costs for low-income households by increasing the energy efficiency of their homes, while ensuring their health and safety. The program supports 8,500 jobs and provides weatherization services to approximately 35,000 homes every year using DOE funds.
Through weatherization improvements and upgrades, these households save on average $283 or more every year according to a national evaluation of the program. Since the program began in 1976, WAP has helped improve the lives of than 7 million families through weatherization services.
40th Year Video
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We know that the WAP and other weatherization programs have been working hard before the weather changes. We would love to share your community/agency stories to our network. The work saves energy, GHGs and helps the families on their utility bills. Please send us your accounts of an interesting client, your crew, your office all showing what important work this network does every day. webadmin@energyoutwest.org
The Next EOW conference is being planned in Austin Texas the week of August 10-14, 2020. We are finalizing the tutorials and sessions. Remember, we want to present a conference that helps our “Weatherization Nation” provide services to our communities.
As always if you have needs or suggestions on any sessions or tutorials please send them to us: webadmin@energyoutwest.org
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Our Network
Women in Weatherization
EOW wants to showcase the important work we do and support. A while ago NASCSP asked for stories about women in weatherization. View website here.
We are highlighting an amazing story from Texas, our next host state.
Meet Christie J. Martinez
Weatherization Manager, Nueces County Community Action Agency, Texas
I like building and construction. I got started in 1990 by purchasing homes to flip and re-sell. But I did not really know what I wanted in the home or how I wanted it to look, so I starting looking around at other homes to see their floor plans. I found that to be very enjoyable. I liked the thought of designing my own home.
2.Tell us about your current and past roles in the WAP.
I started with the NCCAA in 1993 as a Weatherization Assessor and held this position for 15 years. During this time I learned the nuts and bolts of a home and how to make a home more energy efficient. I attended workshops and conferences where I gained skills in caulking, inspecting homes, using a blower door, duct blasting, and drawing layouts of homes. I also learned the office part of the job which included audits, reports, work orders and how to communicate with sub-contractors. In 2008, I was promoted to Weatherization Manager, months before the implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. A position I hold to this day. Under this program we weatherized 828 homes and operated a budget of $5.1 million.
3.What is it like being a woman in weatherization? Advantages? Challenges?
One of the biggest challenges is the obvious, in that this is traditionally a man’s field. This can create some issues where subcontractors (who are predominantly men) would rather speak to a male because they feel I don’t know much about weatherization and so I have to prove myself by showing them that I know the job. I know the terminologies, the equipment, materials, the process. I can cite city codes and enforcement but most importantly I can climb a ladder and check the attics and crawl under a house to make sure all is compliant.
And with the challenges comes advantages such as respect from other Community Action Agencies that have a Weatherization Department and by men who work in weatherization departments. Sometimes they feel a little intimidated but once they see what I can do and that I can hold my own, then we are all on the same level. It’s satisfying to know that women can work side-by-side in the same field as men and that women are capable of handling what has been traditionally a man’s job.
I am so glad I have had the opportunity to move into this area by first, having interest in this field and expressing that interest; then having guidance and support from the women who hired me to do such a job; and third, having continual backing and encouragement from women to get further in my job. No barriers have ever been placed upon me. In all the position that I have been hired for in the Weatherization Department, gender has never been an issue.
4.Why do you work in weatherization? What about your job makes you excited to go to work in the morning?
Every day is a new challenge. Every day is different. I love our customers, I get great satisfaction knowing we have helped the elderly, and families in the community with weatherizing their homes when they did not have the financial means to do so themselves.I have a great staff, they are always willing to work as a team. I have great supervisors and great support.
5.Do you have advice for other women interested in joining the weatherization field?
It is a very rewarding job if you want the joy of helping others. We get to know our clients and see how else we can help them. We refer them to other agencies in the community that can serve them. It’s a very satisfying feeling especially when we help others that do not have the means to help themselves.
