In this premiere episode of The People’s Record: Voices for Humanity, we explore the sharp contrast between public testimony and institutional response in Indianapolis. Centered on the 2024–2025 Winter Contingency shelter testimonies, this episode unearths what was said, what was silenced, and what must now be remembered.
🎙️ About the Series
The People’s Record: Voices for Humanity documents public testimony, elevates community critiques, and amplifies the demands that too often get buried in bureaucracy. From City-County Council hearings to grassroots briefings, from legislative accountability to memorial vigils for our unhoused neighbors, each episode holds a mirror to how power operates—and how community pushes back...
🗣️ About This Episode: Unsafe by Design
This episode centers the 2024–2025 Winter Contingency shelter testimonies in Indianapolis and examines the institutional response to Andrew Merkley’s appointment as Director of the Office of Public Health and Safety. You’ll hear reflections from an AI-assisted dialogue, created using public records, press releases, and family testimony—revealing how systems can dehumanize, and how voices can push back.
📅 Call to Action: May 5 City-County Council Meeting
Join Allies for Humanity and community members at the upcoming vote on Merkley’s appointment:
🕖 May 5 at 7:00 PM ET
📍 Indianapolis City-County Building, Public Assembly Room
Even if you can’t speak, your presence speaks volumes.
TITLE: Unsafe by Design: When Testimony Meets Bureaucracy
[TK]
You’re listening to KTTK Love: The Podcast. This is The People’s Record: Voices for Humanity—a series where testimony becomes memory, and memory becomes movement.
[KT]
Based on the Season 2 podcast trailer we released over the weekend, you might’ve expected us to open the season with Reflections—tender stories from our journey of becoming.
And we will.
But this moment called for something else—something urgent.
[TK]
What you’re about to hear isn’t just an episode.
It’s a reckoning.
[KT]
We’re starting here because the people’s truth can’t wait.
The stories of families who survived unsafe shelter conditions—and bravely called for accountability—are what ground our mission.
[TK]
Right now, the Indianapolis City-County Council is preparing to vote on whether to confirm Andrew Merkley as Director of the Office of Public Health and Safety—known by most of "boots on the ground" simply as "OPHS".
[KT]
Until recently, Merkley led the division focused on homelessness and eviction prevention.
It was under his leadership that many families endured moldy walls, freezing showers, burst pipes—and, most tragically, deep trauma.
[TK]
Despite all this, he was appointed to the full directorship in March by the mayor.
And just two weeks ago, the Safety and Criminal Justice Committee unanimously advanced that appointment to the full council.
[KT]
You're going to hear more about that meeting in this episode—that’s our focus.
The voice of the people.
We have more power to create change than most of us realize—and not just at the ballot box.
[TK]
Speaking of votes—that final decision from the full council is set for this coming Monday.
And here’s something that says a lot:
Even before the council votes, Merkley has already updated his LinkedIn profile.
The promotion’s been claimed.
The accountability?
Still missing.
[KT]
He’s been operating as Director for weeks now—without public consent.
If that feels backwards, you’re not alone.
And it raises the real question:
Why are we rewarding leadership that’s already caused harm?
This isn’t about politics.
It’s about people.
[TK]
Families have testified—many with trembling voices—about what happened under his watch.
Mold. Illness. Assault. Neglect.
And now, we’re being asked to entrust him with more.
[KT]
It’s not just a matter of title.
It’s a matter of trust.
If leadership was absent when it mattered most,
how can we move forward without first making things right?
[TK]
That’s what this moment asks of us—not just to confirm a position,
but to confront what that position represents.
And decide: are we ready to do this differently?
[KT]
So while we are storytellers, healers, co-creators—
we are also amplifiers.
We magnify the voice of the people.
And today, that voice is crying out.
[TK]
Ok....so let's set up this episode, now that we have the lay of the land, and help you understand better why we came together and testified in the committee meeting to help them understand that this appointment should not be approved.
In The People’s Record, sometimes we use something a little different: AI-assisted conversations.
We give AI the same documents our city officials receive—testimonies, press releases, memorial programs—
and ask it to reflect honestly, without agenda.
[KT]
And in this first episode, the results are striking.
The AI names what many officials would not.
It recognizes the moral clarity in the voices of families who endured the 2024–2025 Winter Contingency shelter program.
[TK]
You’ll hear excerpts from a conversation about Merkley’s appointment.
But more than that, you’ll hear the emotional truth institutions tried to sanitize.
[KT]
This episode was created in the lead-up to the May 5 council vote.
Public comment won’t be allowed.
But your presence still matters.
[TK]
Because silence doesn’t always mean consent.
And being a witness? That’s a kind of power.
[KT]
This is Episode 1: Unsafe by Design—When Testimony Meets Bureaucracy.
Let’s begin.
LH HOSTS:
Welcome to this deep dive. We're here to really try and understand a critical issue, cut through the noise and hopefully get some clarity.
