2018 Award Winners
Use the link above to watch the 2018 award video, or browse the winner list and project descriptions below.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Comprehensive Plan: City of Fishers - Fishers 2040 Comprehensive Plan
Fishers, Indiana has a population that is currently estimated around 90,000 citizens and is anticipating a similar pace of growth into the future. In 2015, after a referendum made Fishers a second-class city, the Fishers 2040 Comprehensive Plan was commissioned by its first mayor, Scott Fadness, and was adopted in 2016. From a town of 7,000 citizens in 1990 to its current size in less than three decades, the need for a new vision was critical to sustaining and enhancing the quality of life that its citizens enjoy. The plan is rooted in the simple concept that the “City of Fishers is a smart, vibrant, and entrepreneurial city that provides an exceptional quality of life and fosters a culture of innovation and resiliency”.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Comprehensive Plan: City of Brazil - Brazil Comprehensive Plan
The Brazil Comprehensive Plan transforms identified community challenges into opportunities for the city’s residents, visitors and businesses. Core strategies of the plan include a mixed-use development that link the east and west corridor of downtown while creating a signature gathering space, linkages to the National Heritage Road Trail, and a business incubator and Maker Space. While Brazil has big ideas for the future, this plan is broken down and organized into actionable steps. This plan not only outlines a unique and bold vision, but prepares the community with the tools necessary to achieve their vision.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Economic Development Plan: Town of Fortville - Broadway Fortville TIF District Master Plan
The Town of Fortville needed a master plan for the newly established Broadway Consolidated TIF District—an area along the length of Broadway Street/US 36 where the focal point of the redevelopment efforts will include the intersection with Main Street. The master plan creates an identity and sense of place for the community by providing guidance on transportation enhancements and bicycle and pedestrian facilities that are complementary of previous land use recommendations, redevelopment strategies, and development guidelines made for the area. It contains both short term and long-term recommendations for multimodal transportation solutions that over time will aid in the transformation of the Broadway TIF District into a denser, active, pedestrian-oriented environment.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Urban Design: City of Lebanon - Lebanon Downtown Action Plan
Lebanon’s Downtown Action Plan identifies targeted civic investments to support downtown merchant success, augment Main Street events, and provide requisite incentives to prompt a private real estate investment response in downtown.
The Classical Revival Boone County Courthouse and surrounding historic fabric offers a foundation for place-making civic investments to fuel this new downtown renaissance. This Action Plan provides for an urban trail and embellished architectural gems for all to enjoy. Given the stature and prominence of the Boone County Courthouse and grounds, collaboration between the City of Lebanon and Boone County is crucial to the success of this Action Plan. Courthouse Square, when combined with Lebanon’s unique collection of privately held historic buildings, will serve as the foundation for a successful implementation of this Downtown Action Plan.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Urban Design: City of Shelbyville - Shelbyville Downtown Opportunities Plan
The Shelbyville Downtown Opportunities Plan is a comprehensive planning effort intended to improve the quality of life and competitive advantage by identifying opportunities within the community’s downtown and historic Public Square. The Public Square has been a continuous challenge for City leaders in terms of traffic safety and attempting to reclaim what currently acts a parking lot in the city’s historic urban center. After extensive public engagement, research, and analysis, an innovative approach resulted out of the plan’s focus on capitalizing upon the strong relationship between both the public and private realms. The plan’s primary goals include expanding public gathering places, supporting multi-modal transportation, promoting private development, preserving historic architecture, and strengthening the community’s brand. Upon completion, the community has experienced a renewed focus on creating sense of place, an increase in private development, and a revival in the public’s vision to reclaim Downtown Shelbyville as a vibrant urban center.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Transportation Plan: City of Shelbyville - Shelbyville Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan
The Shelbyville Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan is one of the many efforts taken on by the community to reimagine Shelbyville as a vibrant multi-modal city. By utilizing data-driven mapping techniques and a variety of community engagement efforts, the Shelbyville Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan became a plan that truly represented the community members’ vision for the future of alternative transportation in Shelbyville. Since the plan’s completion, the alternative transportation network in the community has nearly doubled in size, with plans to continue expanding at this rate. Aside from physical improvements, the plan is also responsible for the more recent bicycle education and advocacy efforts in the community. Due to the inclusive and comprehensive nature of this plan, Shelbyville has seen a change in the way people view alternative transportation; this change will result in continued investment into the alternative transportation network for generations to come.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Implementation: City of Union City - Union City Artist Alliance
