ACCA Fights Against Regulations from Congress and Federal Agencies

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Leading up to the mid-term elections President Biden, Congress, and Federal Agencies were busy adding regulations and passing legislation that will impact your bottom-line. While some of these helped small businesses, like many ACCA members, many were not, and were vehemently opposed by ACCA.

The team at ACCA is actively fighting for its members to ensure that only common-sense legislation and regulations go on the books. Here are a few of the most recent items that ACCA is working on.

ENABLERS ACT

In late September ACCA voiced its strong opposition to the Establishing New Authorities for Business Laundering and Enabling Risks to Security (ENABLERS) Act that dramatically expands the reporting requirements put in place by the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA). The ENABLERS Act was snuck into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in the House. If that process sounds sneaky you are right, but sadly familiar, it’s how Congress adopted the initial CTA two years prior. They hid it in the NDAA, and the business community was unable to convince the security-minded staff and members of the defense committees to pay attention.

Thankfully ACCA is not alone in this fight and has joined forces with 75 other organizations to oppose the ENABLERS Act, legislation. You can read the letter the group sent to Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell here: https://accanow.net/Enablers

While the bill’s stated goal is to increase reporting by “professional service providers who serve as key gatekeepers to the U.S. financial system,” its broad language would cover the owners, board members, and senior executives of most businesses and charities. Anyone engaged in an entity’s formation, acquisition, or disposal would be covered, as would owners and employees engaged in nearly every financial activity of the business, including money management, payment processing, wire transfers, or buying and selling currencies.

So far, the ENABLERS Act appears to lack the energy and bipartisan support needed to move, but it’s still just one conference and two votes away from enactment, so we must remain focused on our fight and remain vigilant all the way through the end of the year.

ACCA has been focused on Senate offices to educate them on the history of this issue and how the passage would negatively impact and could very well target private businesses and their owners.

Energy Conservation Standard for Consumer Furnaces

In July, the Department of Energy (DOE) released a notice of proposed rulemaking (NOPR) to revise the energy efficiency standards for residential natural gas furnaces. Since it’s contractors’ voice with the federal agencies, ACCA stepped up to let the DOE know that this proposal, if adopted, would negatively impact ACCA’s over 3,000 member companies, and individual homeowners, including low-income households, small businesses, and seniors.

Federal and state lawmakers and regulators focus a significant amount of time on the HVACR industry because of the energy its products consume. Former Secretary of Energy, Ernest Moniz believed energy efficiency improvements within the HVACR industry could have an enormous impact on addressing peak demand for electricity going forward. ACCA agrees with the Secretary, but the DOE continues to ignore the problems that ACCA’s contractor members work on every day: incorrect equipment sizing and poor equipment installations.

ACCA strongly believes that America’s HVAC Contractors should have options for their customers based on their application needs, fuel and installation cost, energy reliability, and product availability when it comes to heating homes and businesses. ACCA once again opposes this latest attempt by the DOE to offer a solution that does not address the root energy problem. This regulation will create an unnecessary burden on homeowners, who already are facing increasing costs of living, by demanding them to install equipment that they can neither afford nor will reach the desired efficiency that the DOE claims this regulation is needed to meet. ACCA firmly stands by the position that HVACR contractors and consumers should have access to whatever source of fuel makes the most sense for their business and economic needs. If the DOE wants to have a real impact on reducing fuel use and increasing the energy efficiency of heating systems, they should focus on proper equipment sizing, correct duct design, and quality installations based on nationally recognized standards such as ACCA’s Manual J®, Manual S®, and Manual D®, which help ensure that systems are properly sized, have the correct ductwork, and are installed in a manner that allows the equipment it reach its stated efficiency rating.

You can read the full letter that ACCA sent to the DOE here: https://accanow.net/DOE-Hegarty-letter

ACCA will continue to keep its members updated on the status of the DOE’s rulemaking activities regarding energy-efficiency standards for furnaces and fight for common-sense regulations and legislation that leverages our members’ expertise.

Stay tuned and keep your eyes open for messages from ACCA asking you to take action on both of these critical issues.

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Posted In: Government, Opinion