There is a reason the Waterville City Council’s vote Dec. 7 to designate $400,000 in ARPA funds to the Mid-Maine Homeless Shelter has been controversial, and it’s because it was flawed in both process and outcome. It was well intentioned, but we know the road to Hell is often paved with good intentions.

Let’s address process first. The council passed it by vote but claims the ARPA Committee formed to allocate federal funds made the decision. How the committee came to its decision is clear as mud to me; the only explanation I’ve received is there were “discussions” with various agencies. Discussions? With whom exactly? What was said? What data was examined? What parameters were used?

It’s problematic that not all of Waterville’s social welfare service providers were included in those discussions, such as they were. Therefore, the decision to carve out one service provider and fast track it to receive $400,000 could only have been based on a limited amount of data. The Interfaith Council and Starfish Village, both substantial providers of emergency care in the Waterville area, as well as other larger, more muscular service providers, were not consulted nor asked to submit proposals. I looked carefully and can’t find a call for proposals posted anywhere.

Whether funds to the shelter are deserved is not the point. It may well be the shelter, an important service provider, is deserving of more funding. But how could that be known without knowing who else may be as deserving? There are services and programs this money is earmarked for that are not unique to the shelter, such as master leasing and case management, but without casting a wider net around more providers, only one narrative arises.

It is wrong to justify this action by saying to those who are annoyed, “Oh, there is more money to be distributed, so don’t worry about it.” Seriously? That’s the answer? If my ministry were to never receive a dime, I would still be arguing that this cannot be the plan by which Waterville distributes millions of federal dollars.

Let’s examine the outcome: It doesn’t seem that any of the $400,000 designated for the shelter provides an emergency response to any of the isolation, hunger and suffering of being unsheltered in winter that my ministry, Starfish Village, and the Interfaith Council, know so well.

Even more consequential is it’s said that some or all (this is unclear) of the $400,000 to the shelter will be “administered” by them and used to support people served by other agencies and will also include “training.”

Administered? The meanings of  “collaboration” and “administration” are very different. The former is collegial, the latter is hierarchical, holding power over another entity or being. What is to be administered and why should it be administered by the shelter?

How was it decided the shelter is the best to train other well-established professionally directed service agencies? How many federal dollars are designated for the shelter to train the rest of us? Who are the targets of this training? Licensed clinical social workers? Chaplains trained in community service with decades in social welfare work? Case managers with years of experience? Vastly experienced state welfare employees? About what? And when?

I’m not asking solely as a service provider but also as a taxpayer.

If any of this is true, or if true and can’t be unwound, it will not work. It is also unwise. It establishes one entity as gatekeeper, creating a type of monopoly, leaving others to petition for assistance, adding not speed nor economy of scale but one more bureaucratic layer. The training element is so problematic it begs being called ludicrous.

The ARPA Committee should create a process that can bear scrutiny. And the Mid-Maine Homeless Shelter should show the good grace I know it possesses and agree this is not a good plan, as it fails to show collegial respect for its many other partners.

What is needed immediately is a daily sit-down hot meals program, similar to that lost when Sacred Heart Catholic Church closed. Waterville also needs a true emergency overnight winter shelter. Both are urgent needs that should have been prioritized ahead of any other programs.

I am exhausted from the endless rounds of meetings, talks, research, professorial lectures about data points and statistics and I think I am not alone in that. Indeed, there are many complex problems that will takes years, maybe decades, to fix. Some problems, however, that are right under our nose are much more easily remediated.

As you read this, people are cold, hungry, and living in flimsy tents in the woods and along the river, pregnant women and senior citizens among them. Can you imagine being either and relieving yourself in this weather? There are also the elderly, sitting alone and not eating well, and working families who could use a healthy free meal. A meals program and an emergency overnight winter shelter are low-budget programs that are quick to establish, not rocket science to operate, and will provide immediate help to God’s children.

Someone accused me of being angry. I’ll take that as a compliment. It’s not at all a bad thing to be angry, especially when worried about the suffering of others. Please join me as I howl in anger and maybe together we can finally get a few simple, inexpensive, but terribly necessary things done around here.

The Rev. Maureen Ausbrook is with Starfish Village, a ministry of the Waterville United Church of Christ and is moderator of the Waterville-Winslow Interfaith Council.

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