Greenwood’s District 1 covers much of Old Town Greenwood, the city’s growing airport and the many established neighborhoods and commercial businesses from Madison Avenue to Interstate 65, and Smith Valley Road to County Line Road, but whoever wins that seat in this year’s highly contested city council race will make decisions that impact the entire city.
Voters will decide who should get the Republican nomination for races in all city council districts this spring. Whoever wins the District 1 seat will face off against Democratic candidate Matthew Smith in the fall general election. The winner will join the other six district council members and three at-large members.
Because District 1 is mostly developed, many of the proposals that come before the council now affect other areas of the city, particularly southeast Greenwood and other parts of the city’s core, near the former middle school property.
Still, Jay Hart, a candidate for the District 1 seat, said his focus would be on his district which has issues of its own, such as torn-up streets, terrible drainage, dilapidated houses and misspelled street signs. That’s the job, Hart said. There are districts for a reason, and the folks he’s talked to on the campaign trail in District 1 feel neglected, he said.
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Incumbent Linda Gibson wants to retain control of that seat, which she has served in since 2008 when she took over for her husband, a former council member who died. Together, they have had a voice on the city council for nearly four decades.
Hart says it’s time for a new voice.
“In my candidacy, I have yet to find a single person who feels like we’re part of the growth, part of the plan. So I decided somebody needed to run to really represent the people here and carry their voice down into the city building,” Hart said.
He and his family moved to the Old Town area from Center Grove to live smaller, be closer to the interstate and refurbish an old house.
"That’s kind of my thing — fixing things that are beyond repair," said Hart, who also restores vintage motorcycles and has played and written music with bands such as Matchbox Twenty. Kyle Cook, an Indiana native and guitarist for the band, performed at Hart’s campaign kickoff event last week.
Gibson has been a mainstay in the community, having lived in the same Greenwood house since the 1980s and helped serve the community alongside her husband for most of that time.
She is running again because she enjoys serving the people, she said.
“There are so many people out there who have problems. And some people just accept it and say, ‘Well it is what it is.’ Then there are others who just really don’t know where to turn or that there is a place to turn,” Gibson said.
That’s where she comes in, she said. In her role as councilwoman, she can help her constituents find solutions, or at least point them in the direction of someone who might have answers.
Gibson is most proud of the council’s efforts to get all city employees under one roof at the Greenwood City Center, which opened in 2013, a feat that saves the city about $120,000 a year, she said. More recently, she’s proud the city was able to secure a deal with Amazon.
"We were so fortunate to get the Amazon receive center. That’s a major boost in our tax base," Gibson said.
Both candidates are supportive of the current administration’s downtown redevelopment efforts, and the growth, throughout the city, that’s followed. Gibson shares Mayor Mark Myers’ vision for the city, including a 1 percent food and beverage tax Myers says is needed to help improve public safety. Hart shares Myers’ vision to an extent, but said the city needs to spend money more cautiously and take its time when making big decisions that could drastically change the city’s small-town vibe.
“I just question some of the ways that we’re doing it. I think we’re wasting a lot of money,” Hart said. “I love the idea of having a walkable community. I do not like the idea of spending $4.9 million on playground equipment."
Both candidates support tax increment financing districts (TIFs) because they’re necessary to help expand and improve a specific area’s infrastructure, they said. Even though TIFs are a serious and sometimes necessary tool, city leaders need to be more cautious when spending those funds, Hart said.
They also both support tax abatements for new businesses because helping those businesses helps improves the city’s tax base, Gibson said.
“I think we need to be getting a lot stronger contracts with these companies, and we have to lock people into some very serious consequences (if they don’t meet those requirements), and we have to act on it,” Hart said.
Beyond District 1, both have a similar vision for development east of the I-65 and Worthsville Road interchange, which has been a hot topic lately and is something whoever wins this seat on the council will inevitably make decisions about. Neither of their visions include warehouses near the city’s newest interchange.
Gibson doesn’t want to see any warehouses further south than where they already are, she said. That’s not what the comprehensive or land-use plans area call for in that area, and she’d like to preserve Worthsville Road as much as possible, she said.
“I want Worthsville Road to stay Worthsville Road. People don’t like going past a lot of warehouses on the way to their homes, and I get that,” she said.
Hart says the city needs more entertainment options, from golf courses to live music venues, whether that be in southeast Greenwood or at the site of the former middle school.
If Hart is elected, he plans to reach out to his constituents and hand deliver news and updates to them, he said.
“People are busy with their lives. They don’t have time to attend every meeting. They’ve elected us and they’re hoping they can not even look at us and know we’re doing the work,” Hart said.
Gibson says her work isn’t done.
The city needs a solid set of building standards, she said, and an ordinance that requires commercial businesses located near residential communities to have deflectors on its lights, a case she’s been arguing for quite awhile now.
She would also like the city to pursue a variety of development options.
“We need to make sure we are enticing developers to come in, and not just home developers, but retirement and assisted living (developers). Baby boomers are living longer and millennials are trying to figure out how to take care of them,” said Gibson, who also serves as a board member at The Social, a senior center in Greenwood.
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Name: Linda Gibson
Age: 72
Family: Husband John, deceased; two adult children
Occupation: Retired from Ernst and Young LLP, current city council member
Education: Southport High School
Political experience: Greenwood City Council member since 2008
Memberships: The Social of Greenwood board of directors, Indiana Utility Shareholders Association board of directors, crime watch coordinator of Holman Heights, Forest Park, Reynolds/Longden neighborhoods, Greenwood Plan Commission, past member of Johnson County Solid Waste Management board, past president of wives auxiliary of Greenwood Jaycees, Aspire Johnson County, member of Miles for Myeloma and Greenwood First Baptist Church
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Greenwood City Council District 1
Term: Four years
Pay: $12,240 per year
Duties: Set annual spending for the city, make policy changes, adopt new local rules and ordinances, approve new taxes, appoint members to various city boards.
District 1: Represents much of Old Town Greenwood, the city’s growing airport and the many commercial businesses from Madison Avenue to Interstate 65, and Smith Valley to County Line Road.
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Name: Jay Hart
Age: 46
Family: Wife Brittney; five-year-old daughter
Occupation: Vintage motorsports fabricator, musician and record producer
Education: Frankfort High School; studied political science at IUPUI
Political experience: None
Memberships: President of the Speedway, Ind. chapter of the Antique Motorcycle Club of America
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