Effort aims to increase funding of essential assistance for Arkansas residents

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - While financially vulnerable families in local communities struggle to meet basic needs such as heating and cooling costs, advocates from Entergy Arkansas are meeting face-to-face with congressional leaders on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, March 26 to urge increased funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

By participating in LIHEAP Action Day, company and community advocates aim to expand support to the life-saving program. LIHEAP helps customers in need afford to keep their homes warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Unfortunately, funding of this vital federal program has dropped by more than a third from $5.1 billion in 2009 to $3.4 billion today. This reduction in funding limits the level of assistance available for the more than 340,000 qualifying households in Arkansas.

During LIHEAP Action Day, Entergy representatives and community partners will be making the case to get LIHEAP funding restored. The goal is to secure LIHEAP funding of at least $4.7 billion for 2015. This could result in as much as $479 million in assistance for families in the company's four-state service territory.

"This increase could mean as much as $41 million in assistance, capable of helping thousands of qualifying households in Arkansas," said Tom Kennedy, vice president of public affairs for Entergy Arkansas, Inc.

Participating in LIHEAP Action Day is just one of the many ways Entergy is working to help its low-income customers. Read more about Entergy's low-income initiatives here.

Entergy Arkansas provides electricity to approximately 700,000 customers in 63 counties. Entergy Arkansas is a subsidiary of Entergy Corporation, an integrated energy company engaged primarily in electric power production and retail distribution operations. Entergy owns and operates power plants with approximately 30,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity, including more than 10,000 megawatts of nuclear power, making it one of the nation's leading nuclear generators. Entergy delivers electricity to 2.8 million utility customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. Entergy has annual revenues of more than $11 billion and approximately 14,000 employees.

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