The birthplace of recorded jazz was at that little Janette studio. Wow. Incredible. We became known as the home of recorded jazz. A little bit of the stickiness of communities isn't necessarily just your career. It's also having beautiful people around you.
There are three Egyptian mummies in the state of Indiana. One's in Indianapolis and two are in Richmond. Why were you driven enough to be like, "Hey, I want to put my name in the hat to become the mayor of Richmond, Indiana." From South Bend to Evansville and everywhere in between, this is Get In, the show focused on the Who's Your State and the incredible stories happening here today. I'm Nate Spangle, founder of Get Indiana, and I will be your host for today's conversation. This is our special mayor's megaphone series that we're doing in partnership with Make My Move, the platform where communities attract new residents with cash incentives, networking, and local perks.
We're sitting down with mayors across the state to get their pitch about what makes their community a great place to live and why you should think about moving there. My guest today is Ron Oler and he is the mayor of Richmond, Indiana. Now, he has a PhD in leadership and administration and he actually holds four degrees all from Indiana institutions. We're going to dive into all the fun stuff happening in Richmond, Indiana. Um, as the mayor, he brings a datadriven people first approach to city leadership focused on making Richmond a place where families, businesses, and communities can thrive. This is a historic Indiana city.
I'm really excited to dive into a little bit of the history and a little bit of what's coming next for Richmond. Mayor Oler, welcome to the show. Yeah, thank you, Nate. Glad to be here today. I'm glad to be here today in Richmond. Um, thanks to our friends at Make My Move.
We're doing our mayor's megaphone series and we got to come out on I7 and learn all about the city of Richmond. Uh, I mean, one, we talked about it a little bit before. You are a statistician and a little bit of a historian. You retain information very well. One thing that I'm curious about that I've done in my research is learned that Richmond is a very very historic place and your family. I mean, you talk about your, you know, there are roads named after your ancestors in Wayne County.
My forefathers, there's two county roads named after my forefathers, Clyde and Wesley. So, ers have been in this part of the state since before Wayne County was a county. Wow. Since the 1700s. Uh, when was the founding of Richmond? 1840 was the first mayor.
1840 was the first mayor of the charter, but the first mayor, John Sailor, was 1840. And right behind our location right now is Sailor Street. And right next to Sailor Street was the historic National Road that crossed America. You know, the wagons across America back in the founding of the western Midwest. Wow. So, it's runs right through the heart of Richmond and runs right through the heart of Indianapolis, right through central Indiana.
So, Highway 40 is the historic national road. So, Richmond's been here a very long time. Yeah. And when you think about the history and the legacy that is Richmond, what has Richmond always been known for? Like you talk about things like I mean the Wright brothers spending time here. You talk about I mean just all the industry locomotion like there's a lot of things that Richmond has been known for.
What are a few of those pillars? A lot of industry but also mixed in with the arts. Richmond has a long arts history. The Richmond Art Museum at the at the high school is I think the only heart art museum of its kind and its size is housed in a high school. the original Meguire Hall and then Richmond Symphony Orchestra will soon be celebrating its 70th year and Indiana it's the second oldest continual orchestra but besides that the history of art is the industry here so along this national road automobiles came through and were automobiles were manufactured here farm equipment was manufactured here um some airplanes were manufactured here for a little bit of time but a lot of industry um heavy automotive a lot of manufacturing still today a lot of manufacturing a lot of plastic plastics, caskets, automotive, and biotechnology. We're starting to get more more life sciences, biotech, and then even especially pet food.
So, about a block from City Hall, you'll find Parina Mills making animal food, probably a hundred years. About a half a mile away, you'll find Hills Science Diet making cat food and dog hair. Been here about 26 years. And then a little bit further west, we now have Blue Buffalo making cat food and dog food here. So, we become the the pet food manufacturer of Indiana. The kind of the capital of that.
Hey, I mean your your pets are going to love Richmond, Indiana. Like, they need to say thank you. Give a dog a bone. Come on. And then baking companies here. So, there's not a day you don't walk out in the city and go, "Oh, they're making cookies today.
Oh, they're making monkey chow a day. Oh, they're making cat food today." You can you can smell it just between Richmond Baking and which is a few blocks from the Pina Mills. So, you get different smells at different times. Wow. There we go.
Okay, one thing you talk about the arts and you talk about industry and what isn't Guanette Records and then there was also like a piano company or something like like music and industry actually collaborated a ton in Richmond. So because of all the manufacturing that was here in the late 17 late 1800s early 1900s along National Road historic National Road 40 we see all these millionaire homes. So there was more millionaires per capita in Richmond during that time than any other city in Indiana because of all the industry and everything was manufactured here. So back then before radio was invented, people who had money had pianos in their homes and that's how you entertain yourself in evenings and weekends. So the Star Piano Company grew up here. We're going to see that in a little while.
So the Star Piano Company grew up in the gorge making hundreds of pianos shipped all over the world, mostly around the Midwest. when the family brought in this new guy Henry Janette to be the new president and kind of run the company, he had this idea about recording stuff. So across from where the pianos were made, he made a recording studio and he started recording things. Richmond was also and still is on part of the the railway system across the country. So you may see the historic Pennsylvania railroad depot sometime in this video, which I hope you do. So there was a time when musicians will be traveling.
