Three years ago, as the city of Lewiston embarked on an ambitious process that officials hoped would result in a $30 million federal grant, researchers talked to a focus group from the Maple Knoll Apartments.

The apartments, owned by the Lewiston Housing Authority, were 41 walk-up units in a four-story building that covered a city block. Built in the 1890s as two buildings, they were connected and renovated in the 1970s. By 2018 they were considered distressed, in such bad shape they couldn’t be rehabbed.

Members of the focus group, which comprised more than half of the building’s households, told the researchers that living there “was just one step up from homelessness.”

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