Indy’s new inclusion office prepares to tackle equity wealth gap

The Hogsett administration’s newest department is now part of a grant-funded effort to craft a racial wealth-equity plan for Indianapolis.

Indianapolis was selected this year as one of five cities to receive a $75,000 planning grant to address challenges such as rising gentrification, disinvestment in key historically Black neighborhoods and the racial wealth divide. The money comes from the New York-based Cities for Financial Empowerment Fund, which will also provide technical assistance and guidance for participants.

The program, known as CityStart, will take 16 to 18 months to complete. At the end, the city will publish a public economic mobility blueprint detailing short- and long-term goals for achieving racial wealth equity.

That won’t be easy. The Indianapolis metropolitan area is the sixth-most economically segregated region in the United States, according to a 2018 report from the Indiana University Public Policy Institute.

“As a city where the barriers to income mobility are felt most acutely by our communities of color, it is critical we design policies and programs aimed at building generational wealth for those families,” Mayor Joe Hogsett said in a statement. “The ability to improve circumstances for the next generation is a key component of the American dream, and I remain committed to making Indianapolis a place where that is not only a dream, but a reality for all of our residents.”

Two top Hogsett administration officials—Aryn Schounce, senior policy adviser, and Ben Tapper, director of the Office of Equity, Belonging and Inclusion, established only last year—flew to New York to interview for the grant early this year after the city’s application made it through the first phase.

Ultimately, Indianapolis was selected in what CityStart Program Manager Sol Vilera Ramos said was a “fairly competitive process.” She said the Indianapolis application was successful due to its focus on equitable community engagement, connections among local organizations and work with neighborhoods determined to meet the needs of Black communities.

“That clear, ongoing commitment and previous work made it really exciting for us to work with Indianapolis,” Vilera Ramos told IBJ.

Indianapolis will focus on economic mobility and autonomy, education and housing, Schounce said.

“This isn’t intended to sort of reinvent the wheel, so if we have things that align in those priority areas, good work that we’re already doing, we want to lift that up,” she said. “But it’s about better coordination of resources and really thinking about how those priorities align with resource allocation.”

Vilera Ramos said the program provides an opportunity and framework for cities to examine and think critically about the disparity between Black and white residents, which is something cash-strapped and preoccupied officials might not otherwise be able to dedicate time and resources to.

“I think the biggest piece of work that each city goes through is identifying, ‘What are the first small intentional steps we can do to move the work forward and how can we make sure that that’s not something that sits on a shelf but it’s ongoing work that we can build upon?’” Vilera Ramos told IBJ.

The process

The Cities for Financial Empowerment Fund touches bases with city grantees biweekly and convenes webinar-style video calls with experts in areas like racial equity, narrative change and data.

The program process is divided into two long phases. The first is a learning phase during which the fund and the city will analyze the local landscape, collect data and engage in intensive stakeholder roundtables to identify key challenges and opportunities. Within the first phase, the city will work to engage residents in their efforts.

Schounce and Tapper are beginning by assembling a 10-member internal stakeholder group consisting of city employees. Tapper will be part of that group, along with representatives from the Office of Public Health and Safety, the Department of Metropolitan Development and the Citizens’ Police Complaint Office.

Later this summer, a representative from the New York-based organization will fly to Indianapolis for a site visit.

In the second phase, city leaders will work with the Cities for Financial Empowerment Fund to craft a comprehensive, government-led financial empowerment blueprint.

As part of the process, the organization will convene current participants and previous cohorts at its New York headquarters and through videoconferences. At one of those gatherings in April, Tapper and Schounce heard short summaries of work done by previous cohorts. Nothing specific stood out, Tapper said, but the cohort will “really inform and shape how we move and vision our blueprint and plan here.”

Vilera Ramos pointed to two nearby Midwestern cities as examples. In South Bend, which was part of the first cohort, city leaders found that Black residents wanted one-on-one financial support. As part of the financial empowerment blueprint, the city established two of what it calls Financial Empowerment Centers in historically Black neighborhoods that offer free professional financial counseling.

In Cincinnati, which was part of the most recent cohort, officials found that Black residents were disproportionately affected by medical debt. The city allocated $1.5 million toward forgiving that debt.

“This, I think, for us is about refinement, clarity and making sure that we’re investing resources where they really need to be invested to make the most impact,” Schounce told IBJ.

Expanded efforts

Over the last several years, the Hogsett administration has made efforts to formalize its work in diversity and inclusion, which created the drive to take on the national grant.

Tapper was hired as the city’s first chief diversity officer in 2022, with additional staff added to his office in 2023. That’s also the year the city created the Office of Equity, Belonging and Inclusion.

But the discussions had started earlier.

The inclusion office came out of the city’s work with the Government Alliance on Race and Equity, a national network of governments devoted to achieving racial equity and advancing opportunities for all. That organization held race-in-government workshops that more than 100 Indianapolis leaders and stakeholders attended in 2019. Indianapolis officially joined the Government Alliance on Race and Equity network in September 2020.

The City-County Council funded the city’s Office of Equity, Belonging and Inclusion with nearly $688,000 during last year’s budget season. That paid the salaries of three full-time staff members: the director, a data analyst and a training manager. Additionally, the office has two AmeriCorps public allies who are paid with funds provided by Serve Indiana and AmeriCorps and specialize in community engagement and closing language barriers.

Not everyone has been on board with the new office, however. Republicans on the City-County Council, who hold just six of the 25 legislative seats, have been vocal in their opposition.

When Tapper stood before the council in May for a routine approval of his appointment by the Democratic mayor, Republican Josh Bain asked Tapper about a 4-year-old social media post in which Tapper responded to an act of police violence against a civilian with the statement, “another reason for the police to be abolished.” In response, Tapper said the councilor didn’t actually want an answer to the question and pointed to a positive working relationship with Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department Chief Chris Bailey.

“I intend to have a relationship based on respect, on trust and a desire to see the citizens of this city protected and served with integrity at the center,” Tapper told the committee. “And as long as the leadership of IMPD are down with that, then we will continue to get along just as we have in the last 16 months.”

Much of Tapper’s work so far has been focused internally on city staff. He’s found some resistance to change, but he said much of the response to his office and its work has been positive. And, he said, “top to bottom,” there’s more support than pushback.

Still, Tapper said he’s hopeful to get even more buy-in for his work through the CityStart process.

And he’s learned that the historical disinvestments in Black neighborhoods in Indianapolis were mirrored in many cities. For example, interstates—built from the 1960s through the 1980s—cut through historically Black neighborhoods in most major cities, just like in Indianapolis.

He hopes that telling authentic stories about the creation of wealth inequality in Indianapolis’ history will help skeptics understand the need for change.

“When we think about talking about equity,” Tapper told IBJ, “one of the reasons that can feel so divisive is because we don’t understand its connection to the broader narrative of wealth, the broader narrative of community building and neighborhoods.”•