Twenty-five years ago, two women in Michigan City noticed something that most people walked past: unhoused men in our community left out in the brutal cold. So, they did something simple and brave. They asked local churches to open their doors, share the responsibility, and care for neighbors who had been left out in the cold. This was the beginning of our organization, a nightly PADS program that relied on the kindness and compassion of our faith community for life-saving care for our unhoused population.
Back then, our program traveled nightly. Guests slept in church basements, and the shelter moved from one congregation to the next across the city. On the first few nights, two men came through the doors, even though there were many in need. Shelter took time because trust was needed, and relationships with those who needed to utilize our services had to be established. Soon, we became a well-known resource in our community for neighbors in need of a safe nightly shelter.
For more than a decade, Nest existed only because the community kept showing up. We didn’t have a building of our own in those early days. There was no permanent address, just a network of churches, volunteers, and donors who decided that no one in La Porte County should have to sleep outside in the winter.
We did not start as a building. We got our start when we, as a community, decided to act.
From a winter program to a year-round support
A lot has changed in 25 years. In 2020, with help from grants, local businesses, individual donors, and community organizations, Nest finally secured a permanent home. We moved into the former Sacred Heart Church on 8th Street, rehabilitated the building, and brought the men’s and women’s programs together under one roof.
We also grew in who we serve. What began as a men’s winter shelter now welcomes men, women, and women with children. In Michigan City, we no longer close when the cold weather ends; we operate year-round, opening every single night. We do not close on holidays or in bad weather. We never close.
When the City of La Porte called in early 2025 because its unhoused residents needed emergency cold-weather shelter, Nest answered. We opened an emergency shelter for the first four months of the year, because we understood what was at stake. We were privileged to return this past cold-weather season, from the fall of 2025 through the spring of 2026.
More than a bed
A safe place to sleep is the beginning of our work, not the end of it.
Every night, Nest offers a hot meal, a clean, safe place to rest, and breakfast to start the next day. But the deeper goal is to equip our guests with the life skills, guidance, and reconnection to community that help them stay stably housed for good.
That is what it means to be infrastructure. Roads connect people to where they need to go. Schools connect children to a future. We reconnect our neighbors with the community they were separated from.
In 2025 alone, Nest was directly responsible for housing 58 individuals. Each of those numbers is a person who no longer sleeps outside, faces the elements, and carries the isolation that comes with being unhoused. They are neighbors who experienced the power of a community that showed up for them.
The next 25 years
None of this was built by us alone. It was built by faith partners who hosted guests in their basements, by volunteers who served thousands of hours, and by donors who believed that caring for one another is not charity, it is how a community holds itself together.
That is the lesson from 25 years. Nest is one half of the infrastructure that helps people find their way home. The community is the other half. Reconnection happens only when both halves are present.
As we mark this milestone, we are not just looking back. We are asking what the next 25 years could look like if Michigan City keeps showing up for one another. That story is still being written, and there is room for you in it.
