#MergerMondays: The Redemption Project + Hope COS
In July 2024, something beautiful happened in Colorado Springs. Two organizations—Hope COS and The Redemption Project—came together to deepen their impact, pool their resources, and serve their community. Now united under the Hope COS name, this collaboration bolsters their capacity and growth, but even more importantly, it allows them to meet community needs with deeper empathy, greater reach, and more collective heart.
Hope COS was already showing up boldly—operating emergency warming shelters, providing reentry services, and engaging in compassionate street outreach. During the polar vortex of early 2024, their shelters stayed open for ten consecutive nights, offering warmth, rest, and survival to over 400 guests at the peak—helping to significantly reduce hypothermic deaths in the region.
The Redemption Project brought years of trusted peer recovery work and sober living support to the table. Before the merger, 87% of its residents were maintaining sobriety, a powerful metric of healing and stability.
Combined, the two organizations have become an even more holistic support system for neighbors navigating homelessness, recovery, and reentry. They continue to meet people where they are, quite literally. During a frigid week in January 2025, volunteers drove through the city to bring folks experiencing homelessness out of the cold and into safety. They didn’t wait for people to find them—they went directly to those in need.
Together, they now operate Hope House, a newly renovated drop-in center offering showers, laundry, and recovery meetings—critical services especially for people who may be restricted from accessing other local providers. It’s just one more way they’re prioritizing dignity and access.
The organization is now led by Executive Director Melissa Oskin and Associate Director Dominique Knowles, with a blended board of directors representing both legacies. In true community fashion, they didn’t just announce the merger—they threw a barbecue. And honestly? We love that! Because what better way to say, “we’re in this together” than with good food, good people, and the kind of summer afternoon that fills you up in more ways than one?
At KHG, we believe in lifting up moments like these—when organizations choose collaboration over competition and build lasting change for people in our communities.
This merger reminds us that change doesn’t have to be heavy. Sometimes, it looks like collaboration. Sometimes, it smells like burgers on the grill. And sometimes, it sounds like neighbors stepping up for each other, saying: “We’ve got you.”
Here's to more human mergers.
