KIB News & Information

STAMFORD, Conn. (February 1, 2023) – Keep America Beautiful® is proud to announce our next Affiliate of the Month. In this KAB initiative, we feature the great work being done in our network of 700 certified affiliates. Our Affiliate of the Month for January 2023 is Keep Indianapolis Beautiful.

Keep Indianapolis Beautiful is being recognized for the Innovation Awards they received from KAB in 2020 and 2021. The Keep America Beautiful Innovation Award salutes affiliates that have created innovative partnerships and programs to further the mission of Keep America Beautiful.

There will be different sites around Indianapolis where 950 Lilly employees will be doing 19 different projects to help spiff up parts of the town on Thursday as part of the Lilly Global Day of Service.

Every year, Lilly employees volunteer in local communities around the world through our Global Day of Service.

INDIANAPOLIS — Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, Inc. (KIB) announced today three new community greenspace projects for 2023, awarded as part of the organization’s AES Indiana Project GreenSpace program. This competitive process reviews applications from community groups looking to transform vacant lots into thriving neighborhood gathering places. There are nearly 60 of these greenspaces across Indianapolis, connecting people to nature, creating a sense of place, and improving community health. 

“These GreenSpaces are transforming neighborhoods and creating a safer, cleaner, greener space for communities to gather,” said Keep Indianapolis Beautiful president and CEO Jeremy Kranowitz.

The three finalists include:

Lilly Endowment Inc. has awarded Keep Indianapolis Beautiful (KIB) a $3.78 million grant to mobilize efforts to clean up litter along several busy streets and waterways in Indianapolis, furthering KIB’s mission to create and maintain vibrant public places where people and nature thrive.

Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, which plants 3,000 to 4,000 trees in the city each year, has been collecting and gathering data to help guide its planting plans for more than a dozen years. Now, it is digging even deeper into that data and working even more closely with city government to make sure those plans bene􀀁t all areas of the city in a more equitable way.

INDIANAPOLIS — What was once an eyesore in a community on Indy's west side that attracted crime and drugs, is now a community park.

WRTV has covered this story previously in the Shelton Heights neighborhood, near West Washington Street and Holt Road since 2016.

"Every morning when I get up to go to work, I come out here. It's still like a shock," Debbie Parish said.

Quick Hits

• Masks are strongly encouraged during the project check-in and demonstrations
  • Masks are optional during the project itself.
• If an event is indoors, non vaccinated volunteers are strongly recommended to wear a mask 
• Bringing your own water to a project is recommended
  • KIB will provide water for volunteers as well
• There are no group restrictions at this time for volunteers
• Social distancing as much as is feasible (little longer than a shovel between people)
• Stay home if sick or if contact was made with someone who is ill

CITY COUNTY COUNCIL PROPOSAL NO. 143, 2021

CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS-MARION COUNTY, INDIANA

SPONSOR: Councillors J. Evans, Osili and Jones

DIGEST: honors all those who contributed to the City of Indianapolis hosting a safe, successful NCAA men's basketball tournament

Keep Indianapolis Beautiful joins in the call around our nation for an end to the violence and racism directed at the Asian American and Pacific Islander community.  These senseless acts of hate that plague our country must stop. We stand in solidarity with our friends and neighbors in the AAPI community and everyone who has been affected by racial discrimination. As a community-focused environmental organization, we remain committed to bringing positive change and promoting greater equality and inclusiveness throughout all of our communities. Join us by visiting StopAAPIHate.org for more information and resources.

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It is going to be a historic month for the Hoosier State.

For the first time, the entire NCAA Tournament and practices are taking place in Indiana.

This year’s Big Dance also will run entirely on renewable energy.

March Madness will be carbon neutral event
All operations emissions from venues of tournament will be offset by renewable energy credits and carbon offsets

Quick Hits

• Masks required all the time
• Gloves strongly recommended
  • Volunteers can bring their own from home
• 25 volunteers per project leader
  • Separate meeting locations, tools, water, and hand sanitizer
• Hand sanitizer everywhere
  • Sanitizing wipes available
• Tools set out in kits before the project
• Tools sprayed with sanitizer after each project
• Encourage volunteering with a household member
  • Especially at Community Forestry projects!
• Encourage check-ins on volunteers’ personal cell phones
• Social distancing as much as is feasible (little longer than a shovel between people)
• Stay home if sick or if contact was made with someone who is ill
  • No onsite health screening or temperature check due to unreliability

Indianapolis has been labeled as the most wasteful city in the United States, according to an article from RTV6. City environmental organizations, such as the Indiana Recycling Coalition and Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, have established initiatives to offer ways for people to keep clean and live more sustainably.

READ FULL ARTICLE

A $25,000 grant from the Duke Energy Foundation is helping fund the effort, which is part of broader programs to reduce invasive species in Hamilton County and restore the White River so it can be used by residents. In place of the unwanted plants, the city will likely plant Sycamore trees and other native vegetation.

READ FULL ARTICLE

Starting in 1950, a group of Black families built a neighborhood just off Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street. Veterans had returned to Indianapolis after the war, and a self-help housing program organized a way for families to afford dwellings that would build wealth in the Black community.

Indianapolis leaders were hard at work Friday for a downtown revitalization project. Participants included board members from groups like Keep Indianapolis Beautiful, Indy Chamber and Visit Indy as well as companies like Cummins and Salesforce. They worked on cleaning, weeding, painting and landscaping projects.

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KIB is calling the campaign Art & Seek, which is a play off the popular children’s game hide-and-seek. It’s a COVID-friendly, self-guided tour through the new installations. You can find a map to the locations through a free phone app called Otocast. Within the app, you can get directions, and hear from the artists on what inspired them. It promotes people to seek the art, hence the name.

In this episode of the Indy’s Trusted Servant Show, host Danny O’Malia speaks with Jeremy Kranowitz with Keep Indianapolis Beautiful.

Several new steps are being taken to ensure the safety of our volunteers and staff. Please read this article before coming to a KIB project.

KIB's statement regarding COVID-19.

FOX59 News interviews KIB's new President and CEO, Jeremy Kranowitz, about Operation My Indy, Kranowitz's strategy to learn about all parts of Indianapolis. Krantowitz came to Keep Indianapolis Beautiful from Connecticut. Rather than immediately find a home in the city, he stayed in a different neighborhood for 15 weeks to better know his new home.

Matt McKinney reports on the City-County Council's early focus on addressing climate change in 2020.

Clean water is critical for everything we grow, eat, cook, wash and manufacture—it really is our most valuable resource.

Jill Sheridan reports on KIB's renewed partnership with the City of Indianapolis.

IPL Project GreenSpace Projects Selected for Transformation in 2020 with Keep Indianapolis Beautiful
Neighborhood diversity, building community, and addressing need underscore upcoming greenspace

Keep Indianapolis Beautiful's Director of Eduction, Heather Maurer, discusses the importance of urban forestry with other experts on WFYI's show "All In"