The first day of 2024 marked the 50th anniversary of Bangor’s only low-barrier emergency shelter, but its future remains uncertain as it seeks a new owner due to financial shortfalls.
The Hope House Health and Living Center opened on Illinois Avenue on January 1, 1974. At the time, the emergency shelter had 15 to 20 beds and aimed to serve people struggling with alcohol addiction, according to a Bangor Daily News article published Dec. 6, 1973.
In the month leading up to the shelter’s opening, the center needed an additional $2,600 from the community — more than $17,000 in today’s money. If community members could raise that, the state would chip in the additional $12,000 needed to open its doors, according to the article.
Today, Penobscot Community Health Care owns and operates the Hope House, which is based on Corporate Drive. The center now offers three different services to Bangor’s homeless population: the emergency shelter, which includes three daily meals, medical and mental health care, and a transitional housing program.
While the shelter’s size, location, owner and offerings have shifted in 50 years, its financial woes have stood the test of time. PCHC announced in November it needs a new organization to take over the shelter due to growing financial losses in recent years.
If the agency can’t find a new owner, Lori Dwyer, PCHC president and CEO, told state representatives that the shelter will close in October 2024. That closure would eliminate the shelter’s 44 dorm room beds and 12 overflow mats from Bangor’s shelter offerings at a time when the city is struggling to serve its burgeoning homeless population.
The Hope House opened in two buildings on Illinois Avenue in the Bangor International Airport, donated by the University of Maine, that previously served as temporary housing for dependents of U.S. Air Force members.
Prior to its grand opening, Bangor architect George Lloyd, who helped raise money and refurbish the buildings, said the Hope House would be “a no-questions-asked kind of place” that offers help to “anybody who wants it.”
The Hope House has remained Bangor’s only low-barrier shelter, meaning criminal background checks, income verification, program participation, sobriety and identification are not required for a person to stay there.
Though the shelter has either broken even or lost money in the 13 years since PCHC took it over from Acadia Hospital, Dwyer said, the trend of increasing need and unsteady funding in recent years made operating the shelter untenable.
The shelter portion of the Hope House was projected to lose more than $600,000 by the end of 2023, according to Dwyer. In 2024, the shelter is projected to lose more than $800,000.
The health care agency has had “substantive discussions in recent weeks regarding the transfer of ownership” of the shelter, but a new owner hasn’t yet been found, Dwyer said on Monday. However, the organization remains “optimistic” that a new operator will be found in 2024.
“It has been our privilege to provide the most critical of services to those seeking shelter for more than a decade,” Dwyer said. “With homelessness on the rise, finding a partner that can meet the needs and challenges of operating a low barrier shelter is our top priority.”