The City of Union City is charging forward into new territory by focusing on arts and culture and cultivating a community that supports the creative exploration of skill, craft, and art as a career. A key component of this effort is the innovative Union City Artist Alliance, a pilot program designed to bring artists to the greater Union City Indiana-Ohio community, specifically to design, implement, and complete projects during a one-year residency. At the same time, the program will increase placemaking and quality of life in Union City while also providing creative housing solutions for artists. Residency artists will contribute their time and talent to projects that will benefit Union City and its mission to encourage the arts. The alliance expands beyond housing and focuses on supporting artists by formalizing and utilizing the local artist community as mentors, for professional development, to provide resources, and to endorse creative projects.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Implementation: City of South Bend - West Side Main Streets Initiative
The West Side Main Streets Initiative is a series of visionary, yet pragmatic physical, programmatic, and policy changes that have revitalized Lincolnway West and Western Avenue, two of South Bend’s historic major streets. Once the thriving main streets of the city’s west side working-class neighborhoods, these streets have experienced extensive decline and disinvestment. Yet, they retain much of their historic fabric, support entrepreneurism, and are the center of the
region’s African American and Latino communities. With strategies originating from the West Side Main Streets Plan completed in late 2014 and the engagement of diverse populations, the West Side Main Streets Initiative has employed streetscape improvements, road diets, bus shelters, matching grants, property acquisition, zoning revisions, marketing, and special events to reestablish vibrant, walkable places.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Grassroots Initiative: Bluffton NOW! - Youth Engagement Program
Bluffton NOW!, an Indiana Main Street organization, in collaboration with the Bluffton Harrison Metropolitan School District and the Wells County Foundation have created a grassroots effort to get our high school age youth directly engaged in downtown revitalization. Over the last three years members of Bluffton NOW! have helped lead a marketing class to come up with ways to improve the downtown and make it more meaningful to their generation. The students have performed surveys of their student body, participated in downtown cleanup and decoration efforts, created banners to help advertise for Bluffton NOW!, created a business expansion model for a downtown business, filmed videos supporting Bluffton NOW!’s fundraising efforts, created first Friday event ideas, toured other downtowns to gain perspective on what is possible, and provided important feedback on ideas that Bluffton NOW! has. This collaboration has energized the youth of Bluffton and brought a greater meaning towards downtown revitalization.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Outreach and Communication: Vibrant Communities Steering Committee Elkhart County - Vibrant Communities of Elkhart County initiative
The Vibrant Communities initiative of Elkhart County is a demonstration of the effectiveness of a citizen-led engagement process. The legacy of this process is a strongly bound network of civic partners who feel a shared obligation to implement the plan they helped create. This infrastructure was created through a robust outreach and engagement campaign where participants – in record numbers and from all walks of life – were encouraged to think deeply and creatively about the future of their community. The implementers executing the plan, from the private, public, and non-profit sectors, can be reassured that the 77 projects, policies, and programs lifted through the process represent the collective voice of all residents of the county. The scale of engagement effort, diverse representation, and success of the plan thus far indicate the Steering Committee achieved their goal for the process, to give anyone the choice to participate.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Outreach and Communication: City of Indianapolis - People’s Planning Academy
The People’s Planning Academy is a public education program developed by the City of Indianapolis in partnership with the Indianapolis Neighborhood Resource Center. Born out of the need to expand and diversify community voices during planning processes, People’s Planning Academy classes focused on how planning can address the four key values from the vision element of the City’s Comprehensive Plan: making Indy healthier, more inclusive, more competitive, and more resilient. A workbook, guest speakers, and activities provided participants with knowledge of planning fundamentals as well as training in the city’s new land use planning system. The free program offered childcare, was televised on government tv, and continues to enroll residents through online recordings. Graduates of the Academy are invited into the City’s first opt-in stakeholder committee for development of the countywide Land Use Plan. A planning Ambassador program will continue to invest in and support this new group of resident planners.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Student Project: Ball State University Neighborhood Analysis Studio - Anthony Neighborhood Action Plan
Ball State’s Neighborhood Analysis Studio worked with Muncie’s Anthony Neighborhood to develop a neighborhood action plan. Students worked closely with community members to assess community needs and create initiatives that residents desired, and researched innovative planning strategies to address challenges in Anthony. The studio gathered data in the field to inventory community assets and determine opportunities and weaknesses. The class met with community members regularly at neighborhood meetings, and designed creative graphics to help residents visualize potential improvements in their community. The information in this plan was assembled in a booklet and website for Anthony residents to use, which contained tools and framework for implementation of initiatives, such as funding sources, contacts for helpful community leaders, and step-by-step implementation guides.
