Candidates pitch ideas on economy Hopefuls look to ease energy, housing costs

With summertime oil prices topping $130 a barrel and gasoline pump prices more than $4 a gallon, it’s looking like the economy might not get back on its feet anytime soon.

For most Mainers, it means planning ahead for the coming winter months, when heating costs could be much higher than they were last year. For politicians, especially those up for election this fall, it means assuring voters that they have a plan for stabilizing energy prices and getting the economy back on track.

To that end, Sen. Susan Collins last week introduced a bill designed to improve the nation’s financial fortunes. The bill, dubbed the Economic Recovery Act of 2008, includes provisions aimed at promoting energy efficiency for homeowners, additional funding for work force investment, tax incentives for small businesses, and expansion of the Federal Housing Administration Secure program, according to a prepared statement released by Collins’ office.

It also would provide relief to independent truckers, boost federal financing for transportation infrastructure improvements, and give a $500 tax credit to consumers replacing old wood stoves with cleaner-burning wood stoves and wood pellet stoves, the statement indicated.

“Over the past several years, we have seen the price of oil climb by more than 400 percent,” Collins told the Senate when she introduced the bill last week. “This escalation in energy costs threatens to plunge our economy into a recession.”

But improving the economy goes beyond addressing energy costs, she added.

“Weaknesses in the housing market is making it impossible for millions of Americans to get the financing they need to stay in their homes when adjustable rate mortgages reset,” Collins said.

Expanding the FHA Secure program to make more homeowners eligible for refinancing assistance and to provide homeowners with more options for making mortgage payments could help alleviate the home loan crisis, according to the senator.

But Collins is not alone in making legislative pitches for improving the economy. Tom Allen, the Democratic nominee who’s running against Collins, has some economic stimulus ideas of his own.

According to his campaign, in 2007 Allen introduced the Middle Class Opportunity Act, which would provide direct tax cuts to the middle class and to working families. It also offers tax credits for affordable housing, college tuition, and helping to provide medical care for children and senior family members.

He also is a co-sponsor of the National Affordable Housing Trust Fund Act, which would provide up to $1 billion in housing revenues, rather than taxpayer dollars, to help first-time homebuyers purchase safe and decent housing. The Working Families Act of 2007, which Allen also has co-sponsored, would provide middle-class families with tax-exempt individual development accounts that first-time homebuyers could use for home purchase costs, according to his campaign staffers.

On his campaign Web site, Allen indicates he also has introduced the Small Business Fuel Cost Relief Act, which would create a tax credit to offset fuel prices for small businesses, including independent truckers, and that he supports permanently extending the federal tax credit for research and development. He also has called for federal regulators to investigate the possibilities of market manipulation and price gouging in the oil markets.

To help small businesses and individuals with health care costs, Allen also has introduced a plan to provide Americans with universal health care, his campaign has said.

The Allen campaign offered some critical comments about Collins when asked about economic issues in the race.

“Susan Collins totally contradicts her record of consistently supporting Bush economic policies that greatly harm Maine’s middle class and small businesses,” Carol Andrews, Allen’s campaign spokeswoman, said Saturday in an e-mailed statement. “Because he believes that a strong middle-class and small-business core mean that Maine is stronger, Tom Allen has consistently focused his efforts there.”

In response, the Collins campaign on Sunday criticized Allen for leaving the House Armed Services Committee in 2003 in favor of the House Energy Committee. The switch has been detrimental to Bath Iron Works, which depends on military shipbuilding contracts, and hasn’t prevented gasoline prices from increasing dramatically, according to Kevin Kelley, spokesman for the Collins campaign.

“Mainers, like so many Americans, are struggling in this poor economy with the high costs of energy, fuel and food,” Kelley said in a prepared statement. “Unfortunately, Congressman Allen’s campaign is focused on partisan, political attacks while Senator Collins continues to work to find bipartisan solutions to these challenges.”

btrotter@bangordailynews.net

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