It’s been almost two years since Indiana Avenue was promised a redevelopment plan worthy of its history.
But 20 months after a public kickoff event, there are few details about what’s next for the project — or even what’s happened in the meantime.
“It’s been difficult,” historic preservationist Claudia Polley said, “but it needs to get better.”
Part of the problem: turnover at the Department of Metropolitan Development, which has been affected by city government scandals.
And Lourenzo Giple, who was leading the Indiana Avenue redevelopment plan within the department, left his job in October 2024.
“Everything seemed to be moving in the direction we wanted,” Giple, who now works at an engineering firm, said of his time with the city.
The Department of Metropolitan Development had been paying EKLA, a New York-based architecture firm, to lead community engagement. But that contract, worth up to $356,000, expired at the end of 2024. There have been no results or recommendations published.
Now, a year later, the city is working with a different contractor to move the plan forward. And a group of community leaders and developers that started meeting last year is getting together again.
Creating a plan for the Avenue has taken on a new urgency as Purdue University expands its campus near — and on — Indiana Avenue.
The university has already purchased at least two properties located on the Avenue: an office building that now houses a student center and property that’s being redeveloped into an apartment building with office and retail space.
Carmen Lethig, the Department of Metropolitan Development’s deputy director of planning, preservation and design, is leading the project. The department did not make Lethig available for an interview for this story.
In an email to the group obtained by Mirror Indy, Lethig said the rest of the planning process is expected to last through fall 2026.
“I know this has been a long and silent pause in the planning process and I do apologize for that,” she wrote in the email, sent Wednesday, Nov. 5.
What did EKLA do?
During the kickoff event in April 2024, EKLA founder Elizabeth Kennedy said her goal was to leave the community with “strategies and tools” to protect Indiana Avenue.
The firm planned to work with a group of community leaders and developers, who then started meeting to talk about development efforts.
Those meetings weren’t public. Some group members told Mirror Indy the meetings felt like a dead end, and they stopped hearing from the city and EKLA.
“The lack of certainty and closure around such an important topic has been upsetting,” said Nicole Carey, CEO of Convergence Global, an Indianapolis-based consulting firm. Carey helped lead community engagement and was part of the group.
Kennedy could not be reached for comment.
Lethig told the Indianapolis Business Journal in December that EKLA’s research will be used in the next stage of planning.
But the Department of Metropolitan Development won’t say what exactly the company’s research led to.
Auboni Hart, a spokesperson for the department, declined to share specifics about what EKLA did, saying the work falls under an exception to Indiana’s public access law.
Mirror Indy obtained a copy of a draft report submitted by EKLA that outlines some of the challenges in coming up with a redevelopment plan, especially because of how Indiana Avenue development has been handled in the past.
“Rather than engaging primarily with the technical strategies,” the report says, “many participants responded through a lens of generational trauma, distrust, and a history of broken promises, which fundamentally altered the direction and priorities of the engagement process.”
The report says the absence of a neighborhood plan and clear regulatory framework hasn’t led to “organic” development for Indiana Avenue.
“Instead,” the report says, “it has enabled a pattern of inequitable design, cultural erasure, and deepening injustice.”
Enter: another planning firm
With EKLA leaving, the Department of Metropolitan Development is paying a new company to put together a redevelopment plan.
Columbus, Ohio-based MKSK has a $125,000 contract through the end of 2026. The firm has an office in Indianapolis and is also working with the city to update the regional center design that encompasses the larger downtown area, including Indiana Avenue.
Representatives for MKSK did not respond to Mirror Indy’s requests for comment.
Paula Brooks, founder of the advocacy group Reclaim Indiana Avenue, said she’s looking forward to establishing a framework for redevelopment.
“I’m just happy that that’s moving forward,” she said.
But Brooks may have to wait another year to see that framework take shape.
If the project stays on track now, that would mean it took 32 months — more than two and half years — to do community outreach and create a plan for Indiana Avenue.
For Sylva Zhang, vice president of the Ransom Place Neighborhood Association, the long timeline is an example of what she calls “engagement fatigue,” where the city and developers ask residents to give feedback, go to meetings and guide decision making.
“But it doesn’t seem to come to fruition very often,” Zhang said.
Mirror Indy, a nonprofit newsroom, is funded through grants and donations from individuals, foundations and organizations.
Mirror Indy reporter Tyler Fenwick covers housing and labor. Contact him at 317-766-1406 or tyler.fenwick@mirrorindy.org. Follow him on X @ty_fenwick and Bluesky @tyfenwick.bsky.social.
Claire Rafford covers higher education for Mirror Indy in partnership with Open Campus. Contact Claire by email claire.rafford@mirrorindy.org, on most social media @clairerafford or on Signal 317-759-0429.
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