Heckuva job, Barry. New York Times:
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s plan to create jobs and rein in energy costs through a steep increase in funds for weatherization of low-income homes has so far borne little fruit, with many of the biggest states meeting less than 2 percent of their goals to date, the Department of Energy’s inspector general said in a report issued Tuesday.
The inspector general, Gregory H. Friedman, called the lack of progress “alarming.” Far into the nation’s winter heating season, the program for the most part has neither saved energy nor put people to work, he wrote.
“The job creation impact of what was considered to be one of the department’s most ‘shovel ready’ projects has not materialized,” the report said.
The report, issued a year after passage of a fiscal stimulus bill that created the weatherization program, comes as Congress moves toward passing a second bill meant to stimulate employment. Republicans and Democrats have been arguing over whether last year’s legislation made enough of a difference to justify its cost and whether the second will add enough jobs in time to help jumpstart the economy.
Quick action on weatherization was doomed by bureaucratic delays and by the recession itself, the inspector general’s report said, as spending cuts caused by the economic downturn forced states to trim personnel expenses.
Many states either furloughed the state employees who would administer such programs or instituted hiring freezes that prevented state offices from processing additional work — even though the federal government would have paid the additional salaries, the report found.
New York State, for example, had a goal of weatherizing 45,400 units but by December had accomplished only 280, a completion rate of 0.62 percent, the report found. One reason was a hiring freeze in New York City.
Progress in Pennsylvania, which weatherized 1.28 percent of the houses and apartments it had intended to, was slowed by a deadlock over the state budget, the report said. Illinois wanted to hire 21 workers to oversee nearly work on 27 homes; it hired none because of a spending freeze, and completed only 331, or 1.23 percent.
Alaska, Florida, Hawaii, Texas and Wyoming had not weatherized any units by Feb. 16, the report said.