So, we're looking at the early 1900s looking at musicians traveling from Chicago to New Orleans and they had no choice. The train stopped in Richmond and they had to go to a hotel and sleep overnight because it didn't run through the night. And Henry Janette being the entrepreneur he is put up posters and says, "Hey, come on down to my studio and record." So the next thing you know, the big spider decks of the world, the Hoi Carmichaels, the Louiswis Armstrongs, everybody who was anybody in the early 1900s recorded here as they were traveling through, they really didn't have a choice but to be stuck overnight in Richmond and why not go record something. Yeah. And then Hogi Carmichael recorded Stardust here.
So he was he was recording in Indianapolis. Actually, he had a a gig in Indianapolis and it ended late one night and he introduced this new song and everybody thought it was great. So he called his friend uh Henry Janette and said, "Hey, I want to record this." So come on over. So they recorded Stardust here. The most no way most most historic most important Hogi Carmichael song was recorded here cuz he just he played it live and said I like this and we should do this.
Wow. And now all that all those records all the the old records shellac records I was on the Staret board. We digitized a lot of them and then we turned them all over to the Indiana School of Music archives at IU Bloomington Jacob School of Music. So they house all that stuff now. So you can go online and you can hear things digitally. online that was recorded here in analog back in the day.
Wow. And they influenced everybody. So if you go to the Historic Depot district and you go into the the Firehouse Barbecue and Blues Club that has live blues and jazz on the weekends, you'll see all this stuff on the wall, you know, you you'll see how Bob Dylan was influenced. You'll see how Eric Eric Clapton was influenced by people who originally recorded here, the artists in the early 1900s, the guitar players especially. So Richmond became known. So, one of the genres that we picked up were not the the home of recorded blues.
We became known as the home of recorded jazz. So, the birthplace of recorded jazz was at that little Janette studio, which is a building he threw together while they were making pianos and said, "Let's record some stuff." Wow. Incredible. Yes. I mean, I had always known that there was a ton of history when it came to Richmond.
Another piece of history that I like uncovered was Richmond's strong influence and presence in the Underground Railroad like around the time of Civil War. Definitely the C. So the other road that crisscrosses or I should say cuts right through our city is highway 27. So from Florida to Canada. So the underground railroad from Cincinnati came through Richmond. And our early heritage was Quaker.
Yeah. Levi and Katherine Coffin House was a major stop on the Underground Railroad just north of Richmond. There was stuff in Richmond too that probably wasn't documented as well. So we were all all part of that freedom cuz did Erland start as a Quaker institution? Started as a Quaker institution. So this was a place 1846 is when they started I believe.
And this was a place of as I did my research like a place of peace, right? You have like the friends and the whole nine yards. And I I feel like every civil war tour you go on, you know, all around the country, especially like in the north, they're like, "This was the Grand Central Station of the Underground Railroad and this was the Grand Central." But the Levi Coffin, Levi and Katherine Coffin House is like widely regarded as the Grand Central Station from like multiple accounts. Because if you were walking across country and you stopped into Cincinnati, which has the the museum and everything, you made a your next day trip was you stopped at Fountain City just north of Richmond. Yeah.
Cuz that's about the far as you could walk in at a given day. Wow. Incredible. Well, Richmond doesn't only have a storied past, they have a lot of positive momentum happening today in 2026. And I'd love to dive into a big uh a big piece of that, which is the real estate development and the housing that's happening. Uh and there were like I would say the the energy that's come to downtown Richmond.
Talk catch us up on on a few of the big projects you and the team and the entire city of Richmond have been working on the past few years. 100%. It probably started in the 1940s, this revitalization and bringing industry. So the United States Air Force during World War II built a new airport south of Richmond to train pilots cuz they were out of space at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. And when it was over, they gifted it to the city. And that started some other things happening around the same time of different manufacturing and different jobs.
So the the jobs that the the the residential count the the demographics of Richmond peaked in the 1960s and then some housing subdivisions were built out in the county. But one of the things we've done since then too is also we've added an industrial park. So the reason I brought up the airport is because where it used to be became our first industrial park on the east side of town. And there's some historic businesses still today. There's a third generation machining manufacturing company still day that made space shuttle parts back in the day. they were made here.
So, since then though, we picked up other land on the west side of town, the industrial park. So, we've been able to bring in Abbott Foods is over there. I've already mentioned Blue Buffalo. Um, Ankor Ingredients, Liberation Biosciences, the Parina Mills, built there, the Life Sciences Lab here in Richmond. This is interesting when you think about attracting new businesses, attracting new residents, like it is this like balance like So, that's the thing. We got all these new businesses coming.
And so in the last decade or so, we've had some really good success bringing some new businesses. The governor's been here many times. One of the things we were short on was quality housing. We have a lot of people commuting to work here. So when I first became mayor, one of my first things, this this is my third year as mayor. We got to work on this housing issue.
We were looking at all these reports and studies saying that there's 12,000 people working in Richmond and Wayne County that don't work live here. And then another report says, well, 8,000 of those commuting a day, some as far as Indianapolis. We have a large regional hospital here. We have five colleges, universities. We have several businesses who are headquartered here. So, we're getting a lot of executives and even emerging professionals working at these facilities, but we had a quality housing shortage.
So, with with partnership with Erlam College and Lily Endowment, we're able to secure a $25 million grant in 2023 for revitalized Richmond. There's like a bunch of C's like the college community something something. Community Yeah. Community college collaboration, I think it is. Yes, I was going to say it's like the three C's. Revitalize Richmond.
