mayor hamilton’s Platform

A Proven Leader,
Fighting for Bloomington’s Future:

Mayor Hamilton is leading Bloomington’s city government to new levels of excellence. Together with a diverse cabinet of outstanding department heads, he is fighting for Bloomington’s future of good jobs, affordable housing, and a high quality of life for all.

Bloomington is a fantastic city in which to live. Much of what is truly special about Bloomington is what we have developed here over the past 200 years: good jobs, great neighborhoods, dozens of beautiful parks and trails, a vibrant and historic downtown, a thriving arts community, a world-class university, a safe community, our Farmers Markets, unique local businesses, and hundreds of dedicated nonprofits, among many wonderful features. The future of Bloomington depends on our ability to build on and further harness this natural energy and creativity to make our city even better, and for all people. To assure this bright future is open to everyone, Mayor Hamilton has worked proactively and creatively to address the challenges of job creation, affordable housing, and quality of life.

Much of our work will build on the progress we’ve made since 2016 in these important areas.But more remains to be done to sustain our progress, to help all of our people fulfill their potential, and to assure the next generations of Bloomingtonians find even more opportunity to thrive.

Affordable Housing

Mayor Hamilton is dedicated to making housing affordable for residents of all ages, abilities, and incomes. By collaborating with stakeholders, we’ve developed and preserved hundreds of units of new, long-term affordable housing. This unprecedented community effort--public, private, and nonprofit sectors working together--will help us reach our goal of every local family having a safe place to call home.

• With John’s leadership, over 600 bedrooms of affordable housing have been preserved or built in Bloomington, including B-Line Heights, Bloomington Cooperative Living, Urban Station, Park South, Crescent Village, and more.

• Promoting Housing-First to Fight Homelessness: As President of the Shalom Community Center Board, John helped attract $1 million in new federal funds to create Crawford Homes, an apartment complex that houses some of Bloomington’s most disadvantaged. As mayor, John continued his collaboration with Shalom to establish Crawford II and provide housing to persons experiencing chronic homelessness. John’s focus on a housing-first approach to address homelessness aligns with Shalom Center and Life Designs.

• Expanding Affordable Housing for Seniors: In 2018, Evergreen Village opened in Bloomington: the first Medicaid-accepting assisted living facility in town. This facility offers high-quality housing and care senior citizens, regardless of their income level.

• By including new housing strategies in the city’s Comprehensive Master Plan and zoning, we’ll  assure long-term progress toward housing our community’s most vulnerable populations.

Creating Jobs and Strengthening the Economy

Over past decades, like many midwestern cities, Bloomington lost a lot of traditional manufacturing jobs. Big companies like G.E., RCA/Thomson, Westinghouse, and Otis Elevator, which used to employ thousands of local workers at good pay, closed up or left. But many other local employers large and small have expanded. The creation of sustainable jobs, the shift to the new economy, and support for homegrown businesses must be priorities for Bloomington.

• Developing the Downtown Trades Park: “The Mill” has opened in the Trades Park, providing 19,000 square feet of coworking space and serving as a business incubator. This space both provides resources for local start-ups and incentivizes larger businesses to expand to Bloomington.  

• Collaborating to Establish CDFI Friendly Bloomington: This innovative approach to attract Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) from our region and beyond aims to catalyze small business growth, expand affordable housing, and support community facilities in Bloomington and our area. Financing for the CDFI totals $14 million, with $4 million in local financing leveraging $10 million in outside financing. Bloomington is the first CDFI Friendly City in the country.

• The city of Bloomington recently led by example on fair wages, establishing minimum wage of $15/hour for city employees.

• Large employers are investing in Bloomington’s future: The new Regional Academic Health Center, our community’s largest-ever single project, is a $400 million investment partnership between IU and IU Health, retaining 3,000 jobs.
  Cook Group is investing $100 million into the shuttered GE plant and creating 500 new jobs. Catalent invested $1 billion in Bloomington’s economy, retaining 750 jobs, and soon announced a $125 million expansion to add 200 more jobs.

• Smaller and mid-sized companies are growing in Bloomington as well, including Bloom, Synopsys, Hanapin Marketing, Envisage, Cornerstone, Secretly Group, PTS Electronics, and many more.

