UIndy unveils mayoral initiative
The University of Indianapolis is hosting an event on March 11 to unveil its newly announced Institute for Civic Leadership and Mayoral Archives. The event will feature the four most recent mayors of Indianapolis – U.S. Sen. Richard G. Lugar, William H. Hudnut, Stephen Goldsmith and Bart Peterson, in addition to current mayor Greg Ballard.
The materials in the mayoral archive are currently held in the University Archives, but a specific area in the library for the documents is currently in the works.
The event, entitled “Five Mayors: An Evening of Insight and Vision,” is free and will feature a discussion and question-and-answer forum based on questions from the public. The primary topic of discussion will be how Indianapolis can continue to build upon its past while still moving forward.
The event will be moderated by a panel of The Indianapolis Star journalists. While open to the public, seating is limited, and tickets must be reserved through the Chamber of Commerce website.
“We feel very fortunate to have had good relationships with the mayors whose papers we have,” said Deborah Balogh, provost and vice president of academic affairs.
Lugar, Hudnut and Goldsmith are all former members of the UIndy Board of Trustees, and Peterson is a current member.
Balogh was part of the planning committee for the institute housing the materials.
“We worked for several months to conceptualize the center and what its service to the campus and communities will be,” Balogh said.
The new institute will help to jump-start renovations on the library.
“There is a broader, long-term plan to modernize the library, bring it into the digital age and make it the sort of place where people can work together and have access to digital resources in the 21st century,” said Scott Hall, assistant director of university communications.
The collection includes a wide variety of documents which reflect a time of expansions in the city’s history. Personal correspondence, photographs, meeting minutes, microfilm, invitations to various events and other official documents will be included in the archive.
Highlighted documents include notes on race relations, public opinion polls of the mayor in question, budget reports and notes concerning projects in the city of Indianapolis.
“These papers cover a period of time where Indianapolis went from being a sleepy Midwestern town to being a major American city and a model to other cities on how to revitalize downtown and how to strengthen your community,” Hall said.
The archive was conceived as a continuously growing and evolving collection of historical papers that reflect the changing nature of Indianapolis. Documents that show the development of the city will be constantly added to the archive, which will be digitized to assist those who wish to research civic development.
“There had been some discussions for some time about how can we capitalize on these documents and materials we have,” Hall said. “We decided to make it available to our own students and to anyone nationwide who wants to study the progress in Indianapolis and go back and look at the historical source materials of how these changes were made in the city.”
The collection helps tie UIndy to its namesake.
“It’s another way to connect us to our home city in ways that set us apart from other universities,” Balogh said.
The university hopes that the event will serve as a public introduction to the initiative, in addition to raising awareness of the planned library renovations.
