How Carmel, Indiana Became America’s #1 Place to Live

pictures of city center and what it is today took a long time to build out and it offers just something extra for Caramel that we don't have going from one corner to the opposite corner. Seeing if there's a route that does not have a roundabout. We're going to challenge our engineering team to look at that like wouldn't that be interesting? We're an aspirational city and people worked really hard to try to get to Caramel and they're so proud of it and they want to be a part of the continued success. 106,000 voted the number one best place to live. Like where does all that start?

From South Bend to Evansville and everywhere in between, this is Get In, the show focused on the Hooser 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. My guest today is Sue Finham, and she has served as the mayor of Carmel for the last 3 years after decades of leadership in healthcare, management, consulting, and launching her own full service marketing agency. And before being elected mayor, she served 12 years on the Carmel City Council in various leadership roles. As mayor, she's focused on keeping Carmel one of America's best places to live with a commitment to public safety, fiscal responsibility, innovation, and transparency. Today, we're going to talk about how you can keep Caramel number one.

When you're at the top, everybody's coming for you, so you best not miss uh how they're building the next generation of Caramel and the future of America's best city. Sue, welcome to get in. Thank you for having me here. I am I'm excited for this one. I think that uh just from, you know, the five minutes we've hung out before we pressed record here, this is going to be like an iceberg. The city of Caramel might be like an iceberg where there's a lot more below the surface that not a lot of people realize.

I think from the outside being someone from a small town in northern Indiana like rural Indiana you're like oh caramel you know everybody caramel is just so caramel you know and now getting to meet more people from there and getting to spend more time it it's an interesting again like an iceberg there's a lot more below the surface than the average person thinks and I'm really excited to unpack that today I have to ask where does your experience and your story with Carmel Indiana start uh that was started in 2005 and I had the wonderful opportunity to be one of the handful of team members that opened IU Health North Hospital. Yeah. As I wasn't living there yet. We were living in Northeast Indianapolis and our son was three and so we wanted to wait until he was ready to go into school cuz we had amazing setup with a licensed daycare next door, two babysitters across the street. So there's no way we're leaving that incredible setup until he was ready to roll.

Okay. So when did you then move to Caramel? 2007. 2007. What was Caramel like in the in the 2000s? Like I know what it looks like today in my experience moving to the central Indiana in 2019, but take me back a few years and and what did it look like in the 2000s?

A lot less roundabouts. Uh it also was, you know, really growing quickly uh in the early 2000s. That's when you really see our population really start to spike, you know, as far as a massive growth. So lots and lots of subdivisions being grown. I remember when we were moving, we were looking at uh some town homes and condos right on Main Street by the Monan and uh so that was really the the the housing in the central core of the city was starting to change and turn over. Uh but it was still the same karma we have now.

Just incredible people that are, you know, warm and welcoming to have new people be there. Like by the population chart, 2000 census says 37. 7, 2010 census 84 and a 84,500. So to over double in that stretch of 10 years does seem yeah like rapid rapid growth. What what was driving that? Why were so many people interested in moving to Carmel in the mid 2000 or the early 2000s?

Hey this the amazing school system that we have has always been the key economic development driver for the city of Carmel. Now we have other things to partner with it as far as our incredible walkability and our arts and cultural focus. You know the padium opened in 2011. So it was really the school system though. incredible schools have always had that. Um, and so I think that was really what was driver and again, you know, u beautiful houses and neighborhoods.

Um, for those who didn't want the urban environment, the downtown Indianapolis offered, you know, it offered a different opportunity. Hamilton County was growing, you know, so was Fischers as well. So, I think that was the big thing. Yeah. Like I think when people think about Caramel, it's a lot of new growth. It's a lot of, you know, the the Midtown Caramel vibe, which is, you know, beautiful.

It's it's a crazy cool the public art all the things there. But there's also history to Caramel too. And so like as you see I mean I'm looking at that population report and it's like yeah in 1980 the population was 18,000. Like that is still like a relatively pretty small town. Uh I think your predecessor Mayor Brainer spent 28 years as mayor. Exactly.

Like how do you put together a plan to take a town that would have would that have been in the '9s when he started? 96 96 like how does the community come together because you were a part of the city county or the city council for 12 years of that stretch as well. How does everyone come together and start to build something and within you know within three decades take it from again 30 something thousand to I mean now today over 100,000 right around 100,000 106,000 yeah 106,000 voted the number one best place to live like where does all that start? I think two things and I'll give Jim credit for so many things but I think these two things he really got right and that was one listen to people and so he'll he'll tell you the story you should have on sometime he'll tell you the story where he walked door to door and heard from people we want a real downtown we want a real center of our city to enjoy and Main Street is not what Main Street was it what is it today is not what it was then and so one he listened to that and then two he put together a plan and sold the vision And sometimes you have to sell a vision with pretty pictures and you know renderings.

Yeah. Exactly. But I remember even I was I remember the Kowanas in those early years. I had started um engaging with Carmel as an employee and see these pictures of city center and what it is today and I was like this is beautiful and different and amazing. It offers just something extra for Caramel that we don't have. And so you know that took a long time to build out.

Did it start with city center? Like before I think today people think of like the downtown of Carmel as kind of like the main street and Midtown like the Sun King area right there. It's kind of like the heart. But before that, did it start with the city center area? No, it really started with Main Street, you know, and really investing uh those shops that you see now that Joe's Butcher Shop is in right near the Monan that that came out of the ground and um and so there were started to see investment there and then really it was you know Bruce Cordingly with Pedcore and Jim Brainer saying we're going to build something that's architecturally significant that's different that offers an environment that we don't have and that was another district city center we see it as another district different than Main Street. Okay.

Um because it's outside the art design. Do you have like do you have like Main Street, Midtown, and then City Center? Are those kind of like the three or do they We have the art and design district. Yeah. You know, when you go through the arches, you're technically in the in the art and design district. And that has that's right in the periphery of Midtown, but we do look at art and design district is mostly being the main street area.

Okay. And then you guess Yes. The Monine Trail, which goes up to Midtown, which we call like America's or Carmel's Living Room right there, and then go up to City Center. And of course, then we have Civic Square by the city hall and the Japanese garden. So those are just different districts a lot of cities identify you know from a branding perspective or a placemaking perspective different areas of the city and that's you've done that. Wow.

So vision do you think like if there's other and I know there will be if there's other mayors and municipal leaders listening from around the state and maybe even around the country like what advice would you give them if like how they can help transform their place how they can help you know paint this vision and start to move wherever they might be in the world uh a a little bit closer to number one in the country. I don't know if I'm the best position to do that. I'd like to learn from all those people as well, right? But I feel like what we all do really well uh is is listen to our constituents and understand what's important to them. Keep in mind the history and the journey that their own cities have been in and been through. Uh and then compile that into okay, knowing who we are, where we've been, what who we are and what we stand for, where we've been.

This is where we need to to to move forward. You know, every city has a different economic position. Yeah. You may be a manufacturing town. It may be a merchants town. It may be a innovation city.

Uh every city has a different demographic of people and what they value. Um and then you have to really look at your assets. Some are like we have incredible park assets. Uh so between our parks, our spring like caramel has like a spring somewhere flowing well. Flowing well like just water coming up out of the ground. An artisian well.

Absolutely. Like that's like a wild natural resource. Like I had someone on that talked about uh Cool Creek Park. It's like that's another like you're in a relatively urban area but you're not far from nature and there's a lot of Yeah. the public park system is really good and the Mon Trail just like I will say I am a proud I am a proud Indianapolis inside the loop uh resident but there is a difference when you cross over on the Monan Trail going north. Like, no, no disrespect.

