Plan of Action
Mary Clark leads the Lafayette Square area revitalization efforts
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When she was 8 years old, Mary Clark gathered kids her age and formed a neighborhood clean-up club. She decided which club members would be best suited to rake leaves, pull weeds or sweep off porches. She also made executive decisions about how club profits would best be spent for fun.
It’s no surprise, really, that she grew into a strong, ambitious woman who never accepts no as an answer, never gives up on a goal and still loves to clean up the neighborhood.
A few years ago, when high-traffic businesses such as Macys and other large department stores moved out of the Lafayette Square area on the northwest side, surrounding neighborhoods appeared to be at risk for a higher crime rate –– as well as a ghost-town type of existence. Many members of different cultures had moved into the area, and Clark’s vision was to bring all of them together for a growing and thriving future.
Since 2005, she’s served as president of the Lafayette Square Area Coalition, a nonprofit organization focused on celebrating community diversity and bringing new businesses into the area.
Realizing her vision
Clark has a natural knack with people –– talking to them, discovering their gifts and then putting them to work on community projects that best complement their gifts and talents.
In 2005, while working as branch manager at the National City Bank at 38th Street and Georgetown Road, Clark worked diligently with her staff to increase business at the bank and improve the bank’s ranking among other branches. Somewhere along the way, she took a moment to note that she was constantly walking into the lobby of the bank, feeling the need to introduce area business owners to each other.
“I was thinking, How do we get businesses to come into the area and stay here when no one knows anyone?”
Once a question or concern burns in this woman’s mind, she immediately seeks a way to resolve it. Clark spoke with State Rep. Jeb Bardon, a friend and a client at the bank, about her hope to bring the business community closer together. By the time she shared why it was an important task, Bardon was quickly nodding his head in agreement.
After knowing Clark for at least 10 of the 13 years he has served as State Representative, Bardon says he immediately trusted her vision.
“Mary has an unending, unbendable, constant belief and foresight,” he says. “She saw the potential for the community.”
The next step in Clark’s vision was to host a town meeting.
When 40 business owners showed up for the meeting, she and Bardon saw that they were definitely on the right track. As the meeting drew to a close that evening, “Somebody looked at me and said, ‘Well Mary, we want you to start an organization.’ So I said OK. And it happened just like that.”
A handful of meetings later, with Clark, the tireless organizer, at the helm, the Coalition was officially launched. Within those first few months, a mission statement was in place, officers were appointed and bylaws were written. Status as a nonprofit organization was achieved. Then committees began to mushroom.
Spearheaded by knowledgeable business owners in the area, the committees focused on all aspects of growth. The Land Use Committee, for example, worked on long-range plans for the area and created property maps. Their expertise won Honorable Mention this year from the American Planning Association.
“There are some awesome people involved in this organization,” Clark says with a knowing nod. “Over the course of six years, hundreds of people have been involved in one way or another. And now the residents in the area are starting to come out for the meetings too.”
Since the Coalition was launched, more than a dozen businesses have moved into this rich multicultural area where, Clark says, 70 different languages are spoken. Small-business owners now chase after the American Dream by opening restaurants, ethnic bakeries and grocery stores.
In fact, ethnic eateries are likely the most noticeable additions now springing into view. So noticeable, in fact, that a New York Times article ran last February about the Coalition and the many choices of ethnic foods along this stretch of Lafayette Road.
“I think we have around 40 ethnic restaurants now,” Bardon says. “And these are Mom-and-Pop places, the real-deal food.”
In 2004, the area qualified as a Community Revitalization Enhancement District, “so we are set up to collect sales tax and new revenue,” Bardon says. “We’re using that $750,000 for redevelopment. We’re working on Gateways to the area, which is two square miles surrounding the Lafayette Square Mall and other businesses.”
In addition, a federally funded program called Weed & Seed was brought in to “weed out” crime, drug dealers and gang activity, and the Indiana Math and Science Academy, established through Ball State University, was opened.
These wonderful Coalition accomplishments are invaluable to the community.
But still, Clark saw something lacking.
Bringing together the community
She wanted residents to meet and mingle. So she suggested that the World of Difference Cultural Parade, to celebrate diversity, was the perfect first step.
To spearhead the effort, Clark reverted to one of her best talents –– picking the perfect person to be in charge –– and that person was Indianapolis City Council member Maggie Lewis.
