Aurora, Denver, Mayor Mike Coffman has been spending his Friday nights in a homeless shelter, on purpose.
Coffman said on Facebook on June 17 that he has been sleeping at the Aurora Regional Navigation Center every Friday night since late February, meeting residents in the men’s entry-level dorm and helping serve breakfast on Saturday mornings.
He said he is doing it because he wants the center to become “a model program for serving the needs of the area’s homeless.”
According to the 2026 Point-in-Time Count Survey from the Metro Denver Homelessness Initiative, 832 people are experiencing homelessness in Aurora. The Aurora Regional Navigation Center opened in November 2025, but the city is still short a few hundred beds for people who need them.
A few months after opening, the center faced criticism over bad plumbing, noxious odors, sickness and maintenance issues, the Aurora Sentinel reported in February.
Coffman, 71, is also a board member for Advance Pathways, the nonprofit partner that operates the center.
“It’s definitely a humbling experience being there,” Coffman told Axios.
Axios reported staff knew about the arrangement from the start, and that some residents are now beginning to recognize him as the mayor.
In his Facebook post, Coffman said he gives residents his business cards in case they need to contact him during the week.
“Consistency is important so that they know that I will be there every Friday,” he wrote on Facebook, “and as I’ve become more familiar to them, they have become more relaxed and open about talking to me about their challenges and expectations for their future.”
The center has three tiers.
Tier I is an “austere” option for people who are newly homeless or recently coming in from sleeping on the streets.
Tier II includes addiction recovery, mental health and job training support, along with more private accommodation and storage for belongings.
Tier III includes individual rooms in a former hotel and is aimed at people who are working full-time and looking for their own accommodation.
Coffman told Denverite that every Friday afternoon he leaves his office and goes directly to the shelter. He said he has brought construction ear protection to block extra noise.
“We are one of the few shelters that allow dogs, and the dogs are with them,” Coffman told Denverite. “And so if one dog starts barking, they all start barking. And then the lights are completely on until 10 o’clock. I’m used to going to bed a little earlier than that.”
He told Denverite the discomfort is worth it.
“Never order somebody to do something you yourself would not do,” he said.
On Facebook, Coffman said he would keep staying at the shelter every Friday night “until the program is everything that I believe it can be.”
“The experience has enabled me to better understand [the residents’] unique and complex challenges,” he concluded, “and it has helped me to see them with compassion, as individuals, and not through a lens of condescension or contempt.”
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