We're a little gritty down here in uh in the 317, but uh uh hey, that feeling different both in the winter when you see the plowing difference as well as walking the Monan Trail, that is a badge of honor for our city employees. So, I mean, it is absolutely one of the things they're super proud of that, you know, when you enter Caramel, whether it's cleaner, it's plow better, it's maintained differently, that is one thing that our our residents love. What do you feel like the the biggest misconception about Caramel is? I will say everyone thinks that it is like the streets are paved in roundabout gold and that there's no like everyone is rich, everyone is white, everyone it's just like this utopian or dystopian society depending on which way it is like the stereotype. Like what do you think the biggest misconception about Carmel, Indiana is? I think the biggest is that we're snobby.

You know, my son when he went to IU said, "I didn't tell people I was from Carmel." Because we get the whole like negative reaction right in the first micro seconds of the conversation, right? Uh, so I you we had a long conversation about you better tell people from your caramel. Yeah. You're part of the you're part of the the cheerleader gang. Yeah.

You got that's the thing. It's like I mean for you it's like you're working to build the greatest place possible and to keep it ranked number one and to make it even better. And it's like well you know your son or whoever needs to take pride in where they're from. Like whether you're from a small town or you're from the number one place to live in the country. having pride in where you're from and not being like, oh, like you shouldn't feel uh ashamed for building a good place, right? And it's like there are misconceptions on both sides of of from the smallest towns in Indiana to the biggest cities or the best cities or or all this stuff.

So, I don't know. I just think there Yeah, the misconception around Caramel. We're a lot more diverse than people uh understand. We have uh the from the school data, we have 110 languages spoken in Caramel from 90 different countries and that makes for a super interesting community, right? And um we are more affluent. Uh a lot of our families travel internationally and so there are kids who have experiences in Paris and Rome and wherever and here I am sounding snobby, right?

But it's the reality of they're getting international experiences because their parents travel for work or um came from a different country and then they bring those experiences back to Caramel and they appreciate the fact that we have architecture and uh companies and stories from other countries as well. But like I looked at the Are you familiar? I mean, you definitely are, but you see the I think the United Way does Alice reports like, okay, Alice, again, anyone who listens to my interview, uh, where we did some a big deep dive into United Way, talk about the acronym Alice, so asset limited, income constrained, but employed. And so, it's like you might be working, but you're not in a highwage job, or you might be working, but you can't save up. you're more like paycheck to paycheck is kind of like my layman's definition. Again, go do the actual research.

We, you know, site your sources there, but um I I mean, I looked through it. It's like Caramel does have households that are below the poverty line. Caramel has like the same problems that, you know, the rest of the state and the rest of the country face. It's not like there are none of those in Caramel. There might be less. It might be a little bit different, but like there are still people that, you know, go into Carmel Public Schools that are below the poverty line.

And I think that's something that people don't think. They think that again, everyone there is a millionaire. Everyone there makes so much money and blah blah blah blah blah. And when you look at the data, it that's just not the truth. Right. And we had a I think 11in snowstorm in January.

And it hit me that um right before that I'd gone to a school program and we talked about one of the elementary schools had 25% free and reduced lunch and it's 11 to 12% for the district but 25% for that one school and it just hit me like what's happening to these kids who may not get access to food and now we've had 4 days of snow which they may not be out of their driveways yet and who's getting them food and how are we taking care of them. So we did start a food access commission to address that. uh one of my city councilors, Jeff Warell, is chairing that for me and I'm super grateful to identify what are the resources people have if they're living in Carmel. Uh what's the gap and how can we help, right? And that's I think what mayors do really well. Convene people around important topics, promote the heck of their city.

And in Indiana, we're what's called a strong mayor state, so we also run the city. So those are those are my three things that I focus on each and every day. Wow. Yeah, that is interesting. Like if if it was a day in the life of the caramel mayor, like you wake up in the morning and you are the mayor of the number one place to live in the United States of America, like one, it's like you could either I think there's two sides. You could sit back and rest on your laurels and say, "Yeah, we're number one."

But it's like you got to keep going if you want to like retain the title. Like what do you spend like what does a week look like if you're the mayor of Carmel, Indiana, the number one place to live in the country? How do you spend a week as the mayor? You know, I think there's different philosophies on how people lead, too. So, it's could be different for me. I like to be out and about a lot.

Uh, so maybe ribbon cutings, maybe walk into an event at Midtown, it may be um hitting one of our small businesses. Uh, going like I did an HOA meeting last night to educate people on things that happened with the city and answer questions, but there's also an operational role. Um so uh this morning I was on the phone with our uh street department talking about uh repaving projects and also some technology innovation that we're using. Um you know it's talking about new projects and new economic development opportunities come to the city. It's counseling employees and coaching them to you know higher performance and we're doing a ton of modernization efforts as well. Yeah.

Okay. So that's and from looking through it that was really uh that's a a big initiative of yours is the modernization of local government. I do think traditionally across the country governments are ran on spreadsheets and you know Excel documents or Google whatever not even Google we're Microsoft documents word docs like how are you guys modernizing the caramel government? Well first and foremost it was breaking down silos uh because Jim leads with a little bit different style than I do and neither's right or wrong it just is. Uh and I want to break down the silos so we're really functioning as one team. I give my husband a hard time.

I know you watch Gladiator like a thousand times, right? But there's a saying in there and I'm not may not get it quite right because when he was has it on, I'm really not listening. Yeah, but uh you know Maximus at some point says uh they're standing, you know, in the coliseum and he says to the cast of characters with him, hey, no matter what comes through those gates, as long as we're together, we'll be okay. And so trying to get that kind of mentality uh into our city leadership, it's like you're not all running 15 different separate businesses. You know, streets can't operate uh different than engineering, which can't operate different than police and fire. We are all one big unit.

So, that is that has been a cultural change we've been working on. And don't underestimate the the power of a culture of of any kind of company or community. It's strong and resistant and so that's taken time and we've been working on that. Super fun. Yeah. It's it's like um everyone is in the customer service.

Let's say it's the citizen service business, right? It's like whether you are, you know, plowing the snow off the Mon on trail or you're, I don't know, accepting um a tax bill or a parking ticket or whatever, you know, like everyone has to represent the city of Caramel, the number one place to live. I'm going to keep saying that a lot just cuz it's cool. Like this is right in our backyard. Again, I think the numbers came out. You had them all locked out, but like Caramel was number one, Fischers was number two, Nolesville's 18, and Greenwood was 28.

Yep. Like incredible. This is all in the doughnut counties in central Indiana are four of the 30 best places to live in the country. Like that's incredible, right? And we're sitting here, you're you're the mayor of the number one place to live in the country. And you do have to get everyone rowing in the same direction where whether or not you're having um you know an encounter with a police, fire, street department, I don't know, the accountant, whatever it might be, everyone Yeah.

is a representative of this place and and your hospitality. And I think that that that like you know there's one thing to cast the vision of the physical assets of how it's going to look there which is super important but like I think a lot of towns realize and see that you can slap a bunch of money on real estate developments doesn't mean that the people are excited about that. Like there's been a few places where I've been where they've spent money on capital projects of bike lanes or this or that or you know whatever it might be new I feel like sometimes a town thinks that if you slap a brewery on Main Street all of a sudden all the problems are fixed and it's just not true. A lot of people when I have conversations with them they ask like what's the one thing that that you know we can do to make our town better and it's like just get your people to talk better about your place. Like a lot of times it's like you're I always say Indiana as a state can do this better.

It's like you walk into Chicago and somebody, you know, a big suit from Chicago ask where you're from and a lot of people hang around. Yeah, I'm from Indiana. Like I'm whatever. I'm from like you're not like saying that with gusto or pride. And I think that's the number one thing you can fix. You're from Tel City, Indiana.