Making a Difference, One House at a Time
Richfield Senior Center
Richfield Idaho
Weatherization provide by South Central Community Action Partnership, Twin Falls Id.
Recently the South Central Community Action Partnership (SCCAP) Weatherization Program in Twin Falls Idaho, teamed up with the Idaho Power Company (Idaho’s largest electric power company) to provide energy efficiency upgrades to the Richfield Idaho Senior Citizen Center. Richfield Idaho is a small rural Lincoln County community in south central Idaho with just over 400 residents. The senior center is one of the only visiting places where the community can come to gather for fellowship, family reunions, wedding receptions and most of all a place where seniors (many of them low-income) can have a nutritional lunch and visit with friends. However, with their very limited budget, the cost of heating and cooling often prevented the senior center from having these community functions. Idaho Power Company officials heard about this and approached SCCAP to seek our professional expertise in finding a solution to making the center more energy efficient.
Since the late 1980’s Idaho Power has provided weatherization funds to SCCAP for low-income electrically heated customers. SCCAP has leveraged these funds through the past 30 years with our Dept. of Energy WAP and LIHEAP Weatherization dollars. This has allowed SCCAP to stretch our federal funding so more low-income households that have been and continue to weatherize. Part of our contract with Idaho Power includes funding to provide 100% of the cost to install energy upgrades to non-profit organizations such as the Richfield Senior Center. The improvements added to the center included attic insulation from R-11 to R-60 and installing a four head Ductless Heat Pump System with necessary electrical upgrades. The existing center only had baseboard heating and used an outdated swamp cooler to address the 35-year-old, 2100 square foot building. The entire energy upgrade that Idaho Power Company covered the cost on was $14,992. With these building improvements the center will be warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer as well as being affordable thanks to Idaho Power Company and SCCAP’s weatherization Program. Now the residents of Richfield will be able to hold those community functions at the center in comfort.
Pictured to help celebrate the Richfield Senior Center receive their new energy efficient upgrades are SCCAP weatherization staff joined by officials from Idaho Power Company, SCCAP Board Members, Lincoln County Commissioners and members of the senior center.
Two of the members shown are SCCAP CEO & EOW Vice President Ken Robinette and SCCAP Weatherization Manager & EOW Technical Committee Co-Chair Rod Burk.
LIHEAP Success Story
In California, the Central Coast Energy Services (CCES) provides low-income weatherization services to 6 counties. Not only are they a successful provider of services they also head the effort to promote the LIHEAP program with stories of how the program benefits the many low-income households while saving energy and GHGs.
Please visit the CCES site found here.
LIHEAP HELPS CALIFORNIA
LIHEAP.org - Since its inception in 1981, the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) has evolved into a widely supported, highly effective program that delivers critical short-term aid to our most vulnerable neighbors. LIHEAP is an essential resource for the country’s most under-served populations, including the working poor, those making the difficult transition from welfare to work, disabled persons, elderly and families with young children. LIHEAP is an exceptionally efficient and targeted program, with state block grants flowing to local agencies with specific clients on a short-term basis, providing heating and cooling assistance to roughly 6.7 million households.
LIHEAP was originally conceived to address high heating costs, especially in the Northeast. Congress broadened the program in 1984 and made clear that LIHEAP is needed to help meet the pervasive needs of at-risk American in all regions of the country, as they face the rigors of both cold and hot weather. By leveraging private dollars to supplement federal dollars, LIHEAP has proven that successful relationships can exist between the government, businesses, gas and electric utilities and community-based social service organizations.
Without energy assistance, many low-income households would have to choose between heating and eating or other vital necessities. This is especially true during the peak winter heating and summer cooling seasons, when energy bill can comprise roughly 30 percent of a low-income household’s monthly income, especially in substandard housing. During tough economic times and with home heating and cooling prices on a steady incline, LIHEAP has never been more important for the protection of millions of struggling families.
Learn more about the national campaign for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program: www.LIHEAP.org
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