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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowGov. Mike Braun’s administration confirmed this week that it has scrapped plans for an expansion of White River State Park across Washington Street to the part of the former GM stamping plant site that sits along the river.
That is disappointing — not just to the IBJ editorial board but apparently to city officials, neighborhood residents and executives at Elanco Animal Health, which moved its headquarters to adjacent property. The decision should be disappointing to everyone in Indianapolis.
IBJ first reported in September that the state was demolishing a historic crane bay structure that had been envisioned as part of the state park expansion. At that time, state officials said the choice to eliminate the steel structure had been part of an agreement between Elanco and the state.
State officials said then they had put on hold some other plans for the park expansion, in part because lawmakers chose not to include $15 million for the project in the state budget approved last year. Braun had stripped the funding from his budget request, citing a revenue forecast that projected slowing tax receipts.
Then, the White River State Park Commission was forced to return a $30 million grant it had received from Lilly Endowment that was meant for refurbishing the crane bay into a state park asset.
At the time, state officials told IBJ the Indiana Economic Development Corp. had committed $20 million for the riverside portion of the expansion, which they said was then under construction.
But on Monday, nonprofit news outlet Mirror Indy reported that the state has now abandoned the plans developed during Gov. Eric Holcomb’s administration for green space on the stamping plant site.
The park commission told the news outlet that, “upon review, it was determined that available funding was insufficient to complete the project without reducing the scope so significantly that it would no longer meet the original objectives.”
Colleen Dekker, a spokeswoman for Elanco, said the company was disappointed in the news — and it should be (though it probably should have seen the move coming after the state was willing to give up the crane bay structure when previous administrations had tried to save it).
Dekker said in a statement that the riverfront is “a significant community asset that has been underutilized for far too long.” We couldn’t agree more — and this project was supposed to start changing that.
This should all matter to Elanco, which is leading an effort to turn the rest of the stamping plant site into the OneHealth District, a sort of hub for life and animal sciences innovation and companies. An expanded White River State Park was part of the vision — and promise — for the site.
Officials from Elanco, the city and the state say they remain interested in exploring uses for the riverfront. But we fear a number of decisions — including this latest move by the state, last fall’s demolition of the crane bay and the city’s decision not to allow development at the former Diamond Chain property just across the river — make that unlikely.•
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