You look someone in the eyes and say I'm from Tel City, Indiana. And one time like we had a huge furniture manufacturing. We made chairs for the White House and everything. Like there's rich history there. Sorry. I can go on a monologue about that.

No, and I 100% agree with you. And one of the first things we did when we got in office was do a citywide survey because it hadn't been done in a very very long time. And the three words that people said they wanted to make sure that what they were most proud of in Carmel and they wanted to make sure continued safe, clean, and beautiful. That makes the marching orders really clear. Yeah. And when we ask about what got you to move here, what keeps you here?

Public safety by a mile. I thought schools would be at the top um by a mile and it was really number two. Really important. But wait, so public safety, schools clean. Is that the third one? safe, clean, and beautiful were the words, the three words that people mo used most often in the survey tool to describe caramel and what they loved about it most.

Yeah. So again, that's I don't really have to now do a strategic plan. Now, we work on goals and objectives, but if we just say safe, clean, and beautiful. And what really came through then um we did a a rebranding exercise. What came through from that is why did you move here? Like digging into that a little bit more, it wasn't cuz there's no garbage on Main Street.

Um, it was safety was big, but we heard over and over again in so many different words was uh that we were an aspirational city and people worked really hard to try to get to Carmel and they're so proud of it and they want to be a part of the continued success. They want to make their dreams come true, whatever that was. They want to get their kids an incredible school. They want to get near um incredible employment opportunities. They want to make sure that they could walk in the moon at night uh safely to Midtown or what have you. So I mean over and over again it was about people would tell the story about what they wanted to achieve how they moved to Carmel to get closer to that goal.

So the built for big dreams platform that we have is because of their own words that we heard and all those interviews we did. Yeah. So, well, one I think when you talk about cleanliness is like you walk through there and again I think early on it takes you know paid employees picking up trash doing this but once like the movement is started like I don't know it feels like it would just be totally wrong if you like dropped a rapper in the middle of the Mona and like it's like no you don't want like people take more pride in their area because it's beautiful. kind of I think I've said this a few times in in maybe some recent episodes like the broken windows theory like where when people start to feel pride with public art or with with just beautiful trails and parks like good things start to happen good outcomes happen because of that and it's like for me or for maybe the ROI individuals it's hard to say like you know what's the value of making a place beautiful and having public art and things like that but the culture starts to come around full circle I feel Yeah, the public art piece is something that abs absolutely differentiates Carmel.

We've invested a lot there. But I think when you surround kids with a beautiful environment, they feel valued. Yeah. And that value we want them to internalize for their life, right? That they're part of a community who cares about them and their future, that also goes for the senior who may be lonely and may not have a a spouse or a partner or a social work group. And I think that belongingness is a really really important piece of successful community.

Not necessarily rankings. People don't move anywhere for rankings. They move to feel that they have their needs taken care of and they can get their goals met. Wow. And so that blowing piece, so we have an area where people can come root on, you know, the World Cup games, um, you know, pick a team of your choice there or we can, like we're doing for the first year, I'm super excited, a rally for Carmel High School homecoming at Midtown. And so when people can come together around something they're all super proud of, that matters.

Yeah. Now, I do have to ask, we're talking about public art. who sat in the boardroom and said human sculptures all around the city is a good idea. I will absolutely give Jim Jim Brainer that credit like it's it's something you know like a I don't know you like there's been several times where where I've walked through there and I'm like wait is that a and no it's not a real person it is like I mean how many are there? I think 28 perhaps and it's funny because with any type of art you know people love it or hate it. Yeah.

Uh there's been some of our sculptures, the ones we the most recent one we put up with the it's a swirling books right by the library by international artist. People love that sculpture. It has books in it with in you know words on it from Indiana authors and Indiana books. It's really cool. It's lit up at night. It's beautiful.

But then you have these these sculptures that you know there is a group of people that absolutely hate those. So I think anytime you're talking about art is a win, right? That's true. Like I I feel like you you art should is not going to be something that everyone just looks at and loves. Like I don't know. Look at the Mona Lisa like the most famous paint.

It's like I look at that and I don't see anything. I just like it doesn't make me feel any type of way. See your little smirk. Yeah. Like no I don't really get that part. But I know that some people love it and the other people hate it.

Like we had that here in Broadrepple with the giant Gavin statue and it was like some people thought it was really cool, other people hated it. And it's like, hey, at least they're talking about it. Like that's that's art. It's like you don't want to put up like a vanilla whatever. And it's like everyone's just kind of like, okay, I don't love that and I don't hate that. It's just there, you know, like that's not what art is there for.

And for us, it's it's not only part of the brand, the beautiful part, right? To beautify the city. Uh, and also there's a functional aspect of putting art in a roundabout because you really want something in the middle of the roundabout. You don't want people to see through. That's a design standard. But I think the other thing with uh with art is just like we have a highly educated community who appreciates arts and culture.

And so the Palladium was a perfect strategic play for Mayor Brainer to put into our community cuz he had already seen we had uh like a lot of Lily employees early moving to Caramel. And so, you know, um, folks who are highly educated want that access to arts and culture like the again like we you have like a a clientele or a citizen base that does would respect like the orchestras or the symphonies or the things like that that come through the palladium. Um, which which is amazing. I totally see that. Well, the arts program at Carmel High School is incredible. Uh they have six orchestras I think and multiple choirs and award-winning every you know pick a vertical in the music program at Carmel High School.

It's either won the state championship or is winning you know uh competitions everywhere. So incredibly talented kids who are starting violin at two and three right and and are have this thing I know they are uh you talked about like design standard I think you just said that about roundabouts like seeing through them and stuff. One thing that is interesting about car it's like there is an incredibly high bar of the design standard for caramel. How did that get started and how have you upheld that? And like it does feel like you can't build design do anything. It has to match a specific standard and like is that hard to upkeep?

Uh so there's a lot of questions in that. So let's break that down. So first of all I think some of the design came from Jim visiting to Europe. Oh. and seeing these seeing the traffic circles there and saying, "Hey, we should look at those for Indiana." And he and and for Caramel specifically, but credit him for all the roundabouts in in the United States.

I mean the innovation that he had there uh to to work with really strong engineering partners to look at the approach angles because if you notice some of the approach ang you come in and then you go back out that's a slow people around give them to give them the right visual when they're coming around for a safety perspective where we put the crosswalks why we put stuff in the middle we've got you know dog bone roundabouts crossing keystone right different so that was that's engineering innovation and again uh through great engineering partners and and brainers vision. Those have evolved and I will we talked about other mayors in the country and in the state. It's funny the number of texts I get and I can only imagine Mayor Brainer get got a ton more uh is like hey we're putting our first roundabout in. Any advice? Yeah. So because I mean one piece about I don't know why roundabouts aren't like that I would say they're not challenging.

You know people don't like them like if they've never had one before. I think everyone just accepted that Caramel is the roundabout capital of America. But like we're trademarking that by the way. You should. Absolutely. Uh but it's like if you go to a place that doesn't have one, it's like, "Oh my god, why would they?"

And it's like I don't know. Largely like if you if you were to hit a red light there, like you're going to sit way longer even if no one is coming, then you just have the roundabout and you just cruise on through it. Absolutely. Like I don't know. It feels really interesting that people get so up in arms about roundabouts. Like do you Once you move to Caramel, you're like I just can't go back to stop lights.

Let me say, do you do you still get people that I mean I'm sure do you get people that give you negative feedback about the roundabouts? Oh, for sure. So, what are you going to do now? We're like, we're way too far down. If you don't if you if you despise roundabouts, like you probably didn't pick the right spot. Let's be honest.

