Andy Downs
 “A community without competition in its elections is in danger of becoming a vehicle for the few and not the many.”
—Andy Downs, director
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As one of the nation’s leading research institutions, IU is home
to more than 160 institutes and centers, 33 of which are under the
auspices of the Office of the Vice President for Research. IU
Home Pages has created “Think Tank” as the place to acquaint
our readers with the missions and activities of this wide array
of scholarly environments. We are pleased to inaugurate this new
column by taking a look at the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics
at IPFW. Please send your suggestions for centers and institutes
to be featured in future issues to Lee Ann Sandweiss at lsandwei@indiana.edu.
Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics
When Mike Downs died in 2001, his friends, family and colleagues
thought long and hard about the best way to honor this beloved
educator who had served IPFW and the Fort Wayne area for more
than 34 years. A statue or space named for Downs seemed too static
a tribute to his life’s work—teaching people to engage in ongoing
political matters that affect their daily lives. The only way
to incorporate all facets of Downs’ legacy was to create a center
for the study of state and local politics that was accessible
to all Hoosiers.
Located on the IPFW campus, the Mike Downs Center for Indiana
Politics is the first non-partisan center in the nation devoted
to studying the politics of a particular state. Although the center’s
brief mission statement can be found on its Web site, Andy Downs,
director of the Downs Center, said that the mission can be pared
down to a word—education.
In addition to overseeing the research activities of the center, Downs routinely visits schools and community groups in the Fort Wayne area to answer their questions about the political process. “Last week, I visited a local high school, and we explored the role government currently plays in the students’ lives and the role it will play when they are in the working world,” he said. Downs capped off the week by helping a student group get clearance to hold a voting registration drive on the IPFW campus. “It was great! A popular local radio station sent their afternoon on-air personality to broadcast from the registration site. At the end of the day, 404 students had registered to vote,” Downs said.
When asked how large a staff he has to help with the center’s work, without a trace of self-pity, Downs replied, “I am it.”
As the center’s sole paid staff person, he relies heavily on the work of volunteers, interns and work-study students. “They have been especially helpful loading political memorabilia onto the center’s Web site, but there are other projects that need attention. It would be wonderful to work with another department on the on-the-street interviews,” Downs said.
A visit to the center’s Web site provides an overview of its ongoing projects, including compiling a database of campaign finance reports, oral histories of Indiana politics (done in collaboration with area middle and elementary schools), a searchable database of precinct-by-precinct election results and adding to its substantial political memorabilia collection.
With a half dozen worthwhile projects vying for his attention, Downs finds himself back to the core value of the center’s mission during this election year: education.
To help fight voter apathy in Allen County, the center has launched the Voter Education Program, in cooperation with the Allen County Election Board. “For last year’s municipal primary elections, Allen County’s turn-out was only 12 percent. A democratically elected government that is based on the votes of fewer than 40 percent of its eligible voters is a government that is in danger of no longer representing the citizenry,” said Downs.
“A community without competition in its elections is in danger of becoming a vehicle for the few and not the many.”
http://www.indiana.edu/~ovpr/ctrdir/toc.html
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