WHY IT MATTERS THAT EAST LANSING ALMOST CRIMINALIZED HOMELESSNESS

A life legislated

Ordinance 1560 was first introduced by the East Lansing City Council in December 2025 as part of a broader set of recommendations aimed at addressing public safety concerns in the city’s downtown area. The proposal emerged from a committee led by East Lansing Police Chief Jennifer Brown, which cited increased concerns about crime and safety in public spaces as justification for expanding restrictions.

The ordinance sought to prohibit camping in nearly all public areas, extending existing restrictions that already banned sleeping in places like parking structures and restrooms.

Police Chief Jennifer Brown said the ordinance would create a clearer process for addressing prolonged activity in public spaces and help point individuals to services after first offenses.

But, the common refrain from advocates and unhoused residents alike became, point them where?

Erickson cared about the East Lansing ordinance first and foremost because she cares about her neighbors. As a resource-based advocate, she had a stark understanding of what city ordinances criminalizing common lifestyle practices of unhoused people without creating new resources for them really means.

When paired with a rise in unaffordable housing-driven homelessness and encampment crackdowns, these kinds of legislation can be directly responsible for ejecting swathes homeless people from their communities. Unhoused residents then tend to be pushed onto the local social support system (of which East Lansing has virtually none) or through the traumatic — and often violent — rigamarole of the justice system where vulnerabilities only increase.

Top of Erickson's mind were the ways in which unhoused people are commonly edged into surrounding areas — ones typically already struggling to support their existing unhoused populations.

"[The city council has] a lot of power," Erickson said in an interview. "They decide their agenda, right? So at any point in time, they could have ended the misery of every service provider, of every unhoused person who understood what was to come upon passage of a camping ban like that."

It didn't take an expert to understand that reality. Multiple city council meetings ended up packed with concerned residents and advocates. Extensive public comment periods delayed final voting on 1560 multiple times between February and early March. Critics spoke for nearly two hours during public comment, arguing the ordinance would criminalize homelessness.

East Lansing's public camping ban is nothing new. The city already had restrictions on sleeping in certain public and private spaces, but Ordinance 1560 expanded how broadly those rules could be enforced.

Bans like these and other legislation have long targeted unhoused populations and have existed for decades across the United States, often justified through concerns about public safety and sanitation. Supporters of such laws have recently been given a leg up.

Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court found that such ordinances do not violate Eighth Amendment Rights, regardless of a lack of local shelter space. This has cleared the way for the subsequent spike in cities across the country to adopt similar bans, or make existing ones more strict.

Another speaker, Kara Trimbach Shirley, during public comment, asked a simpler question: “Where are unhoused people to go when they cannot be in East Lansing?”

For a city like East Lansing, where advocates say there is no fully developed shelter system, the ordinance highlighted a broader issue. Policies like camping bans do not exist in isolation. They function within systems that are already strained, where access to basic support is limited and resources are often at capacity. Restricting where people can sleep does not eliminate homelessness.

Instead, it displaces it.

Individuals are pushed into surrounding areas, further from the resources, communities, and support systems they rely on. Advocates say this displacement can make it more difficult to achieve stability, while also shifting the burden onto neighboring communities. It may also increase interactions with law enforcement, bringing greater oversight to activities tied to daily survival.

Measures like this are becoming more common across the country. A recent Supreme Court ruling made it easier for local governments to enforce restrictions on public camping, even in places with limited shelter access.

As a result, decisions like the one proposed in East Lansing are not only local, but part of a broader national trend. Still, many who spoke at the meeting returned to the same concern:

The issue was never just about where people sleep.

It was about whether the systems meant to support them actually exist, and whether they are accessible in the first place.

Safety net full of holes

Even when resources exist, access to them is not guaranteed.

Legislation like Ordinance 1560 does not necessarily help unhoused people, even though it includes provisions to direct individuals toward resources after a first offense.

In practice, officers would point people toward local shelters, coordinated entry systems, or service organizations such as Advent House and other area providers, systems that are already limited in capacity and not always accessible.

When communities are pushed to the margins by legal frameworks and restrictions on public space, especially when access to basic rights and resources is limited, community-based infrastructures historically arise to fill those gaps.

These have included soup kitchens, informal encampments, mutual aid networks, and organized programs like the Black Panther Party’s free breakfast programs, efforts that developed in response to needs not met by formal systems.

But across social issues, these infrastructures are typically underfunded and under constant pressure.

There are programs, agencies, and steps to follow, but even getting into those systems can be complicated.

People have to complete assessments, provide documentation, and wait to be placed. In Ingham County, more than 700 households are on the coordinated entry list at a time, waiting for housing opportunities to open.

For many, the process is not immediate and can take months to move forward.

“If you talk to people, you hear, ‘I’ve been on a waitlist for nine months,’ ‘they never called me back,’ ‘I wasn’t eligible,’” Ava Anderson said during the Feb. 3, 2026 City Council meeting.

In one case, a man in his 60s was rejected by a landlord because of a charge tied to sex work from more than 30 years ago.

Even when someone is approved for housing assistance, the barriers remain.

Applicants can reach the final stages of the process and still lose the opportunity because they cannot afford a security deposit or moving costs. In those cases, providers say, vouchers can expire before they are ever used.

For those trying to move forward, navigating the system is a sustained effort, accomplished through intentional help.

Case managers across Lansing describe their work as constant coordination — helping people complete applications, gather documents, follow up with landlords and stay on track with deadlines that can determine whether they receive housing at all. At places like Haven House, families meet with staff daily, building housing plans, making calls and searching for rentals in real time.

Even then, progress is not guaranteed.

The process demands time, access and consistency — resources that many people experiencing homelessness do not have. Missing a call, lacking transportation or losing access to a phone can mean starting over.

For individuals and families who are able to move through the system and secure housing, stability is not immediate.

For many people, daily life is built around securing what others rarely have to think about: a place to shower, a way to charge a phone or clean clothes for the next day.

At Advent House Ministries, those needs surface constantly. Staff help coordinate meals, distribute supplies and connect individuals to resources, but much of the responsibility still falls on the people trying to navigate it.

Without reliable access to basic necessities, tasks like finding a job, maintaining a schedule or following up on housing applications is difficult. Something as simple as a dead phone or lack of transportation can interrupt progress entirely.

Specifically, for families, the experience takes on a different form.

At Haven House, parents continue working, searching for housing and caring for their children while living in temporary space. Case managers meet with families daily, helping them build routines and work toward stability, even as that stability remains uncertain.

Children still go to school, meals are shared and routines are rebuilt where they can be, but the underlying reality does not change.