It's harder for some of our older adults who maybe move to the community to be near family or some of those who are maybe starting to not drive as much, right? Maybe because vision challenges or they just don't like they you keep you moving a lot of times. Uh definitely definitely keep you moving quicker than you would with a signalized or stoplight intersection. So some of our older adults are have challenges. I have one fantastic resident in the home place area who emails me regularly and says, "Now you're you're surrounding me with roundabouts and what am I going to do?" I go to Nora all the time for my doctors and what have you.

And so, you know, we've actually sent one of our paramedics to her and she cut her finger and she didn't have a ride. uh we go a mobile integrated health uh division and so we sent them to her to check out her finger because she didn't feel comfortable driving. I think she's 89. So um we we're laughing because our engineer said we always say that you know roundabouts for those from 8 to 80 and so he's like I got to expand is the 8 to 88 we to 90 you know that we we can make sure that this is safe for everybody. Yeah. Wow.

I think also back to the design stuff you talked about or you were asking about earlier, a lot of the principles that principles that Carmel has been built on is the principles of walkability. And so that has a very specific design standards as far as uh making sure that people aren't walking past big huge openings of buildings because it feels unsafe to walk. Um like a big garage entrance that's four six lanes open versus one smaller entrance. Um lighted pathways, wider sidewalks and on and on. Tree tree lawns right where trees separate you from the car. on street parking where the cars separate you from um as a walker from moving traffic.

So, uh Carmel's had that as well as then again this European aesthetic. Um there's been an architect that works for um Pedcore uh that for many many years who has built I think over 42 um buildings in Carmel and that has had their beautiful architectural. So, we have a high bar for AR architecture and as we look across the country, you know, having trying to build more houses for people because we have such a housing shortage in the country. Uh they're trying to um mandate cities relax those standards. And frankly, I'm kind of happy that we're almost built out. Uh because I don't want to relax the standards for architecture.

Yeah. When you say almost built out, does that mean there's like you're there's no more space? Like land locked. We can't annex anymore. We're we have cities all around us. How does that work if you were to annex and when was the last time that happened?

Uh that was probably home place and it happened um gosh what was the final year? Probably cuz it was on hold for a little while. They fought it then it was on hold. Um I'm going to say it happened in like 2018 19. I have to look that up. So what was Home Place?

Home Place is a area of the south part of town. So, east of 31, uh, south of roughly 111th Street, over to Westfield, almost to Keystone, right? There's a there's a big square there. Oh, very, very early um settlement in Indiana. They were an unincorporated community until 2016. And then, thank you for 2016.

Wow. And it was in one of my it was near the start of one of my council terms there. So, and a great community. It's some of our older housing stock. They're singlestory. They're more affordable.

It's mature trees. Uh lots of green there. And so, you know, they've been worried about us making another Midtown Caramel right in home place because we've been growing and um you know, redeveloping different parcels. And uh we worked with the residents really carefully in 24 and 25 to develop an own an own plan for that area to protect the integrity of that community. I know. So, this is like there's it's 106 in College.

kind of like the center of place. And this is the one again I'm 29. I bought my first house, you know, and it's very, you know, starter home. And that's where I drive through. I'm like, oh, like this part looks like someone like as you were coming up like a starter home or like a first family, like those kind of places cuz then I feel like it is what it is. Like real estate is not necessarily the cheapest in Midtown Carmel.

It's like you probably have to be a little either independently wealthy or like further along in your career if you're going to get like right on Midtown. Yeah. Oh, for sure. But this is a spot where you can be close to a lot of of Caramel. And I'll say it it looks more of like a starter home that like is typical. And they're beautiful homes and great people, a lot of longtime residents.

We also have a lot of rentals in the area. So, I'm concerned about that cuz I don't want the cultural to change of the folks that live there because um we love that people really care for that area. Now, they have really suffered for a 2-year very long project road project and it's going to open this month and I'm so excited. We're doing a street party next week. Is that the college a part? Oh gosh.

Yeah. All right. Massive. That's part of it though. They talk about this where you always even though it stinks, you want construction to be happening. Like I think that that's like a a part of whether it's universities or municipalities.

It's like if you don't have construction worker like if you don't have construction happening like you're not going the right way. Like is that something that you guys feel? Well, it's what our residents say they want, right? They're really proud of good roads. They want they move to Karma for you know newer roads, better maintained roads and so we better maintain them. Yeah.

So this uh when I became mayor, we uh doubled our road road repaving budget. And so this year really feels strong because not only a lot of road repaving, we also have a infrastructure bond. We're doing some more roundabouts and some other investment in our road and street network. And people like, oh my gosh, the construction there's it's all over the city. Like you you can't spend more, not do more, right? Yeah.

I literally said uh if I ever wanted to like if you wanted to win mayor of Indianapolis just like campaign from an asphalt truck. Like you just go out there like I'm marking lot. I'm just going through neighborhoods and I'm just like putting down asphalt and that's how I would win. And like honestly I think that people would get behind that. I actually wanted to make a video. I actually have two video ideas that I'm curious.

One of them was going out and seeing how many uh how many potholes I could fill in 24 hours. I think people would love that. The other one, which this is a concept that we might need to collaborate on, I wanted to see if you could go from the souththeast corner of Caramel to the northwest corner of Caramel without hitting a roundabout. Like is like I wanted to go through and see if there was a pathway on Okay, so not taking like 31, not taking Keystone, but going from one corner to the opposite corner, seeing if there is a route that does not have a roundabout. Like wouldn't that be interesting? Yeah, I don't think we can, but we're going to we're going to challenge our engineering team to look at that.

It's like, okay, how do I It's like, you know how it says there's like a a void roundabouts or sorry, there's like an avoid highways thing. It's like I wanted to go through and it's like you'd be you'd be going through and you come to roundabouts. Okay, well, I have to like take that backwards now and see how long it would take me to like kind of maze my way through. I thought that people would find that so fascinating. It's like silly what the internet loves, but that would be something. Well, every cross of Keystone has a roundabout on it.

So, you that's going to be a challenge for you right there. Oh, boy. But I think maybe if you cut through some neighborhoods, you might be able to do it. I know there's, you know, I'm super proud. I can go to the airport and not hit a stoplight. Oh, and I live in Northeast Caramel.

I'm almost in the river. So, I can go far northeast Caramel to the to the river without excuse me, to the airport without hitting a stoplight. Wow. I just think that would be so fascinating because it literally like And is is that truly a thing at the roundabout capital of America? Yes. Like no one has more roundabout.

I saw the one thing that you put out last April Fools about the the threedimensional roundabout. I I laughed cuz I think that that is an interesting piece too of like having a personality and and a sense of humor about it. You know, it's like, oh yeah, this is funny, but it also is what we own, but we don't take ourselves too seriously. We're actually going to do some and we we got to find a sponsor. We don't have dollars sitting around to do this, but I think I can do this. Uh little tokens for every different roundabout.

kind of a collectible, but doing it in a way you got to go to a certain business to get it, right? So, everyone likes collecting. You gota have the whole set. Uh, so like you're like old school like state capital or state quarters. It's like you're collecting your roundabouts. Exactly.

That's exactly Little Wooden ones we want to do. It's like almost to the uh cuz you know anything about Strava. It's like the running social media, but like they are local legends. So like I run through from my house through Broadripple Park to Broadripple and it's like if you do it the most times in a week, you're like the local legend of this little stretch. And so it's like you're the local legend of the 106 roundabout. Like you've hit this I love it 60 times in the last week.

Like congrats. You're the local leader. We talked about can we get these coins? Can each roundabout have a personality or whatever? And I'm like now that's taking it too far and that's kind of get corny, right? So but people love the roundabouts.

Yeah. I uh especially with the art like that's in the center. You could definitely tie something like that in together. We did have a funny conversation. I was walking dry for a breakfast lunch breakfast meeting this week and I heard this lady saying to a gentleman in the parking lot, "Uh-huh, we have them all over the city and yes, some are two lane, some are one lane." She's given the whole roundabout 101.

