Administrative Rules of the State of Montana

(1) The benefit matrices in (1)(c) and (1)(d) are used to establish the benefit payable to an eligible household for a full heating season. The benefit varies by household income level, type of primary heating fuel, the type of dwelling (single family unit, multi-family unit, mobile home), the number of bedrooms in the dwelling, and the heating districts in which the household is located, to account for climatic differences across the state.

(a) The benefit payable to an eligible household will be computed by multiplying the applicable amount in the table of base benefit levels found in (1)(c) by the applicable matrix amount in the table of income/climatic adjustment multipliers found in (1)(d).

(b) Applicants may claim no more bedrooms than household members except that single elderly and disabled individual households are entitled to claim two bedrooms if their dwelling unit contains more than one bedroom.

(c) The following table of base benefit levels takes into account the number of bedrooms in a house, the type of dwelling structure, and the type of fuel used as a primary source of heating:

TABLE OF BENEFIT LEVELS

(i) SINGLE FAMILY

# BEDROOMS	NATURAL GAS	ELECTRIC	PROPANE	FUEL OIL	WOOD	COAL
ONE	$ 382	$ 417	$ 549	$ 710	$ 297	$ 169
TWO	555	606	798	1,032	432	246
THREE	756	825	1,087	1,406	588	335
FOUR	1,040	1,135	1,495	1,934	809	461

(ii) MULTI-FAMILY

# BEDROOMS	NATURAL GAS	ELECTRIC	PROPANE	FUEL OIL	WOOD	COAL
ONE	$ 323	$ 352	$ 464	$ 754	$ 251	$ 143
TWO	486	530	699	1,136	378	215
THREE	714	778	1,025	1,667	554	316
FOUR	834	909	1,198	1,947	647	369

(iii) MOBILE HOME

# BEDROOMS	NATURAL GAS	ELECTRIC	PROPANE	FUEL OIL	WOOD	COAL
ONE	$ 322	$ 351	$ 462	$ 627	$ 250	$ 143
TWO	470	513	676	917	366	208
THREE	624	680	896	1,215	485	276
FOUR	696	759	1,000	1,356	541	308

(d) The following table is based upon the household's income as a percentage of the federal poverty guideline and adjusted for climatic differences in the ten human resource development council service areas in the state of Montana:

TABLE OF INCOME/CLIMATIC ADJUSTMENT MULTIPLIERS

PERCENT OF POVERTY	AEM	IV	V	VI	VII	VIII	IX	X	XI	XII
0 - 11	1.00	1.08	0.98	0.99	0.93	1.02	1.08	0.90	0.92	1.09
> 11 - 23	0.95	1.02	0.94	0.94	0.89	0.97	1.03	0.86	0.87	1.04
> 23 - 35	0.90	0.97	0.89	0.89	0.84	0.92	0.98	0.81	0.82	0.98
> 35 - 47	0.85	0.92	0.84	0.84	0.79	0.87	0.92	0.77	0.78	0.93
> 47 - 59	0.80	0.86	0.79	0.79	0.75	0.82	0.87	0.72	0.73	0.87
> 59 - 71	0.75	0.81	0.74	0.74	0.70	0.77	0.81	0.68	0.69	0.82
> 71 - 83	0.70	0.75	0.69	0.69	0.65	0.71	0.76	0.63	0.64	0.76
> 83 - 95	0.65	0.70	0.64	0.64	0.61	0.66	0.70	0.59	0.60	0.71
> 95 - 107	0.60	0.65	0.59	0.59	0.56	0.61	0.65	0.54	0.55	0.65
>107 - 119	0.55	0.59	0.54	0.54	0.51	0.56	0.60	0.50	0.50	0.60
>119 - 131	0.50	0.54	0.49	0.49	0.47	0.51	0.54	0.45	0.46	0.55
>131 - 143	0.45	0.48	0.44	0.44	0.42	0.46	0.49	0.41	0.41	0.49
>143 - 150*	0.40	0.43	0.39	0.39	0.37	0.41	0.43	0.36	0.37	0.44

*This category also applies to those whose income exceeds 150% of the poverty guideline and meets the criteria of ARM 37.70.406(1)(a).

History: 53-2-201, MCA; IMP, 53-2-201, MCA; NEW, 1982 MAR p. 732, Eff. 4/16/82; AMD, 1982 MAR p. 1771, Eff. 10/1/82; AMD, 1983 MAR p. 131, Eff. 2/11/83; AMD, 1983 MAR p. 1362, Eff. 9/30/83; AMD, 1984 MAR p. 1481, Eff. 10/12/84; AMD, 1985 MAR p. 1412, Eff. 9/27/85; EMERG, AMD, 1986 MAR p. 362, Eff. 3/14/86; AMD, 1986 MAR p. 1606, Eff. 9/26/86; AMD, 1987 MAR p. 1805, Eff. 10/16/87; AMD, 1988 MAR p. 2042, Eff. 10/1/88; AMD, 1989 MAR p. 1571, Eff. 10/13/89; AMD, 1990 MAR p. 2307, Eff. 10/26/90; AMD, 1991 MAR p. 1857, Eff. 10/1/91; AMD, 1992 MAR p. 2201, Eff. 9/25/92; AMD, 1993 MAR p. 2437, Eff. 10/15/93; AMD, 1994 MAR p. 2642, Eff. 9/23/94; AMD, 1995 MAR p. 2157, Eff. 10/13/95; AMD, 1996 MAR p. 2887, Eff. 10/25/96; AMD, 1997 MAR p. 2296, Eff. 12/16/97; TRANS, from SRS, 1998 MAR p. 2059; AMD, 1999 MAR p. 414, Eff. 3/12/99; AMD, 1999 MAR p. 2575, Eff. 11/5/99; AMD, 2000 MAR p. 2707, Eff. 10/6/00; AMD, 2001 MAR p. 401, Eff. 3/9/01; AMD, 2001 MAR p. 2037, Eff. 10/12/01; AMD, 2002 MAR p. 3635, Eff. 11/28/02; AMD, 2004 MAR p. 1026, Eff. 4/23/04; AMD, 2004 MAR p. 2818, Eff. 11/19/04; AMD, 2005 MAR p. 1786, Eff. 9/23/05; AMD, 2005 MAR p. 2078, Eff. 10/28/05; AMD, 2007 MAR p. 974, Eff. 7/6/07.