Marshall Mercer, left, chats Tuesday with Nikole Powell at the reentry home at 87 Bartlett St. in Lewiston. Mercer is a recovery activist who used to sell drugs in the same building that is now being turned into a home for individuals with substance use disorder transitioning out of prison and into the community. Powell will be a resident at the home and will manage the female residents. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

LEWISTON — A new recovery-focused reentry home for individuals transitioning out of incarceration is opening in Lewiston next month — one step forward in meeting the demand for sober living residences in the area, the home’s executive director said.

“I think you could add a couple hundred (beds) to three, four hundred and still maybe not even meet demand,” said Johnny Clark.

Clark co-owns A Hand Up (formerly Fresh Out), a recovery organization working to provide transitional housing for individuals transitioning out of prison, with Brandon Tobey. Together, they co-own four reentry homes, including their latest location at 87 Bartlett St. in Lewiston, plus three other houses in Augusta.

Clark will serve as the Lewiston location’s executive director and director of operations. Tobey is the director of operations for their Augusta locations.

Both are also heavily involved in other recovery organizations, including the Augusta Recovery Re-entry Center, where Clark is a recovery coach ambassador and Tobey is the program director. The ARRC is a separate organization and does not operate any recovery residences.

The Lewiston location will have 18 beds split between a men’s side and a women’s side. Separating the two sides will be a communal kitchen and dining space with meeting and games spaces in the basement.

A Hand Up partners Johnny Clark, left, and Brandon Tobey discuss work that needs to be done Friday at 87 Bartlett St.in Lewiston. The partners are involved in transitioning the building from a known address for drug use to a reentry home, housing for individuals with substance use disorder transitioning out of prison and into the community. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Clark and Tobey found the building through a series of connections to the building’s owners, Aaron and Wendi McPike, the husband-and-wife team that owns Able Management.

The couple bought the building less than a year ago. They rented rooms in the funeral-home-turned-boarding-home until about two months ago, when they said they had to evict all the residents.

When asked what events preceded the mass eviction, Aaron McPike replied, “What didn’t happen?”

There were shootings and stabbings. After everyone moved out, he said they found huge stashes of drugs and guns in the drop ceiling. One time, someone shot a crossbow. Another time, two residents overdosed in the parking lot within 30 minutes of each other. He said he and the police dispatchers were on a first name basis.

Wendi McPike said that experience, and meeting with Recovery Connections of Maine co-founder and CEO Jeremy Hiltz to discuss turning their building at 88 Oxford St. in Lewiston into another recovery residence, made them realize they could do something to interrupt the cycle of drug use, homelessness and violence and incarceration.

“I said, ‘We need to do something different with this building because this isn’t helpful. It’s, you know, it’s hurting,” she said.

Aaron McPike points to a bullet hole Tuesday in the hallway at 87 Bartlett St. in Lewiston. McPike is involved in transitioning the building from a known address for drug use to a reentry home, housing for individuals with substance use disorder transitioning out of prison and into the community. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Wendi McPike said there is a history of substance use disorder in their family, including their son, who is now in long-term recovery.

“If all we have to do is fix up some building, that seems like a small thing to do,” Aaron McPike said.

They said they are committed to working with partners such as Clark and Tobey to turn 10% of their properties into recovery residences.

They met Clark through a tenant at another of their buildings, who works at the REST Center in Lewiston and is dating Clark.

Clark, who himself is formerly incarcerated and in long-term recovery, also works with the Maine Prisoner Re-entry Network as a project co-ordinator for the tri-county area, which is said has made him well-aware of the community needs in Lewiston-Auburn.

He said many people when they get out of prison find that they have “burned all their bridges in society. They have nowhere to go, families turn their backs on them.”

He said that with community-based support, the likelihood of an individual returning to prison goes down.

“By coming in here, they find community,” and structure and accountability, Clark said. Connection is the opposite of addiction, he said, “so finding that connection through community is the key. And they live in this environment. They can find, build friendships and long-lasting friendships that are real and not something that’s artificial, like a drug dealer to the addict.”

Clark said he feels a particular urgency to get the home opened as soon as possible with the closing of one of the Lewiston-Auburn area’s already-limited number of reentry homes.

Journey House Recovery will close its women’s residence in Auburn on the 31st, Clark and Nikole Powell, a current resident there, said.

The Portland-based organization was founded by Jesse Harvey in 2016. Harvey, a well-known recovery advocate who also founded the Church of Safe Injection, died in 2020 of a suspected overdose at age 28.

Journey House Recovery also operates four other recovery residences — a men’s residence  in Lewiston and three others in southern Maine.

The seven-bed women’s home opened in late 2018.

Building owner Wendi McPike, right, chats Tuesday with her employees Katie Chandler, far left, and Annie Welner outside 87 Bartlett St. in Lewiston. The building is being transitioned from a known address for drug use to a reentry home, housing for individuals with substance use disorder transitioning out of prison and into the community. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Residents will have to find alternative housing in the interim between its closing and when A Hand Up in Lewiston opens, Clark said.

Powell said that having a robust recovery community has made a “huge difference” to her as she transitions from prison into the community, compared to her two previous prison sentences.

Powell was granted early release under the Maine Department of Corrections’ Supervised Community Confinement Program earlier this year and will be one of the Bartlett Street home’s first residents.

Powell served two previous prison sentences and she said that having immediate access to housing with an integrated recovery program as she transitions back into civilian life has made “a huge difference.”

When she was released from prison the first two times, she went back to her hometown of Rockland.

She also said it’s important to have structure and routine. When that’s inconsistent, it is very anxiety-inducing, she said.

“I know at one point in time I knew the recovery community in Rockland, you know, but it was not anything like it is out here,” she said. “Once you get into it, you’re into it.”

She said she goes to meetings nearly every day and has found community — and employment — through the connections she’s made since moving to the area.

“It’s been super great this time because I do have the resources (this time).”

Powell said that her MDOC supervisors in Augusta are “very excited” for her to move into A Hand Up, where she will also be a manager for the women’s side.

This story was updated to reflect A Hand Up’s ownership and that A Hand Up, the Augusta Recovery Re-entry Center and the Maine Prisoner Re-entry Network are separate organizations. It was also updated to reflect that Journey House Recovery’s women’s residence in Auburn is closing, but not the men’s residence in Lewiston.

Marshall Mercer, right, chats Tuesday with Brandon Tobey at the reentry home at 87 Bartlett St. in Lewiston. Mercer is a recovery activist who used to sell drugs in the same building that is now being turned into a home for individuals with substance use disorder transitioning out of prison and into the community. Tobey is partner with A Hand Up, a recovery and reentry housing agency. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal