Issue 21: February 22, 2026

Though unable to attend a NOVA Lansing’s Housing Initiate Meeting, I did watch the live steam. If I’m being completely honest, it made me rather embarrassed as a member of this community to hear again and again the same repeated rhetoric of “We’re all for helping homeless folks but don’t you dare put them in my neighborhood.” Of an hour and half of public commenters I only counted one who was in fact homeless, that is to say, only one person who could actually live in the mod pods. Just last week, Mayor Shor approved NOVA’s suggested mod pod location of the DHS parking lot where it will be fenced and surveilled by security. The purpose of this issue was to hear directly from displaced folks in our community about how they feel about this development. 

If you have been following the city’s lawsuit against the property owners of Dietrich Camp and their eventual destruction of said camp, then you know the city was court ordered to provide housing to the camp’s residents until they find other permanent housing. Many of these folks are being housed at Causeway Bay, a hotel on the edge of town. Reporters are currently banned from interacting with residents within the hotel, but Punks with Lunch allowed me to accompany them on their bi-monthly food (and other essentials) distribution, going door to door throughout the hotel to ensure Detreich residents have the bare essentials. 

It was through their generosity that I had the pleasure to meet many of these residents. What I thought would be interviews regarding the Mod Pods turned largely into interviews regarding the city’s current treatment of these residents within the Causeway Bay itself. Their message was loud and clear, if the mod pods are actually meant to help folks experiencing homelessness then why is their valuable feedback being ignored? And why should they trust the Mod Pods won’t be run like a penitentiary when so many report that the hotel itself has been turned into a kind of jail?

This issue is their words.