He's like, "That's incredible." Wow, that's so funny. We kind of talked about like, you know, roundabouts. Like people might have issues with roundabouts and it's like even when you're the number one place to live in the country, there's still, I don't know, challenges that, you know, citizens might bring to you. Absolutely. Like what are the things you feel like citizens are coming to you with and like what are the big priorities as you're moving forward with Caramel?

Uh public safety uh first and foremost. Uh people love that we are a safe community and they want to keep it a safe community. So as we have how do you do that? Like what you're you're here. You're not out like a like fighting crime, you know. How do you as a mayor make a place safer?

Well, first of all, you go hire two really great chiefs. Yeah. Right. Um, but again, you can use data to look at what you know what our challenges are. You listen for people because I think there's a disconnect between what the data says, how people feel. Uh, so people don't feel safe in a particular area and it goes to perception versus maybe what reality we've seen historically.

Again, I'm not I'm not here to bash my own neighborhood cuz I love it here. But it's like a lot of people like there were some some unfortunate circumstances that happened uh 3 or 4 years ago here in Broadripple and it has gotten that like the perception is way different than reality and a lot of people oh my gosh you live in this area and it's just like it snowballed into this like craziness where the perception is worse than reality and like you're spot on with that when you say like you got to get out in front of these things. Absolutely. But we also talk about it all the time when we did that survey. Again, public safety super far. So I knew right there, that was the number one thing.

I knew that anyway, but to see the data there. Um, so we talk about what our challenges are. We're out in the community a lot. Our police and fire officers, the men and women that serve are in our community. They don't just wait till there's a call and alarm goes off or, you know, call comes over the radio. They are serving our community.

And that looks different though. Like I don't know what the rates are. All right. I'm not a huge I don't know the data in front of me, but like let's say violent crime in Carmel, Indiana, I have to assume is not super high. It's one of the lowest in the country. So then what we are going to keep it that way.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Which I love. And so I'm wondering like when when people say I'm I want public safety to be a top priority, what kind of things are you out there? Like what are the the biggest changes that need to be made to go from where you are to where you want to be?

So first of all, we're using technology differently. Uh we have drone first responder technology which is incredible. Uh so we're also partnering with the county on a real-time information center. So how those kind of work together? Yeah. Uh a 911 call comes in and says, "Hey, um I'm making this up.

Uh I see um uh someone lurking around the outside of a convenience store or a gas station or a building, whatever." Yeah. And so that goes into dispatch, which is a county because we have one dispatch center per county in Indiana. and and the real-time information center, they can hear those calls as well. And they're probably dispatching the drone, getting it up in flight, so that as that call is coming in, the location's coming in, they're already on the way. And they're flying, you know, as the crow flies, not necessarily, you know, through roundabouts.

So, they get there super fast. What? And so by the time that officer and they can, we're now starting to direct dispatch um cars as a 911 call comes into. So, they're getting there faster. And um so that drone could be overhead and say, "Yes, there's someone hiding behind the dumpster or um he just took off down, you know, pick a street." So it's giving our officers better information as they're responding.

Yeah. And that can go the same for there's a car accident on US 31 at 116th Street and the drone could be overhead saying they're standing outside their car or there's a car upside down in in the median or whatever. So you at least like cuz the first thing you have to do is like assess the situation when you get there and it's like you're getting fed and like you're going to come up on this and it's going to look like this and you know uh something looks horribly wrong like you got to get in there ASAP. The police drone was also flew over one of the we had an apartment uh complex fire in 24 and you talk about social post that was one of the most um hit social post I had because it was a thermal imagy imagery of this apartment building with all these different colors right you could see the hot spot clearly in the one corner of the building. So the drone saying, "Hey, it looks like that fire is, you know, here."

So as they're rolling into it, the fire department has more information. Um, so those types of technologies we're investing in. I'm super proud. We're one of only 10 cities in the country um to be partnering with a company called Quake Technologies on this really cool um firefighter helmet technology. So it's a little computer that sits on the fire helmet and this has had I think 15 or more years of development. So it's not like a yesterday project they've been working on.

uh Congress has supported it and now we're finally one of the 10 cities that get to truly pilot it. It drops down a piece of glass uh it's called C the letter C hyphen through and so when they walk into a fire which was very often very dark very right smoky environment I can I can only imagine right uh so it be you know if you turn the lights off in this room and all of a sudden the desk and you and I are outlined in neon green uh so it's this edge technology that they're able to use so our firefighters can see and I I tried it out we did something at our safe house which is a an educational facility we have we use theatrical smoke to to smoke out an area. And I didn't realize, but they had a dummy on the ground. Um, so I could kind of see the forire the firefighters around me, but when it would drop the glass down, I could see that there's that dummy right there. I had no idea. Normally, you'd have to feel your way through being low.

So, very interesting technology. And so, that allows us to get in and out of a fire, get the victims in and out of the fire, which includes pets, right? And then also, um, the firefighters exposed to less carcinogen. And that's the number one killer of firefighters is cancer. So those kind of technologies we're trying to lead on, right? Um because I feel there's a deep responsibility.

Um when you've got a lot of um basically we've had a a healthier budget than other cities do, there's a responsibility there to push the edge and lead and learn and make sure our men and women who serve know that we care about them and their health as well as the families who support them back home, but also the other communities can learn from what we're doing. Wow. I think that's super super cool. It is cool. Um I mean when you talk about building a place that people want to be like are there I mean I know for you guys it's beautiful safe and beautiful safe clean beautiful like for other leaders out there if let's say you were picked up and you were put in random Iowa city okay like what advice would you have to start to take steps towards becoming thing number one, like what can people do? What can local residents do?

What can the people of Caramel do to make Caramel even better? Like if you could talk to everybody one-on-one, could give advice, you can talk about what you guys have done and how you can continue to get better, what would that be? I think it's saturate yourself in the voice of the customer and your customers, the residents and the investors of that community. They're the people who maybe live there for generations, the people invested there, you know, sign a mortgage, right, to put a business there. I mean, those are your deepseated constituents that you really need to listen to. How do you I feel like that would be hard like taking in all of this information.

People on one side, people on the other side, people who love roundabouts, people who hate roundabouts, people who love and like you don't want to discredit anyone like cuz everyone has a reason that they are allowed to feel however they feel about roundabouts. That's an easy one for example. And you still have to take all that in. And at the end of the day, you have to make the decision, well, we're going to put up another one or we're not going to put up another one. Like I feel like that would just be challenging because you have to listen to people who might all have good ideas and good reasons for feeling how they feel, but it not might not be right for everyone. Like that that just seems a hard thing to balance.

You know, there's an element to I mean I think you need to understand clearly the culture of the community and their history and you know what their problems and their pain points are and what their dreams and visions are. All of that goes into something you distill it down to your vision. But again you take Henry Ford, he didn't ask people you what do you want? They're going to say a faster horse, right? A lighter buggy. You know, they weren't coming up with the car.

And so, you know, same thing with the iPhone. There is, you do have to sometime take leaps of faith with where you see the world going and try to again look at your strengths, your weaknesses, your opportunities, your threats, just like any business does with the SWAT analysis and say, "Okay, this is what people are yearning for, wanting or here's where our successes have been." Because I am a person that feels you should build off your strengths and not just try to wipe out your weaknesses, right? build off your strengths, build on the assets you have, and get momentum. Yeah. So, we talked about the brewery, right?

Some, you know, cities think get a brewery. We we've made it. There is something to be said though, though, for taking a maybe a downtown that's maybe hasn't had any investment and putting a key element there that you can then build around. Yeah. And so whatever that looks like, it might be a brewery, it might be an incredible um innovative shop uh that's bringing young talent in. It could be a park.