Honorable Mention Outstanding Best Practice: City of Columbus-Bartholomew County - City of Columbus Neighborhood Commercial Access and Design Study
The City of Columbus Neighborhood Commercial Access and Design Study explores the benefits of neighborhood-serving commercial centers and how these walkable, integrated commercial areas can be provided to Columbus residents while minimizing the disadvantages often associated with living near commercial areas. Specifically, the study (1) examines the extent to which Columbus residents have convenient, nearby access to commercial goods and services; (2) considers where a need for neighborhood serving uses may arise in the future; and (3) recommends how neighborhood commercial centers, if and when they’re proposed in the future, should be designed so that they are compatible with surrounding residential areas. The Study includes a series of recommended Zoning Ordinance amendments and design guidelines that will influence the development of future neighborhood commercial centers in Columbus.
Hoosier Planning Award Outstanding Best Practice: City of Indianapolis - Lift Indy
Lift Indy is a comprehensive community development program which promotes equitable neighborhood revitalization through affordable housing, economic development, and placemaking. Each year, the City of Indianapolis selects one strategic, focused area with market potential and makes a multi-year commitment of HOME Investment Partnerships Program and CDBG funding to achieve goals of the neighborhood’s plan. The City of Indianapolis created the Lift Indy program in 2017 in response to decreasing community development funding, which had become spread too thinly to be truly transformative. The program uses data to select eligible areas, and community teams submit program proposals for those areas. Monon16 was selected as the Lift Indy area for the inaugural year of the program. The City of Indianapolis Department of Metropolitan Development and a team of community partners selected from nine proposals to award Monon16 with an estimated $4.5 million in funding over the next three years.
Mike Carroll Hoosier Planning Award - Pete Fritz
Pete Fritz has done more to promote healthy living than any other planner in our state. Through his work as Healthy Communities Planner at the Indianan State Department of Health, Pete has been on the forefront of introducing this important topic to Hoosiers. His expertise is recognized nationally by both Health and Planning professionals. He was instrumental in gaining the APA Indiana Chapter’s healthy community grants, as author of the applications. The CDC asked Pete to co-author a paper on our State’s efforts to use workshops to promote active living. He was also named a Health Fellow by the Urban Land Institute last year. Pete does volunteer active living advocacy work, including serving as past-chair of the Mayor’s Bike Council, commuter chair for the Central Indiana Bicycle Association and many other efforts. Pete is an inspirational facilitator and a role model for both individuals and communities.
Hoosier Planning Sagamore Award - Pamela Holocher
Pam Holocher’s career in planning spans more than 40 years. During that time, she has held a variety of positions at the City of Fort Wayne, all of them in community development with an emphasis in urban planning. During this time, Pam has applied solid community planning theory and technique to a variety of issues facing Fort Wayne and many Indiana communities. Her expertise includes fiscal planning and policy, transportation, downtown redevelopment, and comprehensive planning. Pam is truly a servant leader and continually works to ensure the professional growth and development of the 10 planners under her direction. She is well-respected and well-known within City government and the community as a tireless defender of the importance of community-based planning and its role in the positive growth and development of the City of Fort Wayne.