Yes. So, we're the the private or the donation is matched with private investment. So, we're looking at over $100 million investment downtown and that is a lot of that's housing and some of it's retail. But we didn't stop there. You know, I kind of thought we would, but I knew we had these other areas of town that needed help also. So, in the historic Star District, which you'll drive through to get to the depot, we're starting up a land bank that's capturing some blighted older historic homes that are on the cusp of either being lost to eternity or being saved.
So, we're setting up a land bank capturing these properties and cleaning them, white boxing them, and sell them to owner occupied, getting them out of um either either blighted or vacant or some landlords that are retiring. And then just on the south side of downtown veil or stars on the north side just on the southside veil about a decade and a half ago through the blight elimination project we demolished 200 homes and we're able to build some homes. Now we were partnering with intend Indiana and home matters we're in the process of building 22 brand new homes in that neighborhood which is right around a school for moderate low to moderate income families just to revitalize that whole neighborhood. Yeah. And you'll be able to buy a brand new home for almost half the price you would otherwise. Wow.
But that's not enough. So on the southeast side of town, we're starting a whole new housing development with single family homes. So we haven't started a housing development like that in 22 years in Richmond. And we're also funding between the city and the county and our economic development corporation. We're funding the completion of four different subdivisions in the city and the county with 82 homes with a grant to developers. You know, an example is there's one in Richmond that had like 15 lots left over, but they really needed an influx of money to get the water lines there.
So, this grant will help them get the water lines there and keep the homes in the affordable price range. They're going to finish that out. So, there's 82 homes like that around the county being done. So, we we becoming we realized early on that we're going to succeed when we get the people working here to live here. Yeah. And you have people coming in and getting exposed to the city.
You know, if you have 12,000, 8,000, 12,000 people commuting in, they know it's getting the quality housing that matches their lifestyle, all those things. What I the safety the apartments we're building right here downtown, the old Elder Bman site will be highly secure. So, especially single persons, emerging professionals feel safe because they have to have an access card and there's all kinds of security and all the amenities are indoors and Yeah. Well, you talk about emerging professionals, you talk about, you know, know that side of things, but what makes Richmond a great place to raise a family? Uh, all the schools, all the amenities. So, we are, we are home, our regional hospital serves six counties in Indiana and two in Ohio.
And those same eight counties, couple hundred thousand people, like 250,000 people come to Richmond already for retail, for for shopping, for medical care, for their attorneys, for their tax accountants, for the restaurants. We have some really fine restaurants, too. So, we already have a lot of people visiting Richmond. So, the next thing we're doing is reinvesting in our park system. You're going to see some of the parks. We actually started a few years ago with a stellar grant from the state and took half a parking lot over here downtown and made a plaza that's become the most program park in the city.
It's it's small, but it's unique. It has a stage, a performance pad, has a splash pad, some really nice facilities. So, concert venue and also the home to the farmers market. And coming in a few couple weeks, food truck Wednesday. Oh. So, we have food trucks that will come out downtown where we're at right now in kind of government square.
There's there's four city blocks here with government buildings. So, I'm looking out one window at the Social Security office. I'm looking at the post office. We're in city hall, the county jail and sheriff's office over there, the county courthouse, the county annex, the county health department, blah blah blah blah, DCS, FSSA. There's 800 government employees working right in this area. Wow.
So, bringing Food Truck Wednesday is huge because they have a captive audience. But there's also three restaurants downtown. So we're getting more restaurants downtown again as people are coming out past CO. We're far enough past CO that people are walking downtown, walking places. Yeah. So that park is the most programmed park, but now we're starting to heavily invest in two other parks you're going to see.
Plus our flagship park, Glenn Miller Park. Yeah. I did I hear there's over a,000 acres of parks in Richmond. We have 1100 acres of parks in Richmond for 35,000 people. But there's we count 68,000 people call this their home for these services. Out of the 200,000 who come here, you know, for different things, there's about 68,000 people who come all the time to our parks and events and stuff.
Our Fourth of July fireworks on the historic Roosevelt Hill. Uh just just a lot of great things happening. Wow. Okay. Another interesting piece that we, you know, we hear from different mayors or different people all across the state is, I don't know, a lot of young people have the idea you have to go to Indianapolis if you want to be successful. You have to go to Indianapolis, blah blah blah blah blah blah.
And for you in thinking about Richmond, you know, a lot of people are getting priced out of a place like Indianapolis and they're like, or they're living in a 500 foot apartment and never able to buy a house or anything like that. Talk to me about why Richmond can make financial sense for people who want to get established and grow their career. Oh, 100% does. So, in this Make My Move program, there's a couple that moved from California and moved to Richmond. To Richmond. Had they ever did they have family here or anything?
No. So, the Make My Move and he's still an engineer for a company in California. So, they bought an historic home in a historic neighborhood. Then she went out and bought a second. Then she went out and bought a third. So the money they brought from California, they bought three historic homes that they're fixing up and they're going to end up selling a couple of them just living their life.
I mean that's and they can walk to barbecue. They can walk to other restaurants and amenities. They can walk to parks. All the stuff we're doing downtown and housing. You'll be able to walk to three really nice parks. Wow.
Nice amenities. Yeah. And you talk about I mean I feel like that goes viral on social media like once or twice a year where it's like what a million dollars gets you in PaloAlto and it's like it's like a one-bedroom shack. It's like crazy. Now, we do have some new builds in a million dollar price range. A lot of our big multi-millionaire homes here are really actually about $700,000.