Uh it just that's where each community has identity of their own. And that can't be overlooked. Each community has to have an identity. And I think that so many places get wiped out trying to be a little bit of something to everyone. Mhm. And it's like you do want to have access to a bunch of different things, but you should have an identity where it's like, you know, we are I mean I think like one of the best examples was I mean that's not a good example today, but in like the 50s like Gary was the city of the century.

It was a steel town for like hard-nosed industrial workers. They made a ton of money. Like again, you put all your eggs in one basket and you know what happens there. But having an identity, the region in Indiana has an identity. the South Bend has an identity. Evans, Caramel has an identity and a lot of these places I feel like uh when you start to have a a lot of voices coming in, it's like you get a lot of good information, but then you just become everything to everyone and you don't have the true identity of like an ambitious place that is striving to be innovative.

And I don't know, I just think that that is that's an interesting take and and you mentioned like we're we're gritty here, right? And so I saw a realtor post something on TikTok. Uh someone sent it to me and was like, "Oh, we don't like Caramel. It's it's it's not gritty. It doesn't have authenticity." Uh you know, that's a perfect example of we're not going to be for everybody.

We're family focused. Yeah. And that is Caramel's identity, right? We're families move to Caramel and stay and because they want that environment for their little children. You know, I did a um an event at the library for um Earth Day with kids had drawn some cute posters, whatever. Two families stayed afterwards and both wanted to tell me that they had moved here because they couldn't let their one one was actually both were from California, one was from San Diego and said I had a home out had an 8 by8 patch of grass out front and I couldn't let my child play in the front yard and we said that's it.

We we can't stay here anymore. And so they did a Google search and found you know best places to live and Caramel popped up and the next family is the same thing was like hey we just wanted something that was cleaner and but people took more pride in their community and we found Caramel. That's who we are. We're, you know, we have 20somes, my son included, who's 24. Mom, we need more bars like Broad. I'm like, we've got Broad right next to us.

You can visit that. Dude, you guys are stealing market cap for going out. Like, oh, there's a stretch there where it's like, what the heck? Like the And that's okay. We can't. That doesn't have to be our new identity.

Right. Right. But it's like this is what's crazy to me. I I love this. So, when I graduated college in 2019, this is like such This is how it happens. It's a slippery slope when you become like the back in my day and this is what I'm saying.

Back in my day again, Caramel is is that is families. It's safe. It's a great place to raise a family. I could never never have imagined graduating college and saying, "You know where I'm going? Caramel, Indiana." And there are so many people that are moving to Caramel as a 22-year-old.

And I'm just like, what? And it's like the amenities. You have like the goat and you have the rooftop bar and you have Sun King and you have all this stuff and it's like literally Broadripple is competing with Caramel and I would say not doing well on the going out vibe going out scene which is crazy. There's crossover but we're not identical, right? And so we may be competing in part of it but if you want the the whole walkable like a two, you know, two fun vlogs of that's not caramel but we have to the goat three up sun king all right in a walkable area that's safe. is it's a Dora district, right?

So, you can have your cool Dora glass and hang out with your friends and uh and it's all like that's all very super safe and super clean and so people enjoy that. I feel like we we we have been super intentional. I think that's what a great city has to have intentionality and so when cities swing the pendulum back and forth all the time. So, this is where people only listen to their constituents only like today's constituents want this and then in four years or 8 years now constituents want something else. That's dangerous and you have to have long-term planning and investment. Yeah.

Being very intentional about that. Like here's where we're headed. That's the point in the shore that we're going. May you drift a little bit, right? Maybe maybe the shor line moves just a little over time with technology and innovation and um you know how talent moves. Yeah, for sure.

Yeah. Uh we didn't have bars before and Mona may Mona and Maine. Now we do. Um but we do need a place for some of our older teens to hang out. That is something we're intentionally we're trying to be intentional about with some of the new investment um that will come to the city. Um we need a giant sports bar.

So um you know we have so many people who want to root for our amazing Colts or Pacers and also Carmel High School teams. We need we need a we need a great sports bar for people to hang out. We've got smaller ones. You heard it. Yeah. What I love about it too is it's like not a lot of like big chainy stuff, you know?

It's not like giant national chains. It's like local stuff. It's it's I don't know familiar which is cool. I think there's going to be a mix, but we love the we love the smaller chains. I think is really is really effective in Indiana alone, right? In central Indiana, Hamilton County in particular, those with Cunningham Group's perfect, right?

They whole whole bunch of residents, but they're local. They understand Indiana, dude. One of my favorite spots uh is the new 1933. Like that whole vibe is just amazing. And a home, right? Absolutely.

The final thing I wanted to talk about before we talk all things Indiana is your journey to becoming mayor and one like you you did 12 years on the city council. Your predecessor is there for 28. It's like that's no matter what you say it's like everyone will at some point say like oh well this is not the way that Jim did it. This is not the way like blah blah blah blah. Like that's a hard thing I feel like to subject yourself to. on top of caramel as a stigma, on top of everyone once you like become a mayor or any sort of politician, you're in the limelight, you know, like people just all of a sudden have opinions on social media or wherever about you and what you're doing and how it's going.

Like why was running for mayor and why was being the mayor of Carmel, Indiana the right choice for you and why did you want to do it? First, I love this community and I want to make sure that we could continue s to succeed and Jim had done such incredible transformation transformational things in our community. I want to make sure that those continue. But I saw an opportunity with my skill set to modernize as we talked a little bit about to again use my background in marketing and you know customer service work to really kind of um be more present in the community in a different way than Jim was. And I just felt it was an opportunity that that my background and skills and desire were a good fit to follow Jim. You know, I think being mayor, it's like running the eternal relay race, right?

You're just passing on the baton to the next leader every single time. You just got to make sure you run your leg really well and you set that city up, that race up, right, just to continue to win. And so that was really important to me. It was not a a journey that I you know I wasn't a kid who went through you know wasn't the class president government leader none of that type of stuff that never interested me. Yeah. Um I was a leader and so I like to lead and stick my head in things and I felt like um undergraduate in sports medicine.

So this performance improvement thing kind of came from that. You know watching coaches try to get teams better and better and better and being part of that team. like I want to take that next step and lead and really like I want to challenge myself personally as well as push the community forward. Yeah. Really happy I did it. It's been and it's an amazing job.

It's I mean being mayor is the best job in the world. Uh there are some days it's hard. I you know was joking with my street department director today. I'm like hey I've got a social post teed up. I'm going to put the digital flack jacket on and just start start talking about road construction and see what questions people have. the digital flack jacket.

I'm going to use that like You're welcome cuz it's true. And I don't know for you, do people come up and have um do they talk to you about their complaints in person? Yeah, absolutely. I usually get, you know, out to eat or grabbing a glass of wine or just walking like, "Hey, I'm sorry to bug you, but if I didn't want that, I wouldn't be out and about." But it's like some of the things that are said when you're behind a keyboard or a screen about like just how nasty or rude or whatever that could be. Like how often does that happen where someone comes up and like cusses you out and says like you're ruining a place or whatever it might be?

I think I've had one really negative interaction in person since I've been mayor. It's really it's really rare that the anonymity is really strong. I mean there was a point when I was running for office I was called for for mayor that I was both called a communist and a fascist on the same day online. Like that's not possible. Yeah. It's like, you know, that's just like a little bit above a little bit above.

But like that's the thing when I started to get some traction and it was just like I don't know. I would say what we put out is pretty pretty straightforward, not polarizing for the most part. It's like fun-hearted. You're telling stories. You're learning about Indiana. You're learning about the people in your communities that are making a big impact.

