Why It Matters
Montana’s housing affordability crisis has strained working families and low-income residents across the state for years, and Missoula has been among the hardest-hit cities. A newly announced $67 million development in Missoula aims to directly address that pressure by converting a former homeless shelter site into a large-scale affordable housing campus serving hundreds of residents across a range of income levels.
The project represents one of the most significant affordable housing investments in Missoula’s recent history and signals a coordinated effort between local government, a public housing authority, and private development to tackle the shortage head-on.
What Happened
The City of Missoula, the Missoula Housing Authority, and local developer United Housing Partners have announced a joint partnership to construct an affordable housing development called Franklin Crossing on the site of the former Johnson Street homeless shelter. The project was publicly detailed in late March 2026.
Franklin Crossing is planned to include 192 income-restricted rental apartments spread across three five-story buildings, along with 33 market-rate townhomes. The development may also incorporate commercial or office space, according to the project proposal. The Missoula Housing Authority and United Housing Partners are expected to jointly develop and operate the housing once complete.
The former Johnson Street shelter site, now repurposed for permanent residential use, reflects a shift in how Missoula officials are approaching the intersection of homelessness, housing supply, and long-term community planning.
By the Numbers
- $67 million — Total projected cost of the Franklin Crossing development
- 192 — Income-restricted rental apartments planned across three five-story buildings
- 33 — Market-rate townhomes included in the project
- 30% to 70% — Range of Missoula’s area median income (AMI) targeted by the income-qualified apartments
- $23,650 to $55,160 — Approximate annual income range for a two-person household qualifying for those units
- 40 units — Number of apartments reserved for residents earning at or below 30% of the area median income, the lowest-income tier served by the project
Zoom Out
Montana’s housing affordability problem is not unique to Missoula, but the city has emerged as a focal point for the broader statewide challenge. Rapid population growth in western Montana over the past several years has driven up property values and rents, squeezing out lower- and middle-income earners who have lived in the region for decades.
Across the Mountain West, cities from Boise to Bozeman to Spokane are grappling with the same fundamental equation: housing supply has not kept pace with demand, and the affordable segment of the market has been especially slow to recover. Developers in many of these markets have prioritized higher-margin market-rate projects, leaving gaps at the lower end of the income spectrum.
The Franklin Crossing model — blending deeply subsidized units for those at 30% AMI with moderate-income and market-rate housing — mirrors a housing development approach that has gained traction in other western states. Mixing income levels within a single development is broadly seen as a more financially sustainable model than concentrating only the lowest-income units in one project, as it allows some market-rate revenue to help offset operational costs.
Critics of large public-private housing partnerships sometimes raise concerns about long-term accountability and whether income restrictions are maintained over time. The involvement of the Missoula Housing Authority, a public entity, is likely to bring additional oversight to the project compared to purely private developments.
What’s Next
The project partners — the City of Missoula, the Missoula Housing Authority, and United Housing Partners — will need to advance the proposal through formal planning and approval processes before construction can begin. Financing for a development of this scale typically involves a combination of federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credits, local funding commitments, and private capital, and securing that full funding stack will be a key milestone.
The inclusion of commercial or office space in the proposal suggests the development team is still working through the final program for the site. Community input and city council review are expected as the project moves forward through Missoula’s approval process.
If the project advances on schedule, Franklin Crossing could become one of the largest single affordable housing developments completed in Montana in recent years, offering a potential model for other communities across the state facing similar housing shortages.
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