Our Story

Founded in 2017, Hoosier hospitality is at the heart of our organization. No matter the color of your skin or how much money you have, we believe every Hoosier deserves a seat at the table. We love Indiana, and are committed to building a bright future for all of us, no exceptions.

But for too long, everyday Hoosiers have been left out of decision-making and left behind by a powerful few in our state. Big corporate special interests and the politicians they pay are hurting our families by putting their profits ahead of our lives and values. We believe that this power imbalance is at the root of the challenges our families and communities face. From the skyrocketing costs of healthcare and rent to the shrinking budgets of our public school classrooms and overdose deaths devastating our families, life is too hard for too many in our state.

We know that it is possible to improve our lives and change the future of Indiana because we’ve done it before. When we join together across our differences, we work on a variety of issues and have won victories at the local, state, and federal levels.

Here’s some of what we’ve achieved together since 2017:

  • In Franklin, we helped other groups like If it was Your Child win an EPA commitment to clean-up a carcinogenic toxic site that was causing high rates of childhood cancer. In Martinsville, our members moved the mayor to commit to transparency on the water toxicity and have helped secure an EPA clean-up plan of a superfund site which has long plagued the community.

  • Since our founding, Hoosier Action has trained hundreds of Hoosiers on their rights and equipped them to advocate for themselves on a variety of issues, including voting rights, medical billing and debt, renter’s rights, navigating IEPs and 504s in public schools, harm reduction and overdose reversal.

    In 2024, following years of organizing by Hoosier Action and legal advocacy by the Indiana Justice Project and National Health Law Program, a federal judge ruled that Indiana must permanently end a set of burdensome barriers to the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP), one of Indiana’s Medicaid programs. These policies include the 2019 “Gateway to Work” paperwork requirements as well as POWER Account premium contributions, the lack of 3-months retroactive coverage, and a waiver of non-emergency medical transportation.Eliminating these unnecessary rules will help improve HIP for the more than 760,000 Hoosier families who rely on the program to see the doctor.

  • During the summer of 2024, while Hoosiers were facing record-breaking temperatures and heat waves, Hoosier Action leaders and 12 local congregations launched a city-wide Cooling Center Program in New Albany. A cooling center is a free, air-conditioned space with water and bathrooms made available to the public during extreme heat to prevent heat-related deaths and hospitalizations. Hoosier Action leaders and clergy in New Albany are currently working with the city to try to institutionalize and fund this program as an annual city project.

  • Since 2020, Hoosier Action leaders have organized to protect Hoosier renters. During the pandemic, we organized members across 12 different counties to support an extension of the eviction moratorium and push on then-Governor Eric Holcomb to fund a rent relief program. Our pressure helped to secure more than help keep Hoosiers in their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, Hoosier renters were protected through an extension of the eviction moratorium and the establishment of a rent relief program with an initial $40 million!

    Built a resident’s association at Crawford Manor, a low-income senior housing complex in Zionsville, to protect the rights of tenants against a landlord trying to scare them out of their low-income public housing. Delivered a 1,000+ person sign-on letter to Baptist Homes of Indiana (BHI), the owners of Crawford Manor, at a 50 person action with residents, a Democratic State Senator, and a Republican State Representative. Won a 5-month extension of HUD’s contract with Baptist Homes of Indiana (BHI), a meeting with BHI’s CEO John Detillo, and a meeting with HUD on site.

  • In 2023, as a part of Faith in Indiana’s “Call for Care” coalition, Hoosier Action leaders helped to pass transformative mental health care reform and move $100 million to new mental health infrastructure for Hoosiers. We are now working at the local level to make certain those resources are spent as intended.

  • Hoosier Action has organized and won increased access to life-saving, evidence based solutions to the overdose crisis since 2017. Hoosier Action leaders have organized at the local and state level multiple times to ensure the continuation of syringe service exchange programs (SSP). SSPs are a vital and proven public health and harm reduction tool which prevents the spread of disease and meets people struggling with substance use where they are at with care and dignity.

    In 2022, the Mainstreaming Addiction Treatment (MAT) Act, a federal bill championed by Hoosier Action passed with bipartisan support from federal elected officials, including Senator Mike Braun who co-sponsored the bill at our request. The MAT Act will make it easier for doctors to prescribe life-saving medicine to those seeking treatment for drug use, and save lives by reducing preventable overdose deaths.

    In 2023, Hoosier Action leaders won a local campaign to train and equip the New Albany police and over 20 small businesses and churches to carry and administer narcan, the lifesaving overdose reversal drug. We partnered with Project Recovery So. IN, a local resource that provides free Narcan.

  • From 2018-2020, Hoosier Action leaders worked in statewide coalition led by Indiana Community Action Association to push for the Indiana General Assembly to pass commonsense protections for pregnant workers to ensure that no expecting parent had to choose between a healthy pregnancy or their job. But for years, our efforts at the Statehouse were stymied by organized big business. So, we took our fight to the federal level and aligned a nearly unanimous set of Indiana Members of Congress to support the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), which became federal law in 2022.

  • Since 2017, Hoosier Action has fought to protect and improve the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP), an essential Medicaid program for lower income Hoosiers. In 2019, our statewide organizing brought together a wide variety of stakeholders including the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis, NAACP, CWA, and diverse HIP members from across rural and urban Indiana to stop the implementation of burdensome “Gateway to Work” requirements which would’ve led to an estimated 76,000 Hoosiers losing their healthcare coverage. 

    In 2024, following years of organizing by Hoosier Action and legal advocacy by the Indiana Justice Project and National Health Law Program, a federal judge ruled that Indiana must permanently end a set of burdensome barriers to the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP), one of Indiana’s Medicaid programs. These policies include the 2019 “Gateway to Work” paperwork requirements as well as POWER Account premium contributions, the lack of 3-months retroactive coverage, and a waiver of non-emergency medical transportation.Eliminating these unnecessary rules will help improve HIP for the more than 760,000 Hoosier families who rely on the program to see the doctor.