And it's like someone goes on and comments like, "It's people like you who are ruining the city of Indianapolis." And I'm like, "Me? Ruining? But like not once, actually one time ever has someone like came up and said something negative to me to my face. And I'm like, man, like if you haven't, again, your job as the mayor is to listen. Like that was you would not have signed up for this if if you didn't like to listen to people and distill all that information and then go make change.

And it's like I don't know. I just think that that's so interesting to count on one hand and then mount because if you come up and you're going to just say it right to my face, I respect it. I might not agree with you, but I'll at least respect it, you know? But it's like you get behind there and you're complaining about this that or the other thing. But I guess that's what you sign up for as mayor. It is.

It's part of the job. And you know, it's challenging. I remember at one point during uh the mayoral campaign, I had to call my son at IU and say, "Hey, you're probably going to see some hate on Instagram. Do not engage." Yeah. Put the phone down and walk away.

Right. Not that he's much on social, but I just didn't want him to like feel he has to defend his mom. Like this happens. It is what it is. Um I mean, I talk with every politician on any side of any aisle. Like I always say that too about mayor.

It's like nobody cares about like your stance on like global issues or whatever as the mayor of a place which is crazy. Like it shouldn't matter. It's like like I say it's like dude you know when you start to get up higher and you're in like the you know Senate or Congress or the governor or whatever there. It's like okay that gets pretty political. It's like you're just here in the mayor spot to try to make the place the best place possible. It's like that part's wild to me.

They know that's one of the people say, "What's the first thing you do in the day?" Well, I'm ne, you know, sadly I pick up my phone and look at it, but it get a good cortisol hit before I even see the first thing because we're an international community. So, what's happened overseas? Maybe maybe having people very upset right in my backyard. Oh, yeah. I didn't think about that.

Uh, that's a challenge. I was like, what happened overnight that I'm not aware of? Because if it's something bad in my community, something's going to wake me up. Yeah. But if it's something overseas, it's something with international relations, uh, or something, you know, in another state or, you know, a tragedy in the United States, those are things I there's a there's a quarter of a second that I'm worried and I see my phone, it's like, okay, um, all is well. See, that is like my um like I have blinders totally and I'm like open to it and it's like what's helped us grow on social media.

It's like if it is within the geographical constraints of Indiana, I probably know about it. But if it's outside, I'm just like I've just become hyper fixated on everything Indiana. So I never thought about that. It's like well what's happening around the country and around the world like does impact like if you have an international population, if you have, you know, large amounts of transplants or wherever like that can make a huge impact. That that's really interesting. And different cities are different.

Again, it's like if you may have a large Korean manufacturer in your city or something like that and so what's happening in Korea is going to man matter to you. maybe not how you run your city at all, but there are people who have family, you know, in that community perhaps if there's a some kind of violent um insurrection somewhere. So, yeah. And then it's like like that's the piece too. It's like if you're informed, it's like, well, maybe people will be out standing in solid or protesting or doing whatever or like organizing and you're like, oh, I at least know what this is about and I can like absolutely, you know, sympathize or understand or see where your constituents are coming from. That's that's fascinating.

Well, I think I could talk all day. Uh, this has been so much fun. We have a few final fun questions for you. 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 home isjart.

com. JC Hart located in Carmel, Indiana. They're doing the new spot, right? I'm pretty sure. Yes, exactly. There's a new apartment building being built on the Monan, right?

New one on extension. They have a beautiful one there as well. Midtown Flats. Midtown Flats. And then there's a new one going in right by the giant slide thing that looks just incredible. Go down it.

It's super fun. I have I know you get up there and do that. Um the question for you is why do you call Indiana home? I moved here two years out of college for a job uh with no friends or family here and so took a little bit of a flyer and moved to Loganport. Logansport. Go Berries.

Exactly. I was there for two years before moving to Indianapolis. So I was hooked on the kindness I who's your hospitality Indiana nice rob whatever it is but the kindness of the people in Indiana and that has proven itself to be valued over and over and over again. So I am all in on Indiana and the and the statewide culture that we have here. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, now we have some rapid fire ones for you.

What's your favorite trail in Caramel? Favorite trail in car? I'll take the Monan trail out of it because we talk about that all the time. Yeah. Um I love the piece of trail that goes along the White River. I live in Northeast Carmel and there's a trail now from 146th Street that goes down through the river through kind of past Prairie View Golf Course and then it loops in over to the river around um as River Road turns to 122nd Street down 116th Street.

There's incredible views. It's quieter. It's peaceful. Lots of nature. As someone who just spent 5 days on the White River, I'm going to take a pass from that trail for a little bit, but I'll go check it out when I'm ready to be a river guy again. Um, that's No, there's some good SP.

This is what's crazy. I took little screenshots of like where we were along the river. So, we went from Muny down to Indianapolis. It was a crazy journey. 5 days camped along the river. Um, and I took screenshots and it's like where my little dot is, it's like you're in the center of urban society, but when you get down close to the river, yes, it is not commercial.

It is you were in nature. Like you could not tell me like every now and again maybe you'll hear a car or something, but it's like it feels like I'm on a back road in the middle of Putnham County. It's crazy. Eagles nest over there. It's just really pretty. So it's amazing.

Okay. What's one caramel project that you're personally excited to see coming up in the next few years? Uh we have been working a lot on uh the CNO land which is 68 acres close to 116th and 31. We'll just say generically and uh that's old uh conco headquarters, CNO insurance uh headquarters campus, corporate campus. And it we want to create basically a very beautiful dynamic mixeduse space with lots of um office space, you know, for corporate headquarters cuz we're built for that. Uh restaurants, occasional bars, entertainment.

Okay. This is over like where Open Lane is like that area. Uh the other side of the street. Okay. Yeah. So by the Renaissance Hotel kind of you know where that is.

Okay. So, northeast quadrant of roughly 116th Street in US 31. US 31 has had increasing vacancy. This is in that that corridor and we really we have a someone has an option on that land now. uh and they're going through due diligence and I'm super excited about that because that is the basically the same size as our whole Midtown area and to be able to build that with one developer with one vision in mind because Midtown was started by amazing Justin Moffett with Oldtown Design Group and then built in around it were allied solutions as you talked to Pete. Um, and this is another area that can complement Caramel, the be on our path network, have another offering that um because Midtown sometimes super super busy.

Uh, and so another offering with more shopping. I mean, our office space is at in the central core is at 2% vacancy. Our our our apartments are full. We have 1% retail vacancy. I mean, it's it's cooking, right? But we need more space, more opportunity, and that is an amazing opportunity.

Yeah, I love that. Okay. What caramel event is a I mean obviously you go to all the events but if there was one where everyone needs to go to Caramel Indiana for an event throughout the year what would that be? So I'm going to put aside caramel fest which is our city celebration at the 4th of July because I'm assuming everyone else is celebrating their own communities. Yes. It would be Artmobilia.

Artobilia. Yeah. Have you been there? No. John Letter has done an incredible job bringing in high-end sports cars, classic cars, unique cars and so we've had incredible. So the streets are there's no traffic on a section of range, a section of Main Street.

There's um you know cars up Monan Boulevard and then you've got live music and fun food. It's super chill. It's incred the car the automobiles that are there. Incredible. Oh my gosh. You're looking at it now, huh?

It's beautiful. I found the the page. If you are like a car person, I'm like looking at the aerial shot on this cuz there's like some Yeah. Some like supercar looking stuff. Absolutely. That's wild.

And they have them, you know, by year, by vintage, you know, there just some really, really incredible machines there. Wow. And a lot of activations around it. So, yeah. Okay. So, they do there's like little things you can register for.

