Republican mayoral candidate state Sen. Jim Merritt on Thursday criticized Mayor Joe Hogsett’s plan to spend about $580,000 on programs to combat food insecurity in Indianapolis and said it “will likely make the problem worse.”
The Indianapolis City-County Council’s public works committee on Thursday unanimously approved a plan to spend about $8 million in returned local option income tax dollars.
Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett’s new initiatives to combat food insecurity were advanced by a vote at an Indianapolis City-County Council committee Wednesday. The overall plan involves spending $580,000 on four programs.
The mayor’s office says the strategy is a way to meet the city’s growing infrastructure needs—which amount to $160 million per year—without raising taxes. But the proposal would create winners and losers among area counties, even as it addresses what’s considered a regional problem.
The often-bipartisan Indianapolis City-County Council cast a rare politically divided vote Monday night on a proposal that would, among other things, spend nearly $850,000 to buy new vehicles for city employees.
Representatives from the city were in New York City on Thursday to entice investors to buy bonds to fund the new criminal justice center—a milestone in the giant public project.
The proposed tax abatement is related to a $91 million investment the company is making in a building at the Lilly Technology Center on Kentucky Avenue.
Some council members voted for the measure in spite of previously expressed frustration that the measure transfers $300,000 out of the city’s parking meter fund to eventually pay for initiatives that seek to curb homelessness and panhandling.
Council Vice President Zach Adamson said “we all have received lots of calls” on the proposal and said postponing the matter would “allow additional conversation” on whether or not to amend the proposal or accept it as written.
The new ordinance is expected to generate an additional $800,000 in parking meter fees annually—about $200,000 less than council members initially sought in a more extensive proposal.
The Indianapolis Parks Department is proposing the creation of public-private partnership involving a health care provider to help pay for a new family event center at Broad Ripple Park.
S&P Global upgraded the city’s property-tax-secured bonds to AA+ from its previous rating of AA.
Moody’s also assigned an initial Aa2 rating to $30 million in revenue bonds issued this year by the Indianapolis Bond Bank to pay for long-term transportation funding.
The proposal’s sponsor, Democratic Majority leader Monroe Gray, said he intends to bring back the pay-raise plan for a vote early next year.
Democrats on the Indianapolis City-County Council are planning to introduce a proposal next week that would nearly triple council salaries—the first pay hike for members since 2002.
A panel of City-County Council members on Monday advanced a plan to provide Corteva Agriscience with incentives to maintain operations in Indianapolis, but not before several councilors expressed objections.
The administration plans to spend $126 million on roads and bridges in 2019, about $30 million more than is slated to be spent this year.
The Indianapolis City-County Council on Monday night unanimously passed a proposal to give $16.7 million in financing to help Keystone Realty Group overhaul two problem downtown office buildings.
The debt, which would be secured by future revenue the city expects to receive from county option vehicle taxes and the increased gas tax, would be on the books for 20 years.
The Indianapolis-based drugmaker has appealed its annual tax bill for its two massive campuses south of downtown every year since 2012.
