(INDIANAPOLIS) – 26 Indianapolis neighborhoods are splitting $220,000 in grant money for new community spaces.
The money from last year’s federal pandemic relief bill will pay for a food box program in the Mapleton-Fall Creek neighborhood, but most of the grants focus on beautification projects, from new signs and playgrounds, to public art projects in Speedway and the Ransom Place neighborhood, to a trash bin upgrade in MLK Park.
The South Village Neighborhood Association will be planting a native garden along Pleasant Run, creating a new neighborhood gathering space while seeking to restore plants like butterfly weed and coneflower. President Laura Piercefield says those plants are at risk of being pushed out by nonnative species like the bush honeysuckle, whose rapid leafy growth can deny sunlight to other plants.
The average grant is about $8,400. Ari Beedie with the Indianapolis Neighborhood Resource Center says that’s still enough to give projects a significant push forward.
The city will start taking applications for the next round in October.