“Mary has this wonderful way of drawing you in,” Lewis says with a laugh. “For whatever reason, she tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to coordinate the parade.”
Soon after the first parade, which attracted 700 participants, Clark followed up with another vision she called Taste the Difference. During this now annual event, area chefs and bakers offer free samples of ethnic dishes and treats to introduce their cultures to their neighbors.
“It’s a way to showcase ethnic restaurants in the area,” says Lewis, a Coalition volunteer for five years who now serves on the board. “I think it’s very important for us to tell our story about this area.”
Clark’s excitement about the Coalition’s accomplishments grows every day, she says.
“I wake up in the night thinking about the Coalition,” Clark says with a grin. “This is my love. I love my community, but I love the city of Indianapolis too. And over the last six years, I’ve found a whole new different kind of love. This community is so diverse. I’m just so privileged to get to meet my neighbors.”
Last summer’s Taste the Difference event drew hundreds of neighbors and 20 restaurant owners, Clark says.
“We never run out of food, which is also amazing. The restaurant owners are doing this from their hearts. And somehow we always have enough for everybody.”
When she stands on stage to greet people during the Taste the Difference event, the experience is always emotional. It is heartwarming to observe so many colors, cultures and languages in one setting, she says.
“To see the fellowship, people talking and learning about each other, kids playing together. There’s nothing like it,” Clark says. “I think it’s the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”
Coalition members and supporters now work to brand the Lafayette Square area as an international marketplace. And yes, this massive undertaking involves countless hours of planning and networking. But Clark takes it all in stride. It’s not a surprise to her that so many talented volunteers rally to offer knowledge and passion for growth. She has never believed the Coalition would find anything but success.
True grit
All her life, this mother and grandmother has recognized when and how she needed to stand firm then courageously followed through. To prove her point, Clark recalls an experience more than 30 years ago when she walked into L.S. Ayres at Lafayette Square Mall, hoping to land a part-time holiday job in retail.
“In the ’70s, there was still a touch of, ‘Is it my place to work there as a black person?’” Clark says.
She joined a group of 15 other potential employees –– all Caucasian –– and waited patiently for her turn to speak with the manager.
“He interviewed everybody but me before he went to lunch,” Clark says. “When he came back, I was still sitting there.”
When she was finally called into the man’s office, he immediately told her that because she had no retail experience, she would not be a likely match for the position.
But since Clark isn’t the type of woman who accepts defeat, she refused the store manager’s evaluation of her potential.
“I said, ‘Mister, I could sell you that blue shirt on your back and convince you it was pink,’” she laughs.
Clark was not only hired that day, she became a full-time employee before the holiday season ended. She later became a buyer for children’s clothing then accepted a management position for the entire L.S. Ayres Budget Store.
Working evenings and weekends in the world of retail was not the grandma-friendly way Clark wanted to live when her first grandchild, Alexis, now 13, was born. Hoping to land better daytime work hours, Clark applied for a job in banking.
“I knew absolutely zero about banking,” she says. “But I do know people. And I can manage people.”
When she started the job in the bank that ranked 34th out of the city’s 34 National City Bank branches at the time, Clark not only worked her way into the position of branch manager, she raised the bank’s rating to No. 1.
“And we stayed No. 1 until I left the branch,” she says proudly.
Clark’s grit hasn’t only served her well in climbing the career ladder. Three years into her job, robbers entered the bank, one with a gun and the other with explosives strapped to his body.
“It was right at closing. We were packed with customers,” Clark says. “I was in my office, which I was rarely ever in there, and I hear, ‘This is a robbery. Everybody get down.’ And then pow –– he shot through the ceiling.”
Clark pressed the emergency button under her desk and proudly points out that the tellers remained calm enough to do the same.
“My team was the best. They did exactly what they were supposed to do.”
Thankfully, no one was injured, and police officers surrounded the building before the would-be robbers could escape.
Going back to work was difficult, Clark says. She remained cautious every single day after that experience.
“But I had to go back,” she says. “I was the leader. And you’ve got to get back in the saddle.”
Now semi-retired, Clark is carried through life by strong family ties and faith, she says. She often copes with difficult life moments by focusing on the Serenity Prayer –– always hoping to be granted serenity and wisdom along the way.
She doesn’t view her work with the Coalition as anything unusual, Clark says.
“This is my community. It’s where I raised my babies. It’s where people of different cultures are starting to settle. We have to make it work.”
