After countless calls, meetings and conversations with anyone we knew connected to the pod villages – the Ministerial offices for Recovery and Housing, the Community Housing Providers (CHPs) village managers (Northern Rivers Housing, Uniting, and Baptist Care which no longer manages Coraki, yet no-one can confirm who does), state MPs, councillors, the NSW Reconstruction Authority, Homes NSW, and pod residents themselves – we still do not have a straight answer to two fundamental questions.
1. Why are 259 households being evicted from functional community housing from 29th July when there is nowhere else for these families to go and no final decision has been made as to what happens to the villages after December 2026?
2. When the need for housing in our community is this severe and rental vacancy this low, why can’t the pod villages continue as community housing – in place, or relocated together with their residents and managed for continuity by the current managing CHPs?
The Northern Rivers has already lost five of its 11 pod villages. Of the six that remain, five – Coraki, Mullumbimby, Lismore, Tweed Street Brunswick Heads, and Ballina – are now being emptied too.
Only Wardell continues as intended: emergency accommodation until a genuine long-term housing pathway is realised, for flood-affected residents returning to the rebuilt Cabbage Tree Island.
Evictions
If a decision isn’t reached between those responsible for the pods hundreds of people will be evicted into homelessness over the next three months because Homes NSW cannot offer actual housing pathways, even to those on the social housing waitlist, with nowhere to house them privately in the region.
The staggered eviction dates – 29th July for those without social housing, 30th September or 3rd November depending on priority, and full decommissioning by 18th December – are being driven entirely by the end of a funding cycle.
We’ve been told directly that the pods must be handed back to the NSW Reconstruction Authority by 18th December because the four-year NEMA funding period is ending, and whatever comes next needs separate funding that is still being finalised.
Some sites may well continue operating as community housing after that date, which makes this much worse because the pod villages won’t disappear, they will sit empty for an indefinite period while the reuse arrangements are sorted out.
In short, residents are being made homeless because of an administrative funding gap and a lack of collaboration between the agencies responsible for keeping people housed until more public and community housing can be delivered across the Northern Rivers.
We have seen the eviction notices handed to Brunswick Heads residents in April 2026, giving roughly three months’ notice for a 29th July deadline.
These notices should have gone out 18 months ago if there was any genuine care or commitment to finding long-term housing pathways for pod residents without a boot on their neck.
Social housing
The pod villages exist for one essential reason: to house flood-affected residents and people experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity, until long-term housing pathways were made available.
Only Wardell is still fulfilling that promise, not because it has more funding or capacity, but because it has an actual plan and residents have been given a real pathway home.
None of the other five villages are granted the same promised arrangement.
Best case is Lismore, where social housing is planned on-site with no construction date confirmed. Worst case is Mullumbimby, where we still don’t know if the site will stay or go. Whatever the outcome for any individual site, there is no valid reason residents need to vacate by 3rd November.
Residents applying for social housing are told they can secure an extension from 29th July to 30th September or 3rd November. Even if approved, there is no public or community housing available in the towns they live in and the Northern Rivers has the lowest rental vacancy rate in the state, at 0.3%.
Social housing approval doesn’t mean there’s anywhere to move to. It means your name is added the end of an already extremely long queue while you’re still forced from the pod you call home. As with community housing, most pod residents are already paying a percentage of their income.
Communication channels
We still have not been able to reach an actual decision-maker at Homes NSW, the agency everyone involved in managing the pods has told repeatedly us holds overarching responsibility.
Every call to Homes NSW has been transferred to the wrong office or organisation, left on hold for hours, and eventually met with the response that the CHPs manage the pods and we would need to contact them directly.
When we push back and point out this isn’t what we’ve been told, we are told the decision sits above the officer’s paygrade. Homes NSW staff have to their credit, been kind and tried to help but can only offer a callback from the relevant decision-maker.
Meanwhile, Northern Rivers Housing, Uniting, and previously Baptist Care, the people who actually run the villages and know the residents – along with the Minister for Housing’s office, all say the same thing: Homes NSW makes the final call. These CHPs can advocate, but they cannot decide who stays past 29th July.
If Homes NSW contracted these providers to manage the villages, it needs to let them do the job and not hold every decision at arm’s length while being nearly impossible to reach.
The human cost of this mismanagement is real and devastating. Some residents have disclosed to us that they are suicidal under the stress of imminent homelessness. Elderly residents have been advised to rehome their pets and prepare to move into their cars. Single parents are at breaking point, unable to provide stability for their children.
Survivors of the 2022 floods, who have done everything asked of them, are being pushed into homelessness over an arbitrary date based on funding that nobody can properly explain.
Residents are paying the price, mentally and physically for this institutional failure.
Site-specific information
Here is what we know about each site.
In every case, residents should remain in place until reuse is confirmed, either continuing as community housing where they stand, or relocating together with residents to a new site.
• Lismore: land owned by Southern Cross University, managed by Northern Rivers Housing. Social housing is planned here but no construction date is confirmed. Residents should have the option to move into the new social housing on this site or relocate with the village, whichever offers a faster housing pathway.
• Tweed Street, Brunswick Heads: land owned by Byron Shire Council, managed by Uniting. The site itself may continue, possibly as Council-run key worker housing. If so, why evict people who need housing to make way for others who also need housing? Council could build key worker housing on a different council-owned site and let Uniting keep managing this village as community housing for the current residents.
• Coraki: land owned by NSW Health. Baptist Care no longer manages this site and no-one can confirm who does beyond Homes NSW being named as responsible. This site should remain as community housing for its current residents with a named, accountable manager confirmed immediately.
• Ballina: land owned by TAFE NSW, managed by Northern Rivers Housing. In discussions, outcome uncertain. This site should also remain as community housing for its current residents until that outcome is confirmed.
• Mullumbimby: land owned by NSW Transport, managed by Northern Rivers Housing. In discussions, outcome uncertain, may close, relocate or remain. If relocated, it should move within Mullumbimby so the pod resident community can move with the village.
• Wardell: stays open because it has a plan and is being allowed to keep it. The other five villages need to do the same.
What needs to happen
1. Do not evict residents until the reuse of each village is determined and every resident has a confirmed long-term housing pathway, applying Wardell’s standard for every village.
2. Automatic priority social housing waitlist placement for every pod resident, with public reporting on how many are rehoused.
3. Written confirmation of exactly who is accountable for this eviction and decommissioning decision, an end to Homes NSW and the CHPs passing responsibility back and forth, and a joint decision-making process bringing Homes NSW, the NSW Reconstruction Authority, the CHPs and landowners to the same table so decisions affecting hundreds of residents stop being made in isolation.
4. A funded, public plan for the reuse of these sites including whether the pods could simply be gifted to the Community Housing Providers already managing them with a lease agreement secured with each landowner rather than requiring those same providers to apply through the Reuse Program for something they’re already running successfully.
If the current site is no longer available, the pods should be relocated with their residents, instead of residents being displaced with nothing to move into.
Residents have already lived through the floods, years of displacement and repeated uncertainty. They do not deserve to end up living in their cars because a funding period ran out before the next one was organised.
This is a housing matter now which the NSW Government and Homes NSW need to take responsibility for. We invite them to meet with us to discuss a genuine path forward and ask that no residents will be evicted while these decisions are finalised. Forced eviction and homelessness for hundreds of families while the pods themselves will likely sit empty until reuse actualised is indefensible and entirely preventable.