Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe Now
Republican City-County Council member Michael-Paul Hart added himself to a bipartisan list of councilors who have called for Mayor Joe Hogsett to resign by doing so in an op-ed published by The Indianapolis Star on Thursday.
“Hogsett’s pattern of corruption, negligence and lack of judgment is clear,” Hart wrote. “Apparent conflicts of interest were ignored. Guardrails were missing. Donor ties overlapped with decisions about public incentives. Employees who raised alarm saw no meaningful change.”
The third-term mayor has repeatedly said he has no intention of resigning.
In his op-ed, Hart referenced an investigation published by Mirror Indy and the Star on Monday that revealed the city’s former top economic development official, Scarlett Andrews, allegedly had a secret relationship with Thomas Cook while he was representing private developers in city deals.
According to that investigation, Hogsett prohibited Cook, who worked for the mayor both as chief of staff and on his campaigns, from having romantic relationships with city employees after Lauren Roberts, a deputy campaign manager for Hogsett, alleged Cook had sexually harassed her and abused his power in 2017.
When human resources investigations showed that Cook had violated that mandate in 2020, the director recommended that Hogsett fire Cook. Additionally, the director said Hogsett should deny Andrews’ promotion to director of metropolitan development.
He did neither, the investigation alleges. Instead, Cook was allowed to resign and went on to join law firm Bose McKinney & Evans’ site selection and economic incentives group. (Cook left the law firm in 2024 following an IndyStar investigation outlining harassment allegations against him.)
Andrews was promoted to the top development role, and later received another promotion to deputy mayor of economic development. The investigation from Mirror Indy and IndyStar found that the pair worked together on $80 million in city economic development deals.
On Wednesday, Hogsett told reporters he would not “speculate on personnel matters” and defended the work his administration has done at making and vetting economic development deals.
Hart is now the fifth member of the City-County Council to call for the mayor to step down.
“This is not leadership the city can rely on to keep people safe, protect taxpayer dollars, or build neighborhoods the right way,” Hart wrote.
Previously, Councilor Joshua Bain had been the only Republican to call for the Democratic mayor’s resignation. Meanwhile, three Democrats—Jesse Brown, Andy Nielsen and Crista Carlino—had taken that step.
Hart, who served as the minority leader of the six-member Republican caucus for less than a year before being removed from the post in August, wrote in the op-ed that he previously felt he had to “represent the view of the majority of the caucus in not calling for resignation.”
Over the summer, following the release of law firm Fisher Phillips’ report on the Hogsett administration’s handling of harassment allegations, two of the women interviewed by investigators told IndyStar that the law firm omitted key details and documents from the report, including “uncomfortable” text messages they had received from Hogsett.
A special Council Rules and Public Policy Committee meeting is scheduled for Oct. 28 to address unanswered questions sparked by that report.
Please enable JavaScript to view this content.