Special Mayor's Night Out - Inner City Issues

Mayor's Night Out for Downtown Neighborhoods
Indianapolis Public School #2 (Center for Inquiry)
725 N New Jersey
February 24th
6:00-7:00 PM

Hi all,

Due to public pressure regarding the increase in crime, speeding/road safety, sidewalk and alley issues, etc. coming from our HMP Association meetings (and other local neighborhood association meetings), a special "Mayor's Night Out" has been scheduled for all downtown neighborhoods, with Mayor Ballard and David Sherman, Director of the Department of Public Works.
Please plan on attending this event, on February 24th at Indianapolis Public School #2 (Center for Inquiry), located at 725 N New Jersey. There will be a public question and answer session from 6-7pm that night. Our Mayor's Neighborhood Liaison, Charles Ingram, has asked that we forward our neighborhood's specific concerns to him, prior to this meeting, so that Mayor Ballard and Mr. Sherman can prepare to discuss them. Please forward any questions/concerns to me, ASAP, and I will get them to Mr. Ingram.

As many HMP neighbors as possible need to make our faces seen and our voices heard at this meeting! We continue t o hear the same things over and over again at our neighborhood meetings about budgets being cut (or allocated elsewhere) while we pay higher and higher taxes. Our water and air quality rank at the very bottom of the list of U.S. cities, IPS schools are in great need of investment and overhaul, our alleys and sidewalks are a mess, our neighborhood is not light enough at night and we don't feel safe in our own homes. The number of police officers within our beat have been cut in half, while the size of the beat itself was doubled. (Even though we have seen a drop in the number of burglaries that have taken place in HMP over the last several months - much of which can probably be attributed to the arrest of Mr. Groves - spring is just around the corner, when these types of crimes start ramping up, again. That, coupled with the recession and wide-spread job loss, will mean that we will need a higher number of officers on the street to protect and serve, an improved prison system to accommodate those who are tried and convicted, and a better system in place to help those transitioning out of prison and back into society, so that those like Troy Groves don't just walk out the prison door go back to robbing the exact same neighborhood they hit before.)

I have a list of questions that is fairly deep, but I may be missing some. Please forward your concerns to me, by Wednesday of next week (Feb. 18). If you would, please phrase your question/concern as if you were communicating directly with Mayor Ballard or Mr. Sherman.

This meeting is open to all downtown neighborhood residents, so be sure to let your friends in other downtown neighborhoods know about this meeting, as well. The more people there to speak out, the better we'll be heard.

Thank you,
Kellie Welborn-Helfenbein
Herron-Morton Association President
(317) 926-1270