BANGOR, Maine — Bangor will consider whether to adopt a 12- to 18-month plan to tackle homelessness, but city councilors shared mixed feelings about a draft proposal Wednesday.
The proposed plan will not solve homelessness in Bangor in such a short period, but it will provide a framework for the city, which has struggled to communicate its vision to the public, said Councilor Jonathan Sprague, who drafted the plan.
“There is no written plan of the city’s intentions for addressing homelessness,” he said during a government operations committee meeting Wednesday. “I do not believe that this should ever have been acceptable.”
Bangor, like other major cities in Maine, is grappling with a homelessness crisis and a shortage of affordable housing. In April, the city took a new approach when a federal disaster relief team stepped in to house people living in the Valley Avenue encampment rather than simply dismantling it and pushing them out. Sprague’s proposal intends to document efforts like that one and outline clear action steps to address the unhoused population and hold the council accountable, he said.
He presented the proposal to six councilors present Wednesday but emphasized it is only a starting point for conversation, and it will need more input from the rest of the council.
The proposal lists nearly 30 action steps, including the guarantee of daily warming centers and overnight shelter beds during extreme weather, and consideration of diversion strategies that could save people on the brink of homelessness. Diversion could be funding a bus ticket to a loved one willing to provide housing or funding a security deposit.
One step proposes the city reduce barriers for people seeking housing, and it lists a tenants’ rights ordinance adopted in February and continued development of a landlord liaison program.
Also listed is the potential adoption of a goal that every child in Bangor will be adequately sheltered and nourished and have timely access to mental health services.
Some work in the proposal is already underway, like launching Bangor’s Community Action Team, which happened earlier this year. The team responds to vagrancy complaints and does welfare checks and other calls that do not require a police presence.
Some of the action steps are broad and it’s unclear how the city will achieve them or measure their progress, but Wednesday’s meeting was a preliminary discussion. For example, the proposal aims to “reduce reliance on the library as a daytime sheltering space,” but how the city is going about that is unclear.
In the three years that Sprague has been a councilor, homelessness has been a top issue, with thousands of hours invested and millions of dollars spent to address it, he said. Many residents have failed to appreciate the city’s efforts, and a cohesive plan would strengthen the city’s strategies and make better use of resources, he said.
Councilor Cara Pelletier said the council is not ready to adopt a plan, and it should wait until it hires a homelessness specialist to ensure it is well-informed and sustainable. The city would never adopt a comprehensive plan without an economic development leader’s perspective, she said.
Hiring a specialist before the council can commit to what it has already said it would do means avoiding the issues, Sprague said.
“If you want us to have an overarching, 18-month strategy that we get behind as a council, then that document should be developed with a professional who understands what we may have missed and who can guide us toward the appropriate strategy,” Pelletier said.
Councilor Jonathan Leonard liked the idea of an action plan and suggested adding an item about improving communication with Penobscot County, like having a councilor serve as a liaison. He saw Sprague’s proposal as an evolving document and agreed with Pelletier that an expert should be involved.
Bangor’s City Council is next scheduled to meet Monday, Sept. 11.
