Amar Patel: The next challenge for Indy: helping people advance

By many measures, Indy is winning.

Since the pandemic, our regional economy has grown faster than the nation’s. Major investments are reshaping downtown. Life sciences employment is surging. Employers are hiring. New innovation districts are emerging. Our flagship universities are expanding their Indy footprint. Momentum is building across the region. These are accomplishments worth celebrating.

For decades, civic leaders worked to make Indianapolis a city that could compete. Their efforts helped build one of the nation’s strongest sports economies, attract world-class employers, strengthen our life sciences sector, and position Indy as a leading Midwestern city.

It is no longer simply whether Indy can create opportunity. It is whether more people can access and advance through the opportunity we are creating.

In other words, our next challenge is converting growth into mobility. The distinction matters. Because despite Indy’s momentum, too many residents face long odds of moving up.

A city can grow while too many families remain stuck. New jobs can be created while pathways into those jobs remain difficult to navigate. Investment can flow into a region without necessarily changing the trajectory of the people who live there.

Growth is important. But growth is not the ultimate goal. The goal is whether more people are building prosperous, meaningful lives.

Are more families moving from poverty to stability? Are more workers gaining the skills and relationships needed to advance? Are more children growing up with access to pathways that lead toward opportunity? Are more residents building wealth and confidence about the future?

Those are the outcomes that matter most.

Through my work with families in Indianapolis, I have become increasingly convinced that our challenge is often less about effort and more about pathways. I know parents who are working hard yet remain stuck because they could not see a path from their current job to a higher-wage career.

Many families are working hard. They have ambitions. They are trying to improve. Yet progress can be elusive.

Sometimes the obstacle is a lack of information, relationships, skills, resources, or support. Sometimes it’s a setback that interrupts momentum at exactly the wrong moment.

What determines progress is whether people can navigate a sequence of opportunities over time. Opportunity is rarely experienced as a single moment or through a single system.

This observation extends beyond individual families Indianapolis is home to extraordinary employers, schools, nonprofits, healthcare systems, faith communities, philanthropies and public institutions. The challenge is not a lack of effort. Nor is it simply a lack of investment.

The challenge is whether we can become better at helping people navigate opportunity and move up. This is how we should think about government effectiveness and civic leadership.

We often debate inputs: budgets, programs, regulations and organizational structures. Those debates matter. But most citizens ask a simpler question: Is life getting better? Are people safer? Are families stronger? Are incomes rising? Are more residents moving up? Are more people flourishing?

Those are the questions that should guide us.

Indy has already demonstrated that it can grow. The next chapter is determining whether more people can grow with it. Can we become one of America’s best cities at helping people advance through pathways to opportunity? Can we build institutions that are judged not simply by activity, but by whether more people are moving upward?

That is the challenge.

And if we succeed, Indy will not simply be a growing city. It will be an opportunity city.•

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Patel is chair of The Center for Independent and Effective Government. Send comments to [email protected].

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