So, Wow. But you can buy a really nice three-bedroom, two bath home with all the amenities you need on a third of an acre lot for about 400 or 500,000 depending on which neighborhood you choose. Yeah. Wow. I mean that is if you think of you know one you have big employers like talk about a few of the I mean you've mentioned from the pet food companies like what are the the staple employers? Yeah other plastic there's a couple plastic companies that have been here a long time.
Uh back to our sister city for Richmond is Japan. There's a cities or sister cities in Japan because we have four direct foreign investment companies in Richmond. They're all Japanese companies making car parts for the bigger car manufacturers scattered throughout the states. Oh. Oh, so these would be like suppliers to the tier one suppliers. Yes.
Yeah. Okay. So, these would be like suppliers to the like Honda, Toyota, Subaru. Yeah. Okay. I'm following.
There's four of those here. Which is like uh you think about places that you want to be kind of like in the gold rush. You want to be the person selling the pickaxes to the to the miners, right? Like selling the components there. Digging for gold is hard work, but selling jeans, Levi Strauss, that's how he got started to miners is is actually a better program. Yeah.
Wow. Okay. So, you talk about being able to afford a home. Are there other like like do you guys do studies of, you know, what a dollar gets you in Richmond, Indiana versus, you know, other other, you know, markets? I don't have that data with me. Unfortunately, something I have it memorized, but our economic development portion in Wayne County has it on their website, ywingcount.
com. So, check out ywingcount. com. You can get that data. It's very affordable with all the groceries. We have all the major grocerers here.
We have some smaller grocerers. We have all the detainine restaurants but we have some local restaurants that are owned by some chefs that are do really well. So there's a lot of lot of stuff happening. When Mayor's Meapone is sponsored by Make My Move, where you can find all the places that will pay you to move with up to $15,000 in cash and perks, professional networking and relocation support. Make my Move is an Indiana based company and they've already helped more than 2,000 people move to communities across the state. So who do you know that should move here to Indiana?
Send them this podcast and tell them about MakeMymove. Or if you're a leader excited about welcoming new residents into your community, go to impact. mmakemymove. com and get in touch with the makemyove team. I love that our state is thinking about direct talent attraction like this. It's just another example of who's your hospitality in action.
Now, let's get back to the episode. When you think about it, why do you love Richmond? Like why were you driven enough to be like, "Hey, I want to put my name in the hat to become the mayor of Richmond, Indiana." Well, after my first college degree, I traveled the world and built radio stations, but always called Richmond my home for so from 1987 to 1999 all over the US, uh, Taiwan, Russia, South Africa. For who? For Harris Corporation.
Wow. Broadcast and Harris Corp. I was a broadcast engineer, but this was always my home. And I came back home and and back to the housing. And why? cause in less than 90 minutes I can go to Cincinnati and see the Who back when they were still touring cuz they did you know in an hour and 10 minutes I can be what we call Deer Creek which is now Ruof Mortgage Concert Center or I can go to Dayton Ohio which is where I go down to the Rose which is like 35 minutes away.
So I can go to Dayton in 35 minutes. I can get to the Dayton International Airport in 35 minutes. Indianapolis an hour and 15. Cincinnati hour and a half. I can go to Chicago for the weekend is less than a 5 hour drive. Yeah.
So by living in Richmond, you have all these options of places you can visit on the weekend or just a day trip to So it works out really well that we're centrally located Indiana is known as a crossroads of America and we are the gateway to Indiana. You are the the welcome wagon, right? If you're coming on 70 from Ohio, like the first, right? This is like the first exit. It is the first exit. We have four exits off Interstate 70.
Wow. But also, like I said, historic National Road Highway 40 comes through here. Highway 27. You can go all the way up to the upper peninsula of Michigan to Florida on Highway 27. Wow. So, we're a crossroad ourselves.
But the interesting piece is you don't have to leave Richmond to get to be entertained. You don't have to leave Richmond to be entertained. There's live music, there's theater, we have live theater. I forgot the historic theater. We have live theater. Well, and one of the most, you know, uh, interesting, I would say a fun things that's coming back this summer is college league summer league baseball.
Yeah. Yeah. With a I mean, how did you guys come up with the name of the college summer league baseball team? So, Northwoods League came up with a name. They did a contest, but when they first interviewed Richmond, they came in the mayor's office. They asked, "What's Richmond known for?"
And I said, "Well, everybody knows who Indiana Jones was, right? And if you are studying archaeology at IU and you want to be in the next Indiana Jones and you study Egyptian history, there are three Egyptian money mummies in the state of Indiana. One's at Indianapolis and two are in Richmond. So if you're studying anything about Egyptian culture, you're coming to Richmond cuz our historical museum has one money mummy and college has the other. Why are there two Egyptian mummies in Richmond, Indiana? because it was an interest that some people had back in the 1900s who had great wealth and wanted to load up our museums with cool things.
100%. That's what just like this is cool. We should do this. We should get these mummies and bring them to Richmond. I hope to one day have Egyptian mummy money, you know, where you know I gold sarcophagus, right, that they're in. Yeah.
I was uh I was up in South Bend not too long ago and I interviewed the guy um Mark Turner who runs the Southbend Chocolate Company and his obsession is dinosaur like fossils and he's just like yeah I went out and dug up a thousand bones. So like you guys had local residents here that just loved Egyptian and you know the history there artifact a lot of artifacts a lot of history art back to the art museum. The Richmond Art Museum is something to see. There's a lot of important pieces of art right here in our art museum. Wow. And they have showings all the time.
