Government relations - provides aga members with information on legislative developments; prepares testimony, comments and filings regarding legislative activities, lobbies on behalf of the industry. Aga's government relations efforts play a key role in protecting the interests of natural gas utilities and their customers from proposed legislation that inadvertently or otherwise could have serious impacts on gas supply, the cost of gas service, reliability and/or safety. Low income home energy assistance program (liheap): aga's ongoing effort with congress to obtain funding for the federal low income home energy assistance program resulted in final fy 2016 appropriations of almost $3. 4 billion. This program is essential in reducing the financial burden of those on low and fixed incomes as they provide themselves with needed basic energy services. With aga's strong support, the securing america's future energy: protecting our infrastructure of pipelines and enhancing safety act (safe pipes act) was passed unanimously by the house of representatives, approved in the senate and signed into law by the president of the united states. The safe pipes act will improve pipeline safety by closing gaps in federal standards, enhancing the quality and timeliness of rulemakings, promoting better usage of data and technology and providing regulatory certainty for natural gas utilities that are actively enhancing safety for their customers and communities. Aga also engaged congressional staff in response to the notice of proposed rulemaking for gas transmission and gathering pipelines. Aga submitted extensive comments on a proposed rule that is overly prescriptive and lacking in technical and economic justification without realizing the desired enhancement to safety. operations & engineering - the operations and engineering section includes 14 technical committees whose work is overseen by a managing committee. These committees focus on helping natural gas utilities achieve operational excellence in the safe, reliable and efficient delivery of natural gas. The fourteen technical committees are: 1) corrosion control committee; 2) distribution construction and maintenance committee; 3) distribution measurement and regulation committee; 4) distribution & transmission engineering committee; 5) environmental matters committee; 6) gas control committee; 7) natural gas security committee; 8) plastic materials committee; 9) safety and occupational health committee; 10) supplemental gas committee; 11) transmission measurement committee; 12) transmission pipeline operations committee; 13) underground storage committee; and 14) customer field services committee. The operations and engineering section provides timely and relevant information to help member companies achieve operational excellence in the safe, reliable, and efficient delivery and use of natural gas. The 2016 information exchange included:- peer review program: since the inception of the peer review program in 2015, aga has conducted 34-member company reviews. This voluntary effort offers an effective venue for members to compare safety and operational initiatives and identifying leading practices and opportunities to enhance their performance. The insights gained and industry-based collaborations built are helping to advance safe and reliable natural gas delivery throughout the united states. The american society of association executives recognized aga with a 2015 gold award describing the peer review program as "groundbreaking". - gas utility operator's best practices program: aga's best practices program is an effort to identify procedures of superior performing gas industry companies and innovative work practices that can be used to improve participants' operations. It focuses on improving the safety and efficiency of gas distribution system construction, maintenance, operation, and inspection. Topics covered in the 2016 best practices program were emergency response, tech