So, there's like the Porsche Classic, the Lotus Palooa, BMW Palooa Pares, and Automobile has stuff throughout the year, too. So, that might be some of what you're looking at. No, on that day there's like meetups, too, for like car owners, like specific models. That's crazy. And then we also do caramel on canvas at that time. We have artists positioned around the city.

So we've had them at different times of the year. The last year and this year we're doing it through Artmobilia. And so really cool um art comes out of that as well. That's amazing. Wow, that one sounds cool. Artia is so colorful.

It's so beautiful. Yeah. All right, we come to the final part of the show where we ask every guest who comes on the same three questions. So this first one 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? I'm going to say just our state park system in general.

Yes. But um like Shades is a state park and Turkey run like those parks people think we're all corn anyway. Yeah. But the topography and the trail systems in those types of parks are incredible. So I'm kind of going to lump it together. Yeah.

I had to pick one. Shades is pretty cool. Shades is like Shades is Turkey run without the as many people. Agree. It gets a good little spot. You get hit with bad weather, right?

So, it was some stuff, you know, they had to repair there, but it's incredible. Love that. Okay, next. This is how we get guest recommendations and learn about other Hoosiers that are inspiring and the people just need to know about who's a Hooser. We need to keep on our radar. Someone who's doing big things.

There's a young man uh in Carmel who's both developing film and also does his own soundtracks. Um, I'm totally space his first name, but Glackman. It's just incredible. Um, and I just that kid is I'm just so impressed with him. How do you spell last name? G L E C K M A N.

We're getting good press right now. Yeah, come on. But he did a um an eight part uh series for the History Channel. He just did one on a a a murder. Oh. In Indiana that was unsolved.

Ashton. Ashton Glman. Uh I love his energy. I love his vision. Uh and he's just an incredible kid. You should have him on.

I mean, so he does like all sorts of film making. He does. Uh he just got an award here for the indie shorts I just read. So he's just incredibly talented. Um a good person. Really wants to tell stories, you know, and uh so he's got some stuff on YouTube you can check out.

He's got his, you know, stuff on his social pages. But I'm just I'm impressed with this kid and I'm his super one of his biggest fans. I know his family's right there, but I'm just one of his biggest fans. And I just think he's got a huge bright future in front of That's amazing. I I just love it when there are inspiring creatives across Indiana that are like doing cuz it's so unique and different. I would say for the most part in Indiana like we are a very traditional like you know you work in finance or you know you work in you're an accountant or a lawyer or whatever.

And when you see someone who's like, I'm a filmmaker or like they're doing these creative things, it's like that helps fuel like the soul of a place and it just makes it like it's hard to say like the ROI of having a filmmaker, but when you can do a movie screening or have a film festival or like all those arts and culture pieces, that's really important. That's really cool. Ashton Glickman. Yeah. And not only do you have to be creative, you have to have a business mind, right? Because you have to be seen or heard uh if you're in in the arts and culture world.

So yeah, it's like the old time race car drivers, right? Where they would have to bring a basically a a briefc case of cash to get a ride. You know, you had to figure out how to do that to get an opportunity. And some of these young um creatives also have to do something to make sure they understand the business side as well as the creative side. Yeah, cuz that's the fun part. Like if all we had to do is just sit here and like have podcast and talk about it, it would be so easy.

I would love this. I do love it. But it's being able to put together the whole thing that that's what makes the magic happen. All right, your final question. So you talk about coming to Indiana, living in Loganport, moving to central Indiana, opening the IU North campus, talking about being in city council with Carmel, then to mayor. When you close your eyes and think about it, what is your favorite Indiana memory?

I have one really specific. Yeah. Uh first, I am a huge race fan and love everything Indianapolis Motor Speedway. I had the amazing blessing when I was an Indiana donor network. It was over external engagement and we um we sponsored a couple different cars and we're the primary sponsor there to get the word out about organ donation and transplantation. And so one year our driver was Steph Wilson who's an amazing person.

Um his brother uh was an organ donor uh was a former indie car driver and so he was driving to honor him a couple different years and we were partnering in that venture and he's what you know Indianaans will call Hoosiers will call a one-off driver, right? He rides he drives for the Indy500 only doesn't drive the whole circuit. That's hard. It's hard to win the Indianapolis 500 with um just driving once a year. And um as a team, we we had prep for everything, every possible outcome. And we're in the stands and cheering him on.

And it got to lap 195 and he all of a sudden is in the lead. And it occurred to all of us that this is, you know, a fuel game, right? He he outlasted others who had to pit and all of a sudden he's in the first place. like we never thought that winning might be an outcome. And we're just sitting with sheer panic in the stands as you're also like so happy for him and the team that works so hard to put the car on the track and and again for our mission that we're trying to save lives and we're like this could be incredible. Please throw a yellow so this guy wins this race.

He did not. But it was like that moment was so fun because I felt it was all the Indiana, you know, the heartbreak of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. amazing stories of winners that come out of there just for, you know, for a century or more. And it was just like we never thought win. We planned for everything that could happen except winning the race. That's honestly not bad because it's like you got maybe a lap or two of good press.

Oh, incredible. That's like I I always say this about depending on if he gets a full-time ride next year, but Connor Daily, it's like he always finds his way to the front and leads a few laps. So, like if you're a sponsor on his car, you're at least going to get like usually some notoriety up at the front. Uh, which is wild. That that would be that's a really specific but very fun memory. Like I can just only imagine like the feeling when like so so we've interviewed a few of the drivers and like I get that feeling or a similar feeling whenever anyone that I actually know makes it to the front.

We had Connor on. We've had him on twice now. So when he gets to the front I was like let's freaking go. When Pota was out front I'm like oh my gosh let's go. Like so when you know them it just makes it so special. It really does.

It was similar feeling honestly as we're all standing jumping up and down. It was you know when Hallebertton hit the three to the first playoff game there was like that same kind of just absolute you know craziness and that hit us. Wow. What do we do if we win? Yeah. Holy smokes.

I love it. Well, it has been a pleasure learning more about Carmel, Indiana, learning more about your journey through I know just public service cuz that's really, you know, everyone kind of like says that in a cliche way, but it really is. It's like absolutely you subject yourself out there to again, you're going to get people when you're out at dinner, someone's going to come up and say, I hate to be a bother, but and like that's almost guaranteed, right? It's like you signed up for this. You are the mayor of Carmel, Indiana, the number one place to live in the country. And and I think a lot of people think that that might be easy.

It's an honor and a privilege and a big huge challenge. Yeah. And that's fun. And so, uh, I just really appreciated getting to know you. Uh, getting to hear the story and what you're working on and, you know, all the different ways. I hope that if there are other municipal leaders out there, um, they get a chance to learn from like your approachableness.

You know what? It's like, hey, you might be the mayor of Caramel, but it's not like, you know, you're too cool for school. Like, I remember I saw you at an event and we just like chatted it up there and it was like, oh wait, like the mayor of Caramel is like super cool and fun and chill, you know, which is a good thing. Like obviously you get a lot of stuff done, but you're approachable. I think that's like one of the oh most underrated qualities in a mayor is like you just want to be as uh incredibly approachable so that when people have any sort of issue positive negative anything like that they can come and talk to you. So I just really appreciate that if people want to learn more about you if they want to learn more about Carmel Indiana if heaven forbid they hear this and not even heaven if people hear this and want to relocate to Caramel how can they do that?

The easiest thing is mayorcaramel. in. gov gov is my direct email, but also I'm all over social media, you know, LinkedIn, Facebook, Insta. So, hit me up and we'll glad to help you out. I love it when people are like, "I've got a friend that wants to move here from Fill in the Blank. Uh, can you talk to them or do you have a place to recommend?"

Like, bring those kind of questions on. We're here to help people. I love it. Well, this is a pleasure and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. 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 Hooer State great. We'll see you next time here on Get