Yeah. And they have a program with high school students and junior high schoolers and even elementary school students to get them to appreciate and become artists. We've had a few artists come out of Richmond. Okay. When you think about Richmond, what are the ways that Richmond punches above its weight class? What do you think this town, this city is exceptionally great at?
We're exceptionally great at being welcoming and being pleasant and nice. Yeah. You look at the history based upon peace and peace studies, but also industry and art. We're very accepting of anyone and everyone. You know, the the Japanese studies program is still going strong at Erm College. Uh there's this whole neighborhoods just just very open and welcoming.
I'd love to talk about the importance that erm plays to Richmond. how I mean that is like a a very um esteemed school like oh you know residential campus right on town like really big huge residential campus a lot of events I mean I sawtha Franklin there I saw Sinbad there I saw Amy Tan the author of the Groat club so a lot of interesting people come through but but also IU East so IU East is a large campus for IU we recently just had the football trophies pass through here oh no way they came to visit I got a pictures with you the national championship football trophy. That's incredible. Purdue Poly Technic's here, Indiana IvyTech Community College is here and Bethany Theological Seminary. So, a lot of diversity and education from community college all the way to graduate level programs. Yeah, I was going to say and isn't erm known as like it's a creative like artistic type school like is that like what they are most known for?
Actually, kind of hidden in all that stuff is their biology program. One of the things I understand now, if if you're hoping to get into medical school, if you get your biology undergraduate biology degree, a microbiology degree from Earlm College, you're more likely to get accepted to medical school than if you got it at that medical school. Wow. That has a medical school. No way. Yes.
Their biology life science program is huge. And they have back to the mummy. They have a woolly mammoth skeleton and all kinds of stuff out there at the museum. Wow. A lot of lot of biology. That is is fascinating.
That's one of their hidden gems. We love hidden gems. That's uh that's the name of the game. And of course at IU uh and I taught for IU for a decade, IU East, they bring in a lot of athletes for their online programs. They were one of the first campuses of IU to adopt online bachelor's degree in business administration. So So one of the Williams sisters got her bachelor's degree there.
When I taught for him, I had a ranked I had a ranked um tennis player from Slovenia and then I had a professional ballerina from Pittsburgh. And then I had soccer player from Africa. They were all getting their business degree from IU East online and some of them actually come to the commencement to the ceremony. That's kind of cool. I mean, yeah, if you were getting your graduate degree and you get to walk across like that's awesome stage. When you're thinking about, you know, we talked a little bit about the industries that are thriving in Richmond.
You mentioned uh obviously, you know, pet food. You talked about plastics. A lot of plastics here that that she injection plastic. So, if you if you see a yard sign right now, political yard sign, it was probably made at Primex Plastics. Wow. If you get a mud flap, it probably came from BNF Plastics.
If you get colored plastics, it probably came from BNF Plastics. If you're in a grocery store or retail store, and there's a sign there, there there's a display that's made out of corrugated plastics. Primex Design, in fact, probably made that. Wow. And printed right on it. So, we have digital printing presses.
If you get a a serial box in your cabinet, it was probably printed here at Manasha, which used to be color box. So, we we print directly onto fiberboard for packaging also here in Richmond. Wow. and ship it all over the world. Well, it is nice when you have uh major thoroughares that like you know take through you can get on 70, you talked about 27, you talk about 40, you can get this is going to this is very industry term. You can get stuff to places.
You get stuff to places either by trucks and UPS has a large facility. Yeah. On the west side of town. So, wow. Get to like I said to all the airports, the interstate 70 connects you everywhere. When you talk about local spots, like familyowned staple businesses in Richmond that like if you were visiting for a day, you you can't leave without checking out.
Where do people need to check out there? So, usually it's poured toward the restaurants. So, like Old Richmond End is owned by the Molino family along with Fifth Street Bagel Shop and Gallows Italian Grill and and even Smiley. There's an old English pub that's been around for a long time. A local family has kind of restored that. Smiley's Pub is a good place to get a drink or some food.
Downtown Deli is good. Sweet Blessings is good. More about the food than other stuff. And then Firehouse Barbecue and other places in the depot. Yeah. Okay.
So, what are the neighbor You talk about the districts like what are the different, you know, kind of neighborhoods districts within Richmond. So, downtown there's a lot of housing and some businesses and restaurants and stuff. And then just north of downtown the historic depot district where those trains came through and the Jaspers got off. There's retail there and groceries there. The entire east side of town is the commercial corridor where the mall is and all the major uh chain restaurants and chain stores are there. We just two weeks ago opened a new store in our mall in our indoor mall.
Ashley Furniture built a new store in our mall. I didn't think they were opening new stores down malls and we're adding stores to our mall and I just it's pretty awesome. And then west side of town is more industrydriven. Yeah. Uh there's a few amenities over there, but it's mostly the factories and stuff like that. Yeah.
So we're divided by a river. So the east fork of the Whitewater River cuts through the heart of the city for 3 and a half miles. This is a gorge you'll see later. Yeah. And 2 and a half miles of that are trails and parks. Oh wow.
And we're totally investing in that with new trail heads, canoe and kayak launching and landing, a bouldering. We're going to put another amphi because we need more performance areas. We're going to put an amphitheater down there. Oh. So, this this this plaza downtown is a small amphitheater. Glenn Miller Park has a huge one.
We're going to build a midsize one down here on on the grass. Okay, that's live music. That's amazing. We get a lot of live music through here. Now, one thing with uh Make My Move is they help people that don't live in an area discover new areas and and really make their move. So, if you were talking to potential new would you like Richmondians?
