2004 NLIEC Conference

Coalition Bsnner

2004 Overview

Building Bridges: Gateway to Energy Solutions and Partnerships

18th Annual National Low Income Energy Conference
June 7-10, 2004
Hyatt Regency Hotel, St. Louis, Missouri

The theme of the 2004 NLIEC conference, Building Bridges: Gateway to Energy Solutions and Partnerships, focused on the opportunities that present themselves when we are able to draw together vast amounts of expertise, knowledge and commitment: opportunities to enter into new partnerships and approach more effective solutions.

The year leading up to the conference presented many challenges. Among them were difficulties in our nation’s economy, threats to funding of low-income energy programs and services, unstable energy prices and energy industries’ reactions to changing market conditions. These forces placed enormous stresses upon low-income energy programs and services, the expanding base of clients that depend upon them and on you, the dedicated network of professionals and grassroots leaders who make up the low-income energy community. NLIEC recognizes our obligation to support your work and commitment and to offer you more of what you need to persevere.

In 2004, NLIEC commissioned a statewide energy poverty study in Missouri showing that unaffordable energy bills threaten families’ health, education and employment. The study, titled "Paid But Unaffordable: The Consequences of Energy Poverty in Missouri – and Elsewhere," was conducted by Roger Colton, a nationally known leader in energy cost research with the Massachusetts firm of Fisher, Sheehan and Colton.

The NLIEC chose to measure the extent and determine the consequences of energy poverty in Missouri because the lessons learned there can be applied throughout the nation. The state has both urban and rural areas, and it has energy hardships from both cold winters and hot summers.

Among the study's key findings were that households with incomes below 50 percent of the federal poverty level were paying a staggering 38 percent or more of their annual income for residential energy. It found that 46 percent of the households surveyed went without food in order to pay their residential energy bills, and 45 percent failed to take prescribed medicines in order to pay residential energy bills.