No two days at work for Hollie and Robert, two members of Bangor’s new Community Action Team, are the same.
One day, they’ll try to help catch a missing dog using cheeseburgers and toys. The next, they’ll fix an elderly woman’s front door or free a vehicle from the mud. Most often, they’re called to assist the many Bangor residents who are homeless, struggling with mental health disorders, substance use disorder or other challenges.
In the past few months, Bangor has quietly premiered this four-member community crisis response team, the first of its kind in Maine, to address situations that don’t require a police response. They often include vagrancy complaints and welfare checks.
The Bangor Community Action Team — or BCAT — is the brainchild of Bangor Police Chief Mark Hathaway, who saw a need for “an alternative and more appropriate response model” to an increasing number of those lower-grade calls during a police staffing shortage.
“Each day the responders engage those who may need outreach, support or conversation and direct those who are struggling with various challenges toward better options and appropriate services,” Hathaway said. “While this program is indeed new, there are already early indicators of success.”
Need has grown since the program was fully staffed and began responding to calls in March. It received about four calls per day when it launched, but now responds to five to eight calls a day, according to Patty Hamilton, Bangor’s public health director, who helps oversee the team.
The team is comprised of four trained human service providers who have experience with mental health disorders, addiction recovery and veterans issues, something that helps them connect with people struggling with those challenges, she said.
The Bangor Public Health Department received $800,000 to fund the team through a Community Development Block Grant, a federal funding program. The funding covers the team’s salaries, their vehicle and supplies for three years.
When someone calls 911 or the non-emergency police line, dispatch will send BCAT for calls in which there is no threat, violence or risk to the individual in need or others. The team is entirely separate from the police and the team members have no power to arrest. Police officers don’t accompany the team when it is dispatched, but they can be called later if a situation escalates.
“A lot of times, partner organizations don’t want a full police presence,” said Rebeca Kirk, Bangor’s community services manager. “BCAT offers an alternative course of action.”
Most people who are homeless or struggling with substance use are wary of the team, or feel threatened by them, at first because they fear the team are police who will arrest them, said Robert, a BCAT member. The city only allowed a reporter to speak to workers on the condition that they were neither fully identified or photographed to protect them in the field.
“It takes a while, but once they realize we’re not there to get them in trouble, they come around,” he said. “They don’t have to be afraid of us — they can’t walk all over us either — but we’re there to help if they need it and are ready to accept it.”
The new program’s role also allows police to stop responding to calls that don’t require law enforcement, allowing them to return to their traditional role, Hathaway said.
“At some point, it became a social norm for the police to deal with mental health issues,” Robert said. “They’re trained to an extent, but a police department was created to stop criminal activity. That’s what they know how to do, so that’s how they interact with people.”
When the team encounters someone in crisis, they’ll work to de-escalate and stabilize the situation, then try to find a solution.
BCAT members can help someone access medical treatment, a detox center or other recovery service, enter a shelter, get a bus ticket, or make a phone call. The team also ensures a person’s caseworker knows where they are and what happened.
“No one is going to progress in their situation alone,” Kirk said. “They’re part of a larger fabric of resources. They’re helping people get to the next level of support where change really happens.”
Unlike police, BCAT has “the luxury of time” to help an individual in crisis calm down and find a solution to their problem, Kirk said. Police officers are often called to emergencies before a situation can be fully resolved.
The team often interacts with people who aren’t yet willing to accept help, sometimes more than once, Kirk said. Rather than seeing that repeated response as discouraging, the team uses that time to build trust. This makes people more likely to accept help in the future.
“You don’t know which day will be a ‘yes’ day,” Kirk said. “You have to be there for every ‘no’ day.”
For example, two weeks ago, Hollie responded to a report of someone curled up on the ground for hours. When she arrived, Hollie found it was someone she met in March who was addicted to alcohol. The two had often talked since then, but they hadn’t been ready to accept help.
That day, they were detoxing. They agreed to enter a treatment center where they could recover safely when Hollie offered because they knew and trusted her. On Thursday, Hollie returned to check on them.
“The light was back in their eyes and they looked at me with the utmost appreciation and told me that I saved their life,” she said. “That is proof that this program is needed and works. That one win is my fire and my inspiration.”
