FORT COLLINS • Kevin Monson Jr. didn’t have a whole lot of options when he was released from Larimer County Detention Center in 2021. 

He was homeless.

Though Monson was able to crash at a friend’s house for two weeks after being released, he knew the stay there was temporary, so he showed up at the doorstep of a familiar ally — the Fort Collins Rescue Mission — in search of a place to stay. 

Monson was familiar with the shelter located in Old Town Fort Collins, as, up to that point, he had been in and out of homelessness since 2012. 

“I came directly to the shelter,” Monson said. “There wasn’t a bed available for me then, so I had to spend 11 days in the night — meaning I had to go back out onto the streets for those 11 nights, which is rough, but I was lucky because more people have to wait longer.”

Fort Collins Rescue Mission, with its 89-bed capacity, had to turn away those seeking shelter 1,247 times in 2024 alone due to a lack of capacity. 

But rejections at the door like that experienced by Monson and many others might soon expected to be a thing of the past.

The shelter is set to expand and relocate from its present 5,000-square-foot facility to a $27 million, 38,000-square-foot location that will include 250 available beds, along with private spaces for intake and case management services and many other amenities.

The site at North College Avenue and Hibdon Court in Fort Collins is scheduled to open in winter 2026, with construction to begin this summer.

As for Monson, he not only took advantage of the shelter’s offerings, he capitalized on the opportunity. Monson stayed at the shelter for the next 10 months without an infraction and was rewarded. He landed a spot in federal housing in October 2022 and left Fort Collins Rescue Mission as a resident but not entirely for good.

Monson, 47, now works as a full-time community life coordinator at the shelter. It’s a position that calls on him to don a lot of hats.

“My position consists of doing everything from cleaning toilets to engaging with our guests to getting meals and helping set up our night services,” Monson said. “It is extremely challenging but incredibly rewarding. I am truly blessed.”

Need for more shelter

Like many other cities in Colorado and the United States, Fort Collins has seen an uptick in homelessness, placing an even greater burden on facilities like the Fort Collins Rescue Mission.  The homeless population in Larimer County has grown 20% faster than the county’s total population between 2019 and 2023, according to the Common Sense Institute of Colorado.

“When we started operating Fort Collins Rescue Mission in 2012, it was not adequate for the people seeking shelter,” said Seth Forwood, vice president of programs for northern Colorado, a subsidiary of Denver Rescue Mission. “That not only hinders how many shelters we can provide but hinders how many resources we can provide. We have to provide lifesaving shelter. If someone wants a warm place to sleep, their life is sacred, and they should have that.”

The Fort Collins Rescue Mission’s move and expansion has been greenlighted, receiving unanimous approval from the Fort Collins Zoning and Planning Commission and the Fort Collins City Council.

Thanks to the support from major stakeholders, including the Bohemian Foundation, the Fort Collins-based philanthropy founded by Pat Stryker, the Rescue Mission already secured $23.9 million of the estimated $27 million price tag to complete the project. Officials from the nonprofit confirmed that the land Fort Collins Rescue Mission will build on from the ground up is owned by the Bohemian Foundation, adding that it has a 99-year lease with the foundation. The city of Fort Collins has pledged $1 million in addition to funding from other foundations and donors.

“We got some really good feedback at the end of 2024 from people who stood up and said, ‘We want to support this project,’” Forwood said. “Now, we’re really casting the widest net we can across the Fort Collins community with this campaign (to complete the funding). We’re saying that we need every sector, every household, and every faith community to join us to get across the finish line.”

The new Fort Collins Rescue Mission would be the latest installation of facilities to open in northern Colorado aimed at helping those in at-risk situations. Larimer County’s Acute Care Facility on the Longview Campus in Southwest Fort Collins opened in December 2023. The Landing, located in Loveland and operated by The Matthews House, opened Jan. 29, serving as a shelter for youths 15-17 and young adults 18-21. 

Changing the narrative

Forwood knows there is opposition to the Rescue Mission’s initiative, with some pointing to fears of increased crime, reduced property values and an increased number of transient individuals.

“It’s really important for us to kind of shed the cloak of shelter only because the shelter only communicates that we’re just putting a Band-aid on the problem,” said Forwood, who sees the new facility becoming a homeless resolution center. “That’s not our focus or goal for this new building. Our hope is that we are impacting homelessness at a very significant level locally and regionally so that there are less people that need shelter because they are getting into stable housing.”

Forwood said the Fort Collins Rescue Mission helped transition 75 men into stable housing last year, with fewer resources than will be available at the new shelter. 

Forwood, who grew up in Fort Collins and graduated from Colorado State University, believes he knows the ins and outs of his community. He was quick to joke that, contrary to popular belief, he has not worked at the shelter since he was 12.

“I’ve lived in Fort Collins for over 33 years, and I love the people at the upper crest in Fort Collins, and I love the people that are desperate and homeless on streets of Fort Collins. I love the concept of having everyone from the top 1% down to our shelter guests be a part of the solution. That is exciting to me. It’s how a community should work,” he said. 

Fort Collins police Officers Annie Hill and Deter Rowe were on hand during the campaign kickoff luncheon last month. They also appealed for more community support for the project. 

“My team’s biggest goal is to build relationships with our community members who are experiencing homelessness,” said Hill, who heads the police department’s homeless outreach team of four. “We’ve developed some great relationships. My team is very passionate and we enjoy what we do. I think the biggest step is getting to know these people and treating them with humanity — respect like everyone wants to be treated. When you really, truly sit down and hear their backstory is when we can truly move forward.”

Not too far away from the two Fort Collins police officers stood Kevin Monson.

He is filled with hope for what lies ahead for him.

Monsoon is planning on applying for a house through Habitat for Humanity in February — something he once “never thought in a million years” would be possible. But he won’t be straying too far away from the Fort Collins Rescue Mission.

After all, he’s digging his new gig as a community life coordinator.

“I always thought I’d be a career construction man,” a smiling Monson said, “but this is career mode, man. I’m thinking retirement, and I never would have thunk it.”