Yeah, and today we're looking at Indianapolis specifically the recent public testimony around Andrew Merkley's proposed appointment. As director of the Office of Public Health and Safety, OPHS.
Right. And what really jumped out at us looking through the materials was this stark, um, difference.
A huge difference, yeah. Between the incredibly urgent personal stories people shared.
Yeah. Families experiencing homelessness, advocates
Exactly. Their experiences in. Say the city's winter shelter program.
Mm-hmm.
Contrasted with how those stories seem to land or get processed by the institutions involved.
So that's our mission here really. To dig into that contrast, we have these firsthand accounts, perspectives from council members, Mr. Merkley himself, plus other materials about homelessness in the city
and those firsthand accounts, particularly from folks who are in the 20 24, 20 25 winter contingency shelter.
They're just incredibly powerful, heartbreaking. Often
they really are. And we wanna see how those human experiences that lived truth bumps up against the institutional response. Yeah, because these aren't abstract debates.
No. They're about people's lives. That emotional weight, you know, it, it demands, we pay attention
when someone shares their story, especially about something so difficult.
It gives you this unique lens, doesn't it?
Absolutely. It forces you beyond the spreadsheets and the policy memos you have to confront. The human impact,
and that's what we'll try to do. Explore these stories, see what systemic issues they reveal, and maybe just as importantly, what gets lost in translation.
You know, the urgency, the nuance, the sheer emotional reality when it gets filtered through bureaucracy and politics. Okay.
So let's dive in. Where should we start? Maybe with those firsthand accounts?
Uh, I think that makes the most sense. Allies for humanity really centered these voices in their testimony packet and for good reason, their stories from that winter contingency shelter while they paint the really concerning picture.
Let's talk about Carrie's Experience School 68 shelter. This was supposed to be refuge safety,
right? During the coldest months.
Yeah.
What he described. Um, it was appalling mold, urine. Pipes,
even rats she mentioned and open sewage in the kitchen area. Yeah,
open sewage. Just imagine dealing with that on top of being homeless.
The stress, the indignity and
the cold. She talked about showering outside and below zero weather when water was even working. Exactly,
and the tragic part is her grandson ended up hospitalized, lasting lung damage. She directly connects it to the conditions in that shelter. It
just hits you that basic responsibility A shelter has to be safe, healthy.
And clearly it wasn't.
Then you have Melanie's testimony, also incredibly harrowing beyond the freezing showers, the lack of heat.
She shared something even worse, didn't she?
Devastating. Her children being sexually assaulted
mm
in their sleeping cubicle, and she reported it to three different staff members, she said,
and nothing was done.
Apparently not. No action taken, which is just a profound failure of care,
and it didn't stop there, did it. It had not gone effects.
Huge ripple effects. She lost her job at FedEx, partly because of the unsafe environment, and then insult to injury.
They wouldn't help with transportation.
Denied transportation assistance for her kids to get to school.
A staffer apparently cited limited funding. Supposedly under Mr. Merkley's authority,
so the breakdown in safety directly destabilized her whole life, made it even harder to get back on her feet.
It speaks volumes about the system. You know how one failure triggers others.
Isabella's account too. It echoes that feeling of just no safety, no dignity.
She said it felt like being in jail staff. Rude. Angry, calling her names,
and she mentioned a physical assault thrown to the ground.
Yes, injured the very placement. For security became a source of fear of humiliation.
And Jocelyn, similar themes, again,
deeply troubling. Yes, poor treatment, staff yelling constantly and again horrifically.
She reported being sexually assaulted in her sleeping area. Her mother reported it,
and again, nothing,
nothing happened. According to her testimony, unconscionable plus, she couldn't go to school. Soft fights constantly between parents, kids. Staff apparently just stood by
even unsafe to take a shower because it was so cold.
These aren't just isolated incidents, are they?
No. It paints a collective picture. Systemic neglect, a fundamental failure to protect vulnerable people.
Yeah.
It makes you ask, how does this happen? What does it say about our priorities?
Then there was Brandon's testimony, founder of Home of Hope,
right?
Providing services directly to these families, and what was striking there was his fear.
Fear of retaliation for. Beaching out. That's concerning in itself
deeply. And it, you mentioned other service providers, other organizations privately shared similar concerns about Merkel's appointment, A wider lack of confidence, maybe a
among those on the front lines.
Exactly. And Brandon raised specific operational issues too. It's
like the delay in opening the winter shelter.
Significant delay. Yeah. And he felt Merkley's presentation to the committee kind of glossed over the obstacles, the real problems faced.
He also pushed back on the housing claims, didn't he
Directly contradicted Merkley's.
Statement that no families returned to homelessness. Brandon said many families he worked with were still in hotels, not permanent housing.
That raises big questions about the information council members were getting accuracy, completeness,
the potential disconnect, right between the official story and the reality people were living.
Okay, so we have these incredibly powerful disturbing accounts, trauma failure within the system now. The shift. How did the institution respond?