How what's the name? What? Richmondesites. I think Richmondites. I think that's it. Something along that.
If you were talking to potential new residents of Richmond, what would the sales pitch be? If you could sit down and have a conversation with every single potential new mover, what would you say to them? After you visit the many parks in Richmond or the golf courses or whatever your athletic desire is, after you do the hiking trails, we have an amazing set of hiking trails. After you play pickle ball at our mini pickle ball course. Oh. Or the municipal swimming pool or baseball or whatever.
visit the locally owned restaurants and shops and you'll just Yeah. Like, why don't I live here? Yeah. Because everything I need is here. If you were not from Richmond and you picked up and moved to Richmond, how would you get plugged in? How would you make friends quickly?
That make my move will get you connection to different things and then you'll start going to events. So, through social media and the city's website, you'll hear about events. So, you'll start going, you'll start going to the farmers market. You'll start going to the Easter egg hunt we had at the park. So that's the way if you're a new resident to Richmond and you want to get plugged in, start going to events because you said the studies show nice people here. I had this past Saturday I did a proclamation for Arbor Day.
We gave away free trees at the farmers market down at Stargate building. I had three events that day and I made it to two of them. Wow. Because there there's always something going on and a lot of it overlaps. What's the biggest misconception about Richmond, Indiana? That there's nothing to do.
That's the biggest misconception because there is so much to do. It it's it doesn't stop. Yeah. Something every night, every weekend. If you were building the itinerary for a perfect summer weekend in Richmond, what would that itinerary look like? Do a little bit of hiking.
Okay. And then where like Okay. So, there's that's in the 1100 acres of parks. Yes. Okay. But also downtown, we we've created a multimodal path that connects downtown to the depot and back again.
So, you either bicycle or walk that. We've got this they call it the loop, but it also connects to our historic park, our 10th Street park. I forgot to mention that. Our first city park was a Civil War encampment and now it's called Tentth Street Park and it's cleaned up really nice. Wow. And it's right in that veil neighborhood and there's signs about how this was a Civil War camp.
And then so after you do all the hiking or maybe even before the hiking, you'll hit one of the coffee shops either local own coffee shops, which there are a bunch, or the national chains and there's another national chain coming because we like our coffee in Richmond. There's I can't I don't I can't tell you how many punch cards I have for coffee shops in Richmond in my car. The local citizens of Richmond are caffeinated. Yes, we are. I love that. Okay, so coffee shop, hiking.
Hiking, probably a music event. And even if there isn't an outdoor concert, there's a couple of venues that have live music pretty much every weekend. Amazing. With some food and some other stuff to do, too. Yeah. And then the theater, if they have a theater, the symphony if they're having a concert or the art museum or the or the actual, you know, the national chain movie theater is also on the east side of town too if you're still going to that.
And I know since co I haven't I don't think I've been inside a movie theater since co I I feel like movie theaters are really in a in a part where they have to do some reinvention. Concerts. Yeah. Still going. Concerts are cool. Absolutely.
I feel like going and sitting in the theater cuz it's like I feel like it gets pushed to Amazon Prime or whatever at the same time and it's like oh do I go and get popcorn there and do the whole nine yards or do I just, you know, stay at home on my own stay home and you know absolutely. But if you want I mean you can go there they're there within driving distance. There are those movie theaters that have the reclining chairs and they bring food to you. Those are all within driving distance. Yeah. Okay.
Go to the airport and learn how to fly a plane just like Orville and Wilbur did. A little better. A little safer actually. Yeah. Just a little a little farther. Yeah.
What is it, like 200 feet or something like that? Yeah. Okay. Here's what I want to I want to know. We talked about the history of Richmond from the first mayor taking over in 1840 to, you know, Hogi Carmichael coming through and recording Stardust to the incredible innovation in whether it be life science and biotech or pet food, like all the amazing stuff happening. I want to know, talk to me about the future.
What does Richmond, Indiana look like over the next decade? What does it look like over the next two decades? Yeah. as we get this housing finished and there's more young families moving here and living here. You know, we one of my first focuses, primary focus when I became mayor was public safety. So, for the first time in a decade, our police department's fully staffed, our fire department's just about there.
So, public safety is hugely important. So, we're making a safe place and now we're making a clean place with our code enforcement department. We're constantly cleaning. Our parks department has a beautifification team. We're constantly planning stuff. If you look outside city hall, you'll see tulips growing on a grass strip, which was always grass in the past that they just weeded eat.
And now we're actually planting flowers. So, we're working really hard to beautify the city. One interesting piece, we get a lot of feedback from other municipalities that listen to these episodes to learn about how to make their place better and and to get the ball rolling there. Uh I mean last episode we did uh two episodes ago actually was with Mayor Rydenower of Muny and the a local economic development director in Edinburgh end up reaching out to like set up coffee to like get the ball moving so that you know Edinburgh could learn from what Munie is doing. One thing that I think is really interesting about Richmond is you guys have positive forward momentum on the housing side of things. Yes, we do.
So, if there are other local leaders, whether you're the mayor or the town manager, whatever, in cities across Indiana, what are what's some advice you have to these other leaders of municipalities across the state? One of the things you have to do is get along well with your counterparts at the county. Yeah. So, the city can't do it alone, the county can't do it alone, and our economic development people, our leaders cannot do it alone. All three have to work together closely. So, the county gets along well with us.
