Economic Enhancement District will bolster Indy’s success as world-class sports city
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Next month, the 2024 NBA All-Star Game will come to Indianapolis for the first time since 1985. Thousands of sports fans will arrive in our city and the eyes of the nation will be on our downtown. Currently, the Legislature is considering a bill that would eliminate the Mile Square Economic Enhancement District (EED), an effort critical to ensuring our downtown is in the strongest shape it can be to continue to attract these types of events.
All-Star Weekend is just the beginning of a robust line-up of national sporting events coming to Indy this year. Over the next few months, Indianapolis will also host the 2024 NFL Scouting Combine, the first and second rounds of the NCAA March Madness 2024 Division I Men’s Basketball Championship, the NCAA Division I Men’s Swimming and Diving Championships, the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament, and the National Invitation Tournament. In June, the U.S. Olympic Team Trials – Swimming will take place for the first time ever in an NFL venue as Lucas Oil Stadium hosts the nine-day event, broadcasted each night on NBC. These events are estimated to generate more than $450 million in economic impact for our community.
Indianapolis has more than solidified itself as a world-class sports city welcoming fans and visitors from across the country and globe. When these visitors arrive, our hope is that they are greeted with a clean, safe, vibrant, and thriving downtown.
Those of us who frequent downtown know the increased challenges our city has been facing, including issues of safety, cleanliness, and homelessness kickstarted by building vacancies and less people working and visiting downtown during the pandemic. These are not unique to Indianapolis and are being felt by other large urban centers across the country. Thankfully we’re seeing the rebound and – most importantly – our government, business, and nonprofit communities have come together to help tackle these issues.
Several months ago, the nonprofit Downtown Indy Inc. began providing expanded services to address safety and cleanliness in the Mile Square. These services include dedicated trash pickup and graffiti removal, increased bike and foot patrols to alleviate safety concerns, and more outreach to those experiencing homelessness to help get individuals off of the streets and into temporary housing options.
These focused efforts have been a needle mover for the Mile Square. We’re seeing a cleaner downtown, more workers and visitors patronizing our businesses, and a surge in new development. Tangible services like this are making a meaningful difference to Hoosiers and visitors coming and staying in our downtown to attend sports and other events.
The Downtown Indy Inc. services are being funded with federal COVID relief dollars that will expire. Fortunately, the Legislature during last year’s budget session allowed the city a new funding mechanism to sustain such services: an Economic Enhancement District for the Mile Square. This concept is used by more than 2,000 large business and cultural centers across the country to give them a competitive advantage. Indy needs a similar tool to compete and help us continue to land global and national sports events, conventions and more that bring in hundreds of thousands of visitors and generate millions in revenue for our city and state.
The Indianapolis City-County Council approved the measure establishing the Mile Square EED in December with broad support from the business, sports, culture, and nonprofit communities downtown. This is the type of partnership and collaboration with property owners we need to realize the Mile Square’s full potential.
It would be a shame to see the EED dismantled by the Legislature – in a stark reversal from its support just last year – before the district even gets off the ground and has the chance to prove its effectiveness.
I hope our legislative leaders will continue to support the Mile Square EED and give downtown the boost it needs to support not only our first-rate sports scene and fans, but all who live, work, visit, and enjoy downtown Indy.