BANGOR – Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross admits he is frustrated by the growing problem of jail inmates with mental health issues and said he’s trying to stem the tide by watching what has worked elsewhere in the state.

Taking cues from Cumberland County, Ross is working with local police, county and medical officials, to help reduce the number of inmates that have mental health issues and also to provide resources for those who are jailed.

Ross, along with Carol Carothers, executive director of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in Maine, is working to establish a countywide committee to focus on the problem.

“Routinely, jails are becoming the default mental health institution, which is a shifting of the responsibility and liability to the counties,” Ross noted in a recent speech.

The problem of mentally ill inmates is not new, but the number is growing as psychiatric beds, transitional housing and other resources and services decline.

“It’s always been an issue, but now it’s a big issue,” Carothers said recently.

It’s something Ross knows well, as mental health assessments at the Penobscot County Jail in Bangor doubled the first quarter of this year compared to the same time last year. Inmates with mental problems are tying up beds in an already crowded jail, draining resources and in some cases being left without the necessary treatments.

Several weeks ago, an inmate tried to kill himself for the eighth time, after being refused admission to the Augusta Mental Health Institute because of lack of space, according to Ross.

Carothers has been enlisted to help start the committee. State Rep. Janet Mills, D-Farmington, a former prosecutor, has been asked to serve on the committee that will be fleshed out further with representatives of agencies and departments that have a stake in the issue.

Cumberland County has had a similar committee in place for more than five years. One of its programs, Divert Offenders to Treatment, has worked effectively with people with mental health and substance abuse issues to keep them out of jail while providing them with the necessary treatments and resources.

As part of the program, police officers and corrections officers are trained at diffusing situations that would prompt an arrest or lead to further problems in the jail, while providing resources outside the jail.

Catherine Chichester, who heads the committee, said Monday that in one year starting last April, 4,027 beds at the jail weren’t needed because prospective inmates were diverted to other programs. At a cost of $102 per day, that’s a savings of $410,754 for the jail.

Ross said that while developing a committee will help resolve certain aspects of the problem, the state Legislature must tackle the issue of finding more psychiatric beds. Bangor Mental Health Institute has the room to take more patients, but not the funding, and that’s what has to be addressed at the state level.

Other groups and agencies also are making headway outside of state government. Manna Inc. of Bangor, a nonprofit organization will open a 10-bed transitional housing unit next fall. The program is for substance abusers, but mental health officials said all too often the two go hand in hand.

“I feel a lot better about it, but it doesn’t change the magnitude of the problem that exists,” the sheriff said about the situation.