The NewAllen Alliance was selected to receive NIPSCO’s 2019 Luminary Award for Economic Development. This award was based on the collaborative efforts of the East Allen County region. NewAllen community representatives, elected officials from East Allen and Allen County, Greater Fort Wayne, Inc. economic development leadership, and Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs representatives participated in an event to celebrate the award on September 12th at the Nisource Corporate Headquarters in Merrillville, IN.
The NewAllen Alliance was founded in 1991 to create a unified voice for seven communities in East Allen County, IN. Twenty-eight years later, the group continues this mission with a concentrated focus on advocating for community and economic development needs. Located just east of the City of Fort Wayne, with a population of 56,000, the NewAllen region is larger than 65 of Indiana’s 92 counties with the largest city, the City of New Haven, at just over 15,000 residents. In 2016, the NewAllen Strategic Investment Plan led to the 2017 John Keller Award for Outstanding Planning Initiative by the American Planning Association, Small Town and Rural Planning Division.
Most recently, the NewAllen Region was named as a 2018 Indiana Regional Stellar Designee. This designation was based on the submission of the East Allen Rural Revival Regional Development Plan. This plan lays out a portfolio of nearly $65 million in federal, state, local, and privately funded projects that focus on connecting people to place. The communities of Grabill, Harlan, Hoagland, Leo-Cedarville, Monroeville, New Haven, Woodburn along with Allen County are now collectively implementing downtown revitalization, park, sidewalk, trail, utility, roadway, and housing projects. This collaboration between multiple communities, each level of government, and the private sector is truly unique. This work is transforming the East Allen region as a place that will retain and attract individuals and families to ensure a thriving future for this rural region over the coming decades. Their efforts are currently being studied by several collegiate sources for excellence in rural revitalization.
As stated by NewAllen Alliance Board President, Kent Castleman, “We are extremely excited about the East Allen Rural Revival Plan, the Indiana Regional Stellar Communities Designation, and this NIPSCO Luminary Award. All of our efforts over the last several years prove that rural America can work together. We believe that to improve our rural communities, we have to collaborate and determine the vision for our future, including what we want our quality of life to be and what we want our economic development to look like. We are grateful to NIPSCO for their ongoing partnership in our efforts and are humbled by this recognition.”
