Bangor housing group will use $2M to help residents out of poverty

A Bangor housing agency will use about $2 million in federal funding to launch a center to help its residents climb out of poverty.

BangorHousing is one of 17 housing agencies in Maine that will split more than $11.5 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins announced Friday. Each year, public housing agencies receive awards from the department’s capital fund to develop, finance and modernize housing. Funding can also be used for management improvements.

BangorHousing will use its $2 million to convert its administrative building on Davis Road into the Opportunity Center, which will become headquarters for the agency’s resident services team and the Boys & Girls Club of Bangor. The center will offer life-skills training and other services to help people become self-sufficient.

For example, a single parent could take a financial literacy class while also accessing care for their children, Michael Myatt, BangorHousing’s executive director, said Friday.

Although the agency and its area partners already offer such services , a dedicated center will provide enough space to ramp up those efforts and reach more people who are navigating how to earn a degree, find a job and save money for the future. It could also help grow the Family Self Sufficiency program available to BangorHousing’s residents.

There are 130 families enrolled in the program. Myatt hopes that once the center launches this fall, it will help grow that figure to about 400 families by the end of the year, he said.

Renovating the building is a $4 million project that began last fall, and the award announced Friday will allow the agency to complete it, Myatt said.

“We’ll have classroom spaces where people can learn new skills, and they can bring their kids and not have to worry about them,” he said. “Depending on how old the kids are, they can also take classes.”

BangorHousing, which owns and operates nearly 570 units in Bangor, will also use the federal funding to repair 50 to 60 roofs.

Public housing agencies cannot go to a bank and ask for a loan to do something like replace a roof, so this annual federal funding allows for large-scale repairs, Myatt said. Over the last two years, the agency used funding from HUD to replace driveways and sidewalks in Capehart , its largest neighborhood.

“Even though it’s not as much as we need, it allows us to do these essential repairs,” he said. “Without the capital fund, our public housing would just deteriorate.”

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development also gave top awards to the Portland Housing Authority and Lewiston Housing Authority, which will receive $3.3 million and $1.2 million, respectively.

Other housing agencies that will receive funding include those in Auburn, Bar Harbor, Brewer, Ellsworth, Fort Fairfield, Mount Desert Island, Old Town, Presque Isle, Sanford, South Portland, Southwest Harbor, Tremont, Van Buren and Waterville. The awards range from about $50,000 to $3.3 million.

“The dedicated staff at housing authorities throughout Maine work hard to link seniors, individuals with disabilities, and low-income individuals and families with access to an array of programs that help them improve their living conditions and achieve economic independence,” Collins said in an announcement Friday.