“Real Talk”
Let's Get Serious About Investing in the Near Northwest
Without a doubt, the Near Northwest of Indianapolis has been hard hit by the ongoing pandemic.
It's been a rolling economic and social disaster, exacerbated by a variety of policy missteps and the existing economic vulnerability of this neighborhood.
But the pandemic's effects are merely icing on the cake of seeming indifference and halting hesitance by our civic leaders to aggressively invest in economic development and housing in this neighborhood. It’s hard for residents to understand it when we see $60M civic investment deployed to the Stutz Building with 14 units of affordable housing, while a mere 1.8 miles away, the MLK housing project developed by neighborhood partners to deliver 130 units of affordable housing can’t get its far smaller ask.
To be fair, the City has invested in some neighborhood projects and supported planning. However, it is also true that the aggressive creativity and urgency we see applied to making commitments of land or money to projects outside this neighborhood isn't brought to bear in the Near Northwest, even after neighborhood partners have expended stupendous effort to boot up equitable development.
Simply put, we need our civic officials who manage development investments and our city council representatives for this district to DELIVER enabling public investment to this neighborhood. We need them to match our energy and our urgency. That is what it looks like to get serious about investing in this neighborhood.
Submitted by, Anonymous
Comments