The Outstater: Why Government Fails
It is good every once in a while to push personalities and ideology out of the way and look at public policy in its purist form. It is bad for the blood pressure to always be imagining little Stalins, Trotskys and Obamas lurking in the back desks of the county planning department (although history tells Read the full article…
White paper: TIF – It’s not Working the Way We Were Told It Would
The foundation’s white papers are intended to make scholarly research on Indiana issues more widely available to policy analysts and researchers. White papers represent research in progress and are published to invite comment and discussion as preparation for their submission to academic journals and other professional publications. The authors are solely responsible for the content Read the full article…
Indiana at 200 (59): A City Built on Natural Gas
by Andrea Neal It was Indiana’s version of the Gold Rush. In the 1880s, the discovery of a massive natural-gas field in east central Indiana launched a gas boom of historic proportion. The news spread fast — as it did with California gold — and folks poured into Indiana in search of fortune. “There was Read the full article…
The Outstater: A Conflict of Visions Over Regional Cities
by Craig Ladwig Forgive skeptics of the tableau vivant unfolding for Regional Cities initiatives across the state. They seem dumbstruck. They don’t have the data to challenge the expansive vision and supporting PowerPoints of economic-development directors and their armies of experts. That does not mean, though, that they don’t have a vision of their own. Read the full article…
Bohanon: Daffodils and Civil Society
by Cecil Bohanon, Ph.D. Did you know there is an Indiana Daffodil Society? I don’t know much about daffodils except they come up after the crocuses and before the tulips and irises. Nor do I desire to acquire detailed knowledge about a flower that shows its face for 20 days a year. However, I think Read the full article…
An Open Letter to the Indianapolis Star
Dear Editor: There are those of us still around who grew up in newsrooms where the model city editor was Jack Webb playing Sam Gatlin in the 1956 film “-30-.” We are limited in what we can add to the debate over your behind-the-back campaign to reorder Hoosier views on sexual orientation and gender. Nonetheless, no Read the full article…
