Nonprofit purchases Colorado motel, expands homeless services: "The most expensive thing we can do is nothing"

A nonprofit in one Colorado city that provides a wide range of resources to the homeless is expanding again.

We first told you about Recovery Works in 2021, when they brought a first-of-its-kind respite care center to Jefferson County.

In December of last year, it partnered with the city of Lakewood to open a navigation center where they offer walk-in services for those who are homeless.

RELATED: New navigation center in Jefferson County helping the Colorado homeless community

Just off Interstate 70 as you exit onto Colfax Avenue, the Mountain View Inn has welcomed out-of-towners for decades.

Today, locals who have fallen on hard times will call these rooms home.

"All the rooms are in excellent shape," James Ginsburg, executive director of Recovery Works, said.

The nonprofit is focused on bringing recovery and housing resources to Jefferson County's homeless population.

"The most expensive thing we can do is nothing and let people languish on the street and access the most expensive and least effective safety net services such as ERs, hospitals, police, contact jails, detoxes," Ginsburg said. "Actually this is the most effective and cost-effective way of dealing with unsheltered homelessness."

They purchased the former motel- as they work to build a continuum of services in the area and is just a piece of the strategic plan the county has been shaping for years.

"When people are left languishing on the street, they are kind of in survival mode. It's hard to pull yourself out of that homelessness," Ginsburg said.

The location, which is close to RTD, and other services is why many already struggling to find affordable housing were paying weekly to live in the motel.

Amos Apencer has a month or so before it will no longer be an option.

"I would like to see it be still kind of an open door. Like, if I'm trying to figure something else out -- something more permanent," Spencer said.

Going forward the building will be used as bridge housing, for those with a referral and focusing largely on the elderly. 

"The largest demographic again was seniors' people over 55," Ginsburg said.

For many of those years, 71-year-old Dorothy McCury was homeless.

"I've been in Lakewood 40-some years," she said. "I got shot at, I got beat up, I got robbed."

Recovery Works found her a bed at another resource center where she's been up until now.

Boxes still waiting to be unpacked, McCury will call one of 33 units home until they can find an affordable apartment for her.

Until then, she says she's grateful for the safe space to lay her head.

"I don't give up. The man up there (is) looking out for me," she said.

Recovery Works says it's giving those current guests -- some who have been staying there for years -- time before they must go.

Ginsburg says they are using their resources to try and find more permanent affordable housing.