City offers to buy cemetery site where Eleven Park and soccer stadium are planned

The city of Indianapolis is offering to buy the former Greenlawn Cemetery site in the southwest corner of downtown from Ersal Ozdemir, founder and owner of real estate development company Keystone Group and minor league soccer team Indy Eleven.

In a letter obtained by IndyStar, Chief Deputy Mayor and Chief of Staff Daniel Parker writes that the city paid $2 million under a pre-development agreement for one-acre of the site last year for the Henry Street Bridge project and is now interested in purchasing the remainder of the property at fair market value.

The city had backed the Keystone project until earlier this year, when Mayor Joe Hogsett announced plans to work with another group hoping to land a Major League Soccer team from Indianapolis ― and build a new stadium at a different site.

Keystone Group Chief of Staff and Senior Vice President Jennifer Pavlik issued a statement today criticizing the move, and accusing the Hogsett administration of engaging in "divisive politics and bare-knuckle intimidation with the City-County Council."

"Rather than respond to Mr. Parker’s last-ditch effort to salvage the bungled rollout of a half-baked idea, it is our hope Mayor Hogsett will once again retake the reins of his own administration and join us in a thoughtful, adult discussion on the future of soccer and downtown development in our state’s capital city," she said.

Parker writes that the offer comes after more than a year of research into the history of Greenlawn Cemetery — a collection of four cemeteries that once held the remains of Indianapolis' early pioneers and settlers. It also comes as the administration seeks swift approval of a Professional Sports Development Area and Map, tax district for the alternative soccer stadium site as it pursues a Major League Soccer team without Ozdemir, Indy Eleven and Keystone Group.

On its own, the Eleven Park site — most recently home of the Diamond Chain Co. manufacturing complex — is not without controversy. The property, spanning roughly 20 acres, was the location of Indianapolis' first cemetery.

Bodies were removed from the four cemeteries at the site, now widely known as Greenlawn, beginning in the mid-1800s as new burial sites opened in the city. Those who could remove their loved ones did so once the collection of cemeteries fell into decay, opting to rebury them in newer and more suitable grounds. Union and Confederate soldiers who died in Indianapolis were removed as well.

But historians, preservationists and genealogists contend that many graves, particularly those of African Americans, were left behind and paved over as the property was turned over to business and industry. Parker said the city believes as many as 650 remains are still located on one acre of the site. It is anticipated that it could cost $12 million to properly treat and care for those remains.

"As we've learned more about this site, the city has sought to take an active role in an effort to right the wrongs committed more than a century ago when the resting place of Indianapolis' first residents were erased from the map and paved over," the letter dated May 22 reads. "Knowing what we know now, any proposed development ought to follow a painstaking and inclusive community conversation on the different perspectives about how to respect the history of the site and the individuals still laid to rest there."

Pavlik disputed Parker's claims, adding that Keystone and Indy Eleven have requested to sit down with Hogsett's team for weeks to no avail. She accused city officials of spreading misinformation through press releases and playing games with tax dollars.

"We intend to correct the record as it relates to our ongoing efforts to work with the community to offer peaceful reinternment for those buried in a site that for over a century has been disregarded and disrespected," she said.

Ozdemir intends to build Eleven Park, a mixed-use development anchored by a 20,000-seat Major League Soccer-eligible stadium, at the site. However, Hogsett recently announced plans to try to bring a Major League Soccer team to a different site and started the process to establish an another professional sports development area as an alternative to the one in the works for Eleven Park.

A PSDA is a mechanism that would help fund a stadium with tax dollars from properties within a one-mile radius on all sides. The Indianapolis City Council and Metropolitan Development Commission approved one for Eleven Park last year, but the city has yet to submit that PSDA to the State Budget Committee.

The decision sparked tension between the city and Ozdemir and Keystone Group. Ozdemir had lobbied for years to get state legislation that would make the Eleven Park stadium possible. Now, the Hogsett administration is using that framework to establish the new PSDA.

That mayor's proposal is swiftly moving through the city's legislative process as the end of June deadline to submit to the state and get approval for the new PSDA looms. The council's Rules and Public Policy Committee is set to take up the proposal next during its 5:30 p.m. meeting on May 28.

Aliya Wishner, spokeswoman for Hogsett, said the city made the offer to purchase the former Diamond Chain site from Keystone Group with the intent to further inclusive community conversations about the site’s appropriate development.

"The offer comes in light of concerns raised by the community after more than a year of research has uncovered the truly historic nature of these hallowed grounds and remains still located on the site," Wishner said. "We believe this offer to purchase the site presents a win for our community, and for Keystone Group."

Eunice Trotter, director of Indiana Landmarks Black Heritage Preservation Program, said she was happy to hear about the city's purchase offer. She and others have advocated for the excavation at the cemetery site as well as honoring and reburying of the human remains still there.

"It absolutely does make me happy to hear," she said. "I was elated that the city was taking this position which to me reflects the humanity and morality of our elected officials and our appointed officials."

Contact IndyStar investigative reporter Alexandria Burris at aburris@gannett.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, at @allyburris.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Indianapolis offers to buy cemetery site where Eleven Park was planned