On August 20th, the US Small Business Administration announced winners for its 2019 Makerspace Training, Collaboration, and Hiring (MaTCH) Pilot Competition. Among the winners in the Proof of Principle category was RUCKUS Makerspace, a local coworking space located in one of the ten Opportunity Zone census tracts that overlap with the IndyEast Promise Zone. The
One of the key pieces of the successful revitalization efforts on the Near Eastside has been finding exciting new uses for old buildings and spaces. The latest example of this process can be found at Vault, a new co-working space located at 3000 East New York Street. Located in a former bank building, Vault represents
On September 7th, Near Eastside neighbors and stakeholders gathered in Arsenal Tech’s cafeteria for Near Eastside Visioning Day. This event is the first major step in the process of creating a new Near Eastside Quality of Life Plan. The original Near Eastside Quality of Life Plan was unveiled in 2008 after months of collaboration between
On Friday, September 13th, a group of nearly 50 community partners and developers took a bus tour of the Promise Zone, stopping at many former industrial sites. The tour was used to highlight the development opportunities offered by the abundance of sites in the Promise Zone that once housed industrial operations. The tour stopped at
On Thursday, August 22nd, the Governor’s Workforce Cabinet announced nearly $1 million in career coaching planning and implementation grants. Among the awardees were the John Boner Neighborhood Centers, awarded a $10,000 planning grant, and Indianapolis Public Schools, awarded a $503,854.95 implementation grant. Indianapolis Public Schools is one of the ten implementation partners for the IndyEast
The Near Eastside is home to a wide variety of former industrial sites. As the economy has shifted throughout the past half-century, many industrial facilities have been abandoned or sold by their original owners, oftentimes leading to destruction and decay. While these old sites and buildings pose a challenge to the redevelopment process of the
On July 17, 2019, the US Department of Labor (DOL) announced nearly $86 million in grant awards through its Reentry Projects program, including a $1.5 million award to Indianapolis-based RecycleForce. RecycleForce is a social enterprise located on the Near Eastside of Indianapolis that focuses on the environmentally-sustainable disposal and destruction of electronics. Though electronic recycling
The recent award of a Brownfields Multipurpose Grant to the City of Indianapolis marks the fifth investment by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) since 2015 that will directly affect the IndyEast Promise Zone (IEPZ). This latest award represents a continuing commitment to environmental remediation and redevelopment by the EPA, the City, and our community.
Near East Area Renewal (NEAR) and development partner TWG have completed the housing portion of the Minnie Hartmann Center, a multifamily senior affordable housing building redeveloped from IPS School #78. The Minnie Hartmann Center consists of 64 affordable rentals for adults 55 and older. The Center will also include a full-day childcare center for 150+
For most of the past century, the 50-acre parcel on the northwest corner of Michigan Street and Sherman Drive on the Near Eastside of Indianapolis was a bustling economic hub. Having hosted General Electric (GE), the RCA Corporation (formerly the Radio Corporation of America), and Thomson Consumer Electronics in succession, the tract was a worksite