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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowThanks to Lesley Weidenbener for writing about my friend Tim Harmon [“Lesley Weidenbener: RIP to reader unafraid to give me a little hell,” July 4].
For those of you fortunate to know Tim, I hope you will agree with me that Lesley captured “Tim’s force.” A force that over many decades impacted the near-east side. From the Near Eastside Community Organization to the John Boner Neighborhood Centers, Tim Harmon was present. Whether you agreed with him or not, Tim made you think and evaluate what you were doing or saying from the local perspective.
Tim was one of the early supporters of the idea our state Legislature now calls “Employment Social Enterprise.” One of our early ESE ideas for wage-paying work for people coming home from prison was Deconstruction Force. The idea was modeled on the Chicago-based Delta Institute. Delta was a new idea for Indianapolis in the mid-2000s, and we were fortunate to get a chance to deconstruct a house in the King Park neighborhood to test that idea. As we developed our plans, Tim was there with “salvage counsel.”
As the project was taking shape, Tim felt the workers on the Deconstruction Force team underappreciated salvage value. Tim and the architect on the project, Terry Bradbury, decided to take our workers to an antique store to better understand the value of salvage.
When my workers got back and I asked them what they had learned, one worker commented “you could buy that stuff at Home Depot and spend way less.” We did salvage some wood and built a table from the house, but that project and that worker’s comment helped RecycleForce realize that the Indy housing stock and where we were in the mid 2000s could not support demolition programs that were the rage in Chicago. Instead RecycleForce focused on electronic recycling, and Tim Harmon was key to my ESE’s success—although I can hear Tim from the great beyond in his nasal voice saying “Gregg, that is not at all what I said.”
Tim Harmon was one of Indianapolis’ good guys. Rest in peace, Tim, and thank you Lesley and IBJ for writing about Tim and our local community.
Gregg Keesling, RecycleForce president
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