Quality of Life

• Supporting the Arts: Mayor Hamilton and Bloomington recently won the 2019 National Award for Local Arts Leadership for cities under 100,000 people. John and his team have doubled arts grants, sponsored new murals all over town, and support new festivals and events like downtown fireworks, the Bicentennial Street Fair, and the Black y Brown Arts Festival

• Ensuring Accessibility for All: John’s administration has overseen the installation of over 400 ADA-compliant accessibility ramps in Bloomington.

• Support for Public Education: A former school board member, John has been an avid supporter of public education, actively promoting two successful funding referendums and visiting many classrooms to connect kids and government. In 2018 The City of Bloomington for the first time ever committed $100,000 of general fund revenue to support pre-K childhood education for families and providers needing support (based on a recommendation from the Wage Growth Task Force). The allocations included the Compass Early Learning Center and the Community Foundation of Bloomington and Monroe County.

• Working together, the Parks and Recreation Department and Centerstone have established a groundbreaking summer jobs program helping hard-to-employ persons gain experience and find new jobs, as they take on public works projects.

• Public safety undergirds all quality of life, and the police and fire departments have risen to new levels of excellence: BPD earned its first ever national accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) and BFD has reduced medical emergency response times by 35%, improved its national safety rating, and tripled its professional training hours.

• Expanding Green Infrastructure: During John’s tenure, Bloomington has broken ground on the new Switchyard Park, the most ambitious public park project in our history, which will include 62 acres of a major amphitheater, a splash pad, a dog park, a skate park, public gardens, daylighted streams, ball fields, an indoor/outdoor pavillion, new trails, and more. Resident input informed what to include in the park, so it’s truly a place for everyone. In 2018, Bloomington parks received the Best in the Nation Award, and we have been a Tree City USA for 34 years running.
  

• Enacting Environmental Sustainability: Using his experience leading the Indiana Department of Environmental Management and the Bloomington Sustainability Commission, Mayor Hamilton has worked to ensure that Bloomington is a more sustainable city by installing over 4,500 solar panels across 30 city buildings, measuring and disclosing energy use of major buildings, and supporting greater innovation and use of alternative energy sources. John has helped expand Bloomington’s bike trails, improve our parks, and protect our green space and biodiversity. Bloomington has also collaborated with The Solar Indiana Renewable Energy Network (SIREN) to provide incentives and resources to residents who wish to add solar panels to their homes.

Promoting Democratic Engagement and Government Transparency

As mayor, John has empowered community members to have a detailed understanding of city activities and a stronger voice in the budget and other processes of their government. Tracking data and making that information publicly available can transform city work, through giving the public detailed performance measurements, holding the city accountable for its improvements and shortfalls, and empowering wider public input into a range of city actions.  Mayor Hamilton has demonstrated a commitment to transparency that gives the public access to the city, online and in person.

• Opening the Doors to City Hall: John holds weekly open office appointments to meet with any city resident in his office at City Hall. He has also established the “Mayor at the Market” program, where John and department heads are regularly available to meet people and answer questions.

• Making Budgeting More Transparent with Activity-Based Budgeting: Bloomington has recently switched to activity-based budgeting, which means we outline and organize the entire budget around key activities rather than budget activities. For example, you'll hear what the city proposes to invest in fire prevention, or housing inspection, or arts promotion, or police patrols, as well as the affiliated total investment costs. And you’ll see the outcomes expected from each investment. This activity-based budgeting is central to helping all of us identify the real investments and choices we make in the budget and is far more transparent because it aligns funding with activities and outcomes.

• Establishing a City-Wide Survey: City government works for our residents, so finding out what our opinions are is important to align services and meet unmet needs. In 2017, John issued the first ever city-wide scientific survey better to understand what residents like, dislike, or want from their city government. The first survey established a baseline of views and opinions. The survey will be repeated every two years to identify trends and highlight opportunities and needs.

• Improving Online Accessibility: The Bloomington City website was named one of the Nation’s Top Ten for Digital Government in 2018. The B-Clear feature makes over 150 public data sets available and easy to access, increasing accessibility and transparency in our local government.