We collaborate on just about everything. A lot of this housing, we're both putting money into it. Most of us in the city, but some's in the county, but we're both putting money into housing. We both put money into industrial projects. We both put money into infrastructure. For an example, when Blue Buffalo came, there was a county road that needed to be improved for semis.
So, the city, the county, and the neighboring little town put money into it because they realized the value of this road is going to bring good paying jobs, and we need to get it semi- ready. So, all three entities put money into it, and even the electric utilities put money in. Yeah. Uh, and I feel like cooperation helps really drive stuff forward. A lot of people I think that's like a lot of feedback, you know, politicians of any level, whether it's local, town manager, whatever it might be, is like, oh, like they talk a lot, but like getting stuff done like look around. It's work.
It's it's a pain. It is a lot of work. I have to when I meet with the county officials pretty much every week, we go out of our way. We have to take time out of our busy days and we have a lot of demands on our time, but this is important to work with your county officials and and if you've never worked with them before, you're going to have a learning curve, but it's definitely worth it. So, if you have to spend a year reestablishing a relationship with county and other other authorities, other elected officials, this is how you be successful. And you got to get to Indianapolis.
I mean, when I was elected mayor, before I was even mayor, I was making trips to the state house and talking with state officials. You got to get to the state house. You got to be involved with legislation. And so this last session, I was there every week speaking to legislators, speaking in sessions, going to different conferences and reminding them Richmond's here, Richmond matters. Yeah. What are the things that some of these laws are good for us and some are bad for us and looking out for the city's interests and the county's interest at the same time?
Yeah. What are the big benefits or like ways that the work that's being done in the state house can directly affect these communities across the the state? Yeah. Some of the laws they change. So, one of the things that they're changing the house and rolled act 1210 is changing our local income tax structure. So, cities will have to work closely with counties and towns and the counties have to work closely with counties on how that gets redesigned, readopted in 2028 and starts rolling in in 2029.
The current structure goes away in 2028. Oh. And you have to work closely with your county and the other towns in the county to be successful. Do you have advice? Let's say there's someone out there, maybe they don't currently work together closely with their county of like a project or a thing. Hey, you're a town that you could start start with a coffee shop, you know, start you got to meet over coffee or something going, but then we all put money into these housing projects and infrastructure.
So, this, you know, the subdivision that had 15 empty lots, we all put money into getting the water lines in there and sewer lines in there. I'm thinking of like, yeah, of like a a smaller project where it's like, hey, we can we can demonstrate park. A park park is a great one. Yeah. So, our our county is helping some of the small towns do some park work and and we're helping everything we can. Yeah.
Absolutely. Parks are hugely important. Your quality of life back to what brings people will look at your town for a job and then look at your town for housing and look at your town for retail and look at your town for parks. What am I going to do in my free time on the weekends? You know, if you can offer everything from hiking to pickle ball to basketball, some really nice basketball courts, too. Basketball is important to Richmond like it is to every Hooser, of course, but I mean we have a really nice basketball court outdoors that anyone can use with this special surface, not concrete and asphalt.
You'll have to see it. It's kind of a special court. We have to get our shots up. Trains people to, you know, gets them ready for the big time. There we go. Well, that is an interesting piece, too.
You talk about quality of life, and as we kind of come to the end of the interview portion here, I think that that is so vitally important. It's like it's one thing to bring jobs. You obviously need that. They need to have opportunity. you bring housing. And then the piece is the people.
Like if you're going to pick up, I'm imagining like the, you know, the engineering um family that moved from California to Richmond. If you're going to pick up, you have to, I feel like, feel like you're going to a place where you can make friends. Like, what am I going to do on Friday night after work? What am I going to do on the weekends, the week nights? Like, am I going to go to dinner with people? Like, a little bit of the stickiness of communities isn't necessarily just your career.
isn't just living in a beautiful home. It's also having beautiful people around you. Like very kind. That's why we're investing in these other two neighborhoods. Yeah. These two historic neighborhoods are important.
And once that neighborhood feels like it's getting some love and attention, the neighbors will feel more kind to each other. Amen. And then you'll have that. I love it. We've come to the end of the show where we ask the a lot of the same questions all about the state of Indiana. So, we're going a little bit outside of Richmond, but obviously Richmond is the the welcome wagon when you're coming from Eastern.
Yeah, the Eastern Gateway to Indiana. The Eastern Gateway of Indiana. I love that. So, this question is brought to you by our friends at JC Hart. They're a leader in creating enjoyable living experiences at apartment communities all across Indiana and beyond. Check them out at homejart.
com. My question for you, why do you call Indiana home? Indiana just is home. I mean, it's a great place to live and raise a family. Yeah, schools are good. The climate, you have climate, you have seasons, four different seasons.
A nephew was stationed in the military in California. Hate it because he missed the change of seasons. Yeah. I mean, it was so you can you can have snow in the winter. You can have baseball in the summertime. You have spring and fall.
The seasons are great here in Indiana. Amen. Yeah. If it was fishing, hiking, there's a lot of great lakes and rivers for a lot of outdoor activities. If it was 80 and sunny every day, I'd start to take it for granted. Yes, you would.
Come on. Okay. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received about being mayor? Shut up and listen. I gave you two ears and one mouth. Yes, exactly.
So, was on council for three terms, 12 years. So, I had a lot of ideas and the mayor has to approach things differently. So, I have to listen to everyone. If local citizens of Richmond listen to this, what's one thing that people of Richmond should be incredibly proud of? They should be proud of our heritage, our arts, and our history. and they should be proud of their neighborhoods.
