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Mayor addresses needs for police, roads, ‘digital city hall’

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett delivered his state of the city address on Monday.

He broke down his proposals to tackle some of the city’s biggest challenges and touted his administration’s accomplishments so far.

Hogsett covered a variety of issues but focused on three: improving public safety, strengthening infrastructure and making local government more accessible to the public.

Public safety was a priority for many in the audience, as 2017 was a record-breaking year for homicides, with 2018 on pace to beat that record.

“Beginning this very evening, Indianapolis will be able to, for the first time in a decade, fully utilize community-based beat policing,” said Hogsett.

Hogsett attributes a rise in violent crime, in part, to the department abandoning beat-based policing six years ago.

Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department’s chief says officers will go back to that model and be assigned to one of 78 beats throughout the city.

“One of the things that we lack is that engagement and that officer knowledge of everyone on that beat and in that geographical area,” said Chief Bryan Roach with IMPD.

Hogsett also talked about fixing Indianapolis’ crumbling roads.

“The era of ignoring our roads and streets is over,” said Hogsett.

He announced a multiyear plan to buy new equipment and add staff to a new street maintenance division.

“What frustrates people is that we will do a major project, and then we don’t take care of it,” said Dan Parker, director of Indianapolis Department of Public Works.

Parker said this new division will allow the city to use new equipment to maintain roads. It would also employ people whose sole responsibility is road maintenance.

Hogsett also touched on the outdated City-County Building downtown and the creation of a new website that would make local government more accessible to residents.

“This will quite literally serve as Indianapolis’ digital city hall, enabling residents to have access to city services on phones,” said Hogsett.

State Sen. Jim Merritt represents Indianapolis and said, overall, he was impressed with the mayor’s address, but there was one topic he would have liked to hear more about from Hogsett: “Regional cities, regionalism. Central Indiana has to work together in finding solutions, and I think that is a key that we haven’t hit on tonight.”