A private New York company will begin a three-year contract to clean and patrol downtown Bangor starting this fall.
Downtown Bangor Partnership is finalizing an agreement with Streetplus, a Brooklyn-based urban safety, cleaning and hospitality service. The company will hire five local personnel who will be tasked with a series of responsibilities, said Betsy Lundy, executive director of Downtown Bangor Partnership.
In addition to cleaning up litter and reporting vandalism to the appropriate city department, the Streetplus workers, called ambassadors, will patrol downtown and can walk people to their vehicles if they feel unsafe, Lundy said. Employees will also approach people who are homeless downtown and direct them to local services that can meet their needs.
Downtown Bangor Partnership is contributing $310,000 this year to the contract while the city chipped in the remaining $230,000, according to Lundy. The city’s portion comes from the unassigned revenue fund, which is money that was budgeted for other things in past years, but never spent.
The city’s approval of funding for the program comes years after Lundy first pitched it to city councilors, but was repeatedly denied funding. Previously, city councilors expressed reservations about whether Streetplus would be able to staff a team in Bangor while others were skeptical of how the company would solve all of Bangor’s issues.
In the years that Lundy continued to ask and advocate for Streetplus, the city added a series of other resources aimed at addressing ongoing and pervasive symptoms of homelessness, untreated mental health issues and visible substance use disorder.
For example, the city’s Bangor Community Action Team, which responds to non-emergency calls that don’t require a police presence, formed in spring 2023. The Bangor Police Department also relaunched its downtown walking beat officer in May after the position was cut in 2021 due to staffing shortages.
While those new resources have all helped, Lundy said they haven’t eliminated the city’s issues and she still hears safety concerns from downtown residents and businesses.
Lundy said seeing someone who’s visibly homeless doesn’t put someone in danger, but “seeing someone who’s behaving unpredictably, needles, graffiti and litter all erode a person’s sense of safety.”
Streetplus, Lundy believes, will create a cleaner downtown and be “another set of eyes” to bolster the public’s perception of safety in the area.
“I believe we have a phenomenal downtown, so helping people get over the hump of feeling unsafe would go a long way to changing the narrative,” Lundy said.
Though the ambassadors aren’t police officers, they will be trained on all local ordinances and will interact with someone to stop unwanted behavior. The team operates on the belief that someone will usually stop an unwanted behavior if asked.
Streetplus has received more than 50 applicants to be the supervisor of the Bangor team and 50 more people have applied to be safety ambassadors, according to Lundy. Streetplus leaders will be in Bangor to conduct interviews.
Lundy said she expects Streetplus services to begin in Bangor in early fall.
The team will work in the days and hours when Bangor’s downtown walking beat police officer, Keith Larby, is off, Lundy said. Larby typically works during the day Tuesdays through Fridays.
Anik Derphilibossian, co-owner of Dreamer food truck on the Bangor Waterfront, wasn’t aware that Streetplus is coming to Bangor, but said she believes it’ll be a good addition to the existing services downtown.
Though she has never had any issues, Derphilibossian said Larby’s presence has been comforting to have during the day, so a similar service available during Larby’s off hours should benefit the city.
“The more services available, the better,” said Derphilibossian, who launched her new food truck this summer.
Julie Baker-Leaden, manager of Mexicali Blues on the corner of Main and Hammond streets, said she believes Streetplus will help downtown Bangor businesses with any challenges they face while being less intimidating than police.
“We’re in a good spot now, but I think Streetplus will be an added benefit for downtown,” Baker-Leaden said.