If they see a piece of trash, they should pick it up. Don't wait on our code enforcement staff to pick it up. You can pick it up, too. We had 120 sixth graders at our our Gateway Park last week, Limmer Park for Earth Day, and they spent 3 hours helping pick up cleanup stuff and then we fed them lunch and then they got to play for an hour and a half on the playgrounds and they loved it. And now it's instilled in them when they come back with their families, if they see something, you know, a raccoon or a squirrel gets something out of the trash, they're going to go pick that up and throw it away. Yeah, absolutely.
And it starts, you know, Yeah. building that that muscle of pride in your community. Yeah, absolutely. Take pride in your neighborhood. Starts with your house, then your neighbor's house, and then your whole entire neighborhood. Take pride.
Keep it clean. Mow your grass. Mow your There it is. Okay. Uh we've come to the final three questions that we ask every guest who comes on the show. First, I have to know, what is your favorite Indiana memory?
Probably showing livestock in 4. Yeah. Yes, you get that opportunity in Indiana steers. I was in all the other clubs, too. But showing the steers and making it all the way to reserve grand champion. Oh, that's fair and open shows, that was a really good feeling.
I accomplished something when you're when you're leading your steer out there and it does exactly like you're it's moving the way you want it to. How good does that feel? It feels great. Oh yeah. Of course, I hit the home run in little league too, so that helped. Won the game.
I had a winning shot in basketball and now in junior high or elementary one of those times. So, I got a trophy somewhere. Let's go. So, you know, I mean, that's Indiana is is we're agriculture. We're also sports, and we're also arts. I'm not the artist in my family.
Other people are. So, if you saw my office, you'd see some artwork in here that I did not create, but I do enjoy cuz family created it. Oh, that's amazing. That makes a baseball glove and a football. Maybe have a little putty mat over there for work on my putting for Absolutely. Okay.
Now, this next question is your opportunity to shed some light on a part of the state that more people need to be talking about. What is a hidden gem in Indiana? The hidden gem in Indiana would have to be Richmond. Yeah, Richmond is a hidden gem. I would I would agree. For a city our size, one thing I tell people, we we have mayor's meetings all the time and I'm going to be in meetings next couple days in Indianapolis.
Mayors get all the time. So, for a city our size, we are blessed with four exits off the interstate. 35,000. The city of 35,000 doesn't get four exits off the interstate. And that's usually important because it gives you four corridors, four different personalities even. So there's really four different personalities to Richmond.
There's the the commercial side with the restaurants in the mall. Then there's the residential side and the the big reservoir where you can go fishing, canoeing, kayaking, boating, also with a great BART park and radiocrolled airplane club. And then there's and then there's the the college exit. And then there's the industrial park exit. And it's just four different personalities rolled into one. You get four chances to turn off the interstate and get your tail to Richmond, Indiana, baby.
Okay, final question for you. This is where we source new guests or learn about other people across the state that are doing amazing things. Who's a Hooser we need to keep on our radar? Someone who's doing big things. So, right from Richmond is Desmond Bane, the basketball player. Grew up in Richmond, played basketball at Richmond, now is with the Orlando Magic.
So, watch him. Oh, absolutely. Could be the next Larry Bird. I don't know. Could be. That's That's a really good one.
And like, yeah, with the magic now repping, anytime we see anyone from Indiana doing big things, whether it be in sports or arts or culture, whatever it might be, I I just love it. And of course, the Indianapolis 500 is coming up. Yeah. I It's funny. I did a study a while back. We were in Nashville, Tennessee two years ago for a vacation.
I said, "Well, how much tourism did Nashville, Tennessee get?" You know, it's got to be a lot. How much does Indianapolis get between the NCAA headquarters, the final four, the convention center, the N500? Like three and a half times. Oh. three and a half times, you know, tourists come to Indianapolis and go to Nashville, Tennessee, and that's an hour and 15 minutes that way.
There are people who live on the north side of Indianapolis who can take almost as long to drive to downtown Indianapolis as you can from Richmond, Indianapolis on 70. That's wild. Even though we're 60 miles away, you can still get there in an hour. Some people take an hour. Wow. Good for That's a wild perspective, too.
Yeah. There have been multiple times if I'm going from like the tippy north side of like Hamilton County to try to get down and it's like, dude, this traffic is is brutal. It's brutal. There you go. Oh man, this has been awesome learning about the storied past of Richmond, Indiana from, you know, again, 1840s to, you know, the influences in the Underground Railroad to his also, you know, jazz, recorded jazz, Hogi Carmichael, all of these amazing artists getting off the train, stopping through uh Janette, not Guanette, it's Janette. I' I've fallen into that trap where I've said, it is Janette Records.
Yes. There we go. Good. Uh, but learning all about that, learning about all the amazing things and the incredible housing, real estate projects you have going on here, mayor. It has been a pleasure to sit down with you and learn all about it. And now I'm excited to go explore.
Yeah, appreciate you and we'll talk soon. This show is made possible by our friends up at Sweetwater. Whether you're looking to start a podcast or take your content to the next level, click the link in the description to see all my gear recommendations at Sweetwater. If you want a behind-the-scenes look at everything we're doing across the state, make sure you follow me on Instagram and Tik Tok, Nate Spangle. Thank you so much for listening and being a part of what makes the Hooser State great. We'll see you next time here on Get
