Keeping Neighbors Warm

www.keepingneighborswarm.org

New non-profit organization tackles
Southern Maine’s heating crisis

BIDDEFORD ── How are you keeping warm this winter? Are you using a credit card to make ends meet, ignoring the interest rates until the snow melts? Worse yet, have you found yourself needing to choose between buying needed prescriptions or buying groceries in order to have enough money left over for a minimum fuel delivery? Or perhaps you have decided to keep the thermostat set at 55 and remain in bed to avoid the cold or getting sick.

Unfortunately, those scenarios are becoming increasingly common here in southern Maine, where a growing number of families and individuals are struggling with skyrocketing home-heating costs and an especially severe winter season.

Although no one is completely immune from sharp increases in home heating costs or the effects of a cold winter, many families in northern York County were faced with yet another hurdle in their challenge to stay warm this winter, when the owners of a fuel oil company abruptly closed their doors without fulfilling their customers’ pre-purchased fuel orders in January.

Enter a coalition of business and community leaders who decided that immediate action was needed. Although members of Keeping Neighbors Warm met initially in response to one highly publicized crisis, they soon learned that the problem was much more extensive and certainly more severe, especially for those who hover just above the guidelines for state or local fuel assistance program.

“We have seen a dramatic increase in both the volume and diversity of need for home heating assistance,” says Vicky Edgerly, general assistance director for the city of Biddeford. “We are getting calls from people who have never before asked for any kind of assistance.”

“We’re especially worried about senior citizens in southern Maine,” said Judith A. Metcalf, director of UNE’s Geriatric Education Center and another member of the Keeping Neighbors Warm coalition. “Many older folks have a hard time asking for help, and others are so isolated they may not know of all the resources available to them.”

Although several non-profit agencies offer resources for those left out in the cold, the Keeping Neighbors Warm Coalition has a specific geographic focus that includes the nine communities in northern York County that were hit hardest by the untimely closing of a pre-paid oil company in this area and the advantage of a singular mission: making sure that no one in that region will be left in the cold.

It only took one meeting for coalition members to choose a name, a mission and a geographic area to serve, not to mention an ambitious fundraising goal of $100,000 to address the growing need of fuel assistance this year.

“We knew that we had to think big because the need is just so overwhelming,” said Sam Zaitlin, one of the group’s organizers. “We’ve all heard these heart-wrenching stories about what our neighbors and friends are going through. We’re just ordinary citizens who decided to come together as a group to hopefully make a difference in the lives of our neighbors.”

Through an innovative partnership with The Maine Way, Inc., a Biddeford based non-profit organization focused on preventing and alleviating homelessness in the tri-city area, donations to the Keeping Neighbors Warm initiative will be tax deductible.
“Good neighbors step in to help before a bad situation gets worse,” said Bill Southwick, President of The Maine Way, Inc. and member of the Keeping Neighbors Warm Coalition “That is what Keeping Neighbors Warm is all about, keeping the heat on before folks get sick or the pipes freeze.”

“We all knew that we couldn’t afford to wait around until we could establish ourselves as a tax-exempt organization,” said Joe Moreshead, a Saco resident and the owner of Precision Screw Machine in Biddeford. “This is a group of people who wanted to make a difference now. The crisis is here, and we don’t have the luxury of spending time shuffling papers while somebody could literally be freezing to death.”

Collaboration, in fact, will be a key component of the Keeping Neighbors Warm coalition. Eligibility for assistance will be determined through the cooperation of the nine municipal general assistance directors in each of the communities that will be covered by the Keeping Neighbors Warm initiative.

“There are a lot of different types of people sitting at this table,” Moreshead explained. “We have nurses, social workers, business people, and bankers all working together because this is about all of us. If you’re lucky enough to be warm this winter, it’s very likely that you know someone who is not as fortunate.”

Donations should be made payable to The Maine Way, Inc. - “Keeping Neighbors Warm” and sent to Keeping Neighbors Warm c/o Biddeford Savings Bank  P.O BOX 525  Biddeford  04005. Or dropped off at any Biddeford Savings Bank branch office.

If you would like to apply for assistance, please contact your municipal general assistance director in one of the following communities: Biddeford, Saco, Old Orchard Beach, Kennebunk, Arundel, Kennebunkport, Dayton, Hollis and Buxton.

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