Bangor grants sober housing organization $500K in pandemic relief funds
A Bangor organization that provides safe, affordable housing for people in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction will receive $500,000 of Bangor’s pandemic relief funding.
Fresh Start Sober Living will use the award to purchase a building at 100 Center St. in Bangor to add housing and offer onsite recovery health services, according to the organization’s funding application.
The organization plans to lease half of the first floor to SaVidea Health, a provider that offers drug and alcohol counseling and medically assisted treatment. Fresh Start will use the other half of the first floor as an office for recovery coaches and social detox space.
The building’s second floor will hold five one-bedroom apartments for people in recovery “to transition to more independent living while still having access to support and structure,” according to the organization’s application.
Fresh Start originally asked the city for $1.2 million for the project, but Bangor city councilors voted on Monday to give partial funding. Councilors said previously this is because the city and county have given the organization other grants in the past.
Councilors have been hesitant to grant Fresh Start’s request because of the organization’s for-profit status, as doing so, Councilor Jonathan Sprague said last week, would be “bad fiscal management.” The group learned Monday, however, that Fresh Start anticipates it will restructure by the end of the calendar year.
Fresh Start’s $1.2 million request was one of five funding applications Bangor city councilors considered during a Monday workshop. Prior to those decisions, the city had more than $11 million of the $20 million-plus pot Bangor initially received from the American Rescue Plan Act.
After initially hanging onto that funding for about two years, Bangor councilors have been working in recent months to slowly distribute those funds to various local organizations.
The new building will be Fresh Start Sober Living’s 15th location after announcing last month it will open its latest sober living home in partnership with the Bangor Area Homeless Shelter. The 14 existing homes across Bangor and Brewer offer housing to 112 people in recovery.
In addition to Fresh Start’s award, councilors voted 4-2 Monday to grant Literacy Volunteers of Bangor’s request for $50,000 in pandemic recovery funds.
The nonprofit will use the award for operational costs, going mostly toward funding its three employees who recruit, train, and match students to volunteers. Those volunteers help local adults either improve their basic English skills or learn English as another language.
Though they expressed support for the organization’s mission and work in the community, Councilors Rick Fournier and Sprague voted against the request, as the council has tried to avoid giving ARPA money that will be used for annual operational expenses.
Though councilors agreed to grant the funding during a workshop on Monday, the awards will be formally approved in a city council meeting in the coming weeks.