Right. When Mr. Merkley presented the focus seemed quite different, a lot on his background.
Public health degrees work for Senator Donnelly, Indiana, Senate Director of Latino Affairs.
All potentially relevant. Sure, but it felt a bit like establishing credentials rather than directly grappling with the issues the families had just raised so powerfully.
He did mention programs, though. Tape be the tenant advocacy project. And the winter contingency shelter itself,
which as we just heard, looks very different through the eyes of those who live there.
He talked about the future too, a housing hub. Priorities like data transparency, program evaluation,
important administrative things. Yes. But they can feel distant detached from the immediate human suffering that was just laid bare.
It's like the language shifts. Data evaluation becomes maybe a buffer, a way to process hard truths that.
Arm's length
and that committee reflections and response summary compiled by allies for humanity is quite revealing.
How so?
Well, it acknowledges pretty traumatic stories were shared. It even suggests some incidents weren't investigated. It's feels very procedural, detached,
frustration with communication.
Gaps mentioned
exactly. No concrete actions outlined to address those systemic failures that people described with such, you know, emotional force. The focus snaps back pretty quickly to the mechanics of governing.
Yeah. It's striking how fast the conversations seem to pivot back. Budget constraints, existing processes, needing more data
while the raw urgency from the families that moral call to act seem to be met with, well, a return to bureaucratic norms.
It makes you ask that fundamental question. Can these systems truly respond to human needs if their main languages process and metrics.
And some of the specific comments from council members were also concerning,
like Councillor Bain
referring to encampments as blight and praising Chicago for apparently not having visible homelessness.
That kind of language,
it dehumanizes people, doesn't, it frames them as a visual problem, not people needing help prioritizes image over wellbeing.
And Councilor Gucci's remarks about being drunk on a RPA money.
That's the Federal pandemic Relief funding. Right.
And warning that only those who can justify their existence will be kept alive.
I mean, that's alarming language.
It frames essential human services purely fiscally, like it disregards the moral obligation to care for vulnerable people needs weight against budget lines
very starkly. Yeah. Yeah. Councilor Perkins did ask some more direct questions though
about merkley's self-assessment staff.
Morale.
Yes. Mercury rated his own performance an eight or above, but seemed to attribute shortcomings vaguely to partner related limitations, not much. Clear. Personal accountability for the failures described
and staff morale.
He praised their incredible hearts but didn't offer many concrete steps to improve things internally.
Rebuild trust after these serious allegations felt. Insufficient
highlights that potential gap between leadership's view and the reality on the ground.
And the other council dialogues mentioned boots on accountability and on metrics, hard on compliance. Graves on partnerships. Carlino on continued partnership.
They illustrate the broader point, right? The focus tends towards data, budget, compliance, relationships.
While the immediate trauma, the urgent needs shared by families and advocates, they seem to fade into the background sometimes.
So this contrast, what's the core takeaway here?
It leads straight to the central message from allies for humanity.
This need to address a deeper crisis leadership, accountability, basic care,
and they cited that devastating statistic. 588 deaths of unhoused neighbors during merkley's time as administrator.
A stark tragic reminder. Of the human cost. When systems fail,
TK from allies for humanity stress, it's not just about one person.
Right. It's systemic.
Systemic lack of accountability. Yes. Yeah. And Brenda Killeen hit hard on the repeated failure to scale up the response to the homelessness crisis.
Yeah.
The funding disconnects. And the real human consequences of delay,
the trauma, the health decline. These aren't just abstract consequences.
No. Their lives being deeply negatively impacted. Jessica, who works directly with people, spoke about those ongoing unmet needs of the lack of resources and how crucial it is to really understand lived experience, not just interact superficially.
It connects to those fractal reflections in the test.
Money packet. That tension between just maintaining institutions versus actually transforming them to be human centered.
Exactly. And allies for humanity didn't just diagnose the problem. They proposed solutions, concrete steps, formal partnerships with grassroots groups. The ones doing the real frontline work, emergency bridge funding for them, more transparency, especially on how RPA and CARES Act money was used
and involving people with lived experience in designing programs.
Ongoing co-creation. Yes. Making sure those directly impacted. Have a real voice. It's a clear vision for a more responsive, equitable system.
And just to really ground this in the human cost, those homeless persons memorial service programs from 2023 and 2024,
looking at those lists of names, it's incredibly sobering.
The sheer number of people who experienced homelessness and died. In 2024 alone, the list is heartbreakingly Long.
There's a responsive reading section in the 2024 program. Could you read a bit?
Yeah. It says to those who have been lost on our city streets, we will remember you. It speaks about homelessness, robbing people of hope of life itself.
And it commits to remembering their strength, their struggles.
It's such a vital reminder behind the data, the policies, individual human lives, each one mattered.
And that reading also includes a powerful quote attributed to St. Augustine. Hope has two beautiful daughters. Anger at the way things are encouraged to change the way things are.
That really sums up the feeling from the testimonies, doesn't it? