Founded to help Maine see itself more clearly.
Common Ground Friends is a Maine-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit challenging the stigma around mental illness, addiction, and homelessness — through documentary film, community conversation, and a clinical foundation of trauma-informed care.
To end the stigma surrounding mental illness, addiction, and homelessness in Maine — through documentary film, community connection, and trauma-informed care.
InhuMAINE & Free Community Screenings
Our 78-minute feature documentary travels to schools, libraries, town halls, and festivals — every community screening is free, and most include a filmmaker Q&A or local resource panel. 11 screenings and selections across 9 communities and 4 film festivals to date.
Clinical Education
Screenings are endorsed by Husson University's Graduate Counseling Program, offering 3 continuing-education units to attending clinicians — bringing stigma-informed practice back to the front lines of care.
Community Projects & Partnerships
Grassroots collaborations across Maine that elevate lived experience and help people navigate housing, healthcare, and belonging — because healing happens when people are seen.
Outpatient Counseling (Licensed)
We hold a Maine state license for trauma-informed outpatient and counseling services. We are not currently accepting new clients, but this clinical foundation keeps our advocacy grounded in practice.
How we started
Common Ground Friends began with a simple, uncomfortable observation: in Maine, the people most affected by mental illness, addiction, and homelessness were the least likely to be heard. Our founders — clinicians, advocates, and people in long-term recovery — had spent years inside the systems meant to help, and watched stigma quietly decide who received compassion and who received judgment. We formed a 501(c)(3) nonprofit to change the conversation itself.
Why film
Statistics rarely change minds; stories do. So our first major project became InhuMAINE, a 78-minute feature documentary filmed over 19 months in Bangor. Rather than speaking about people in crisis, the film lets them speak for themselves — alongside the neighbors, clinicians, and advocates working toward solutions. The film has since traveled from Maine campuses to international festivals, carried by one belief: all important matters are invisible until we learn to see them.
How we work
We are deliberately project-based. We produce documentary storytelling, convene free community screenings and panel conversations, and maintain a Maine state license for trauma-informed outpatient counseling — a clinical foundation that keeps our advocacy honest, even while we are not accepting new clients. Every project asks the same question: does this help Mainers see each other more fully?
Where we're going
Screenings continue across Maine, New York, New Hampshire, and Canada through 2026, each one paired with local resources and honest dialogue. Alongside the film, we are building educational partnerships — like our CEU endorsement from Husson University's Graduate Counseling Program — so the people on the front lines of care can bring these conversations back to their own communities.
Outpatient Services
Licensed outpatient and counseling care rooted in evidence-based, trauma-informed practice — built on the belief that recovery is a human right. We are currently not accepting new clients, but the door to conversation is always open.
Community
Connection is our core. Through grassroots partnership and case management, we help people experiencing homelessness and instability navigate housing, healthcare, and belonging — because healing happens when people are seen.
Art
Documentary storytelling that restores visibility and narrative agency to the unseen. Our film InhuMAINE fuses advocacy and narrative healing into a gut-level call to action.
Rogan O'Donnell, MS
Founder · Documentarian
Clinician, advocate, and filmmaker. Rogan spent 19 months documenting the humanity behind Bangor's homelessness crisis — creating InhuMAINE and carrying its conversation into festivals, classrooms, and policy rooms across the Northeast.
Sazha Ramos
Clinical Social Worker · Navy Veteran
Founder of Recovery Organization Resources, Sazha has spent her career at the intersection of recovery, veteran care, and behavioral health — from the VA to national treatment programs — working to disrupt the narratives around addiction.