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Your Small Donation Can Change a Life. The Scale of Need in Illinois
Based on available reports tracking utility shut-offs and assistance program usage, the number of households struggling to afford basic utilities in Illinois is in the hundreds of thousands annually.
High Disconnection Rates:
The state’s two largest electric utilities (ComEd and Ameren) cover nearly five million residential customer accounts. Even a small percentage of those accounts being in danger of disconnection represents a huge number of families.
A report from early 2023 indicated that utilities in Illinois shut off households’ power around 285,000 times in the first 10 months of the previous year. This staggering figure was noted as the highest among the 30 states that publicly report disconnection numbers.
Major Utility Customer Base:
LIHEAP Assistance: The federally funded Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) is the primary resource for utility relief. In Fiscal Year 2024, LIHEAP provided heating assistance to over 205,000 households in Illinois, and crisis assistance to over 40,500 households. This number represents the families who qualified and successfully received state aid, but it doesn’t account for those who were ineligible, didn’t apply, or applied after funds were exhausted.
How this Context Affects Your Getbackonfeet.org?
These numbers demonstrate a persistent, high-volume demand for utility relief. The families your organization helps are often those who:
- Have received a disconnection notice and need immediate, fast action.
- Do not meet the strict income eligibility guidelines for federal programs like LIHEAP.
- Require assistance outside of the winter moratorium when many state programs are unavailable.
Getbackonfeet.org is stepping into a gap that affects hundreds of thousands of Illinois households annually, providing crucial support when government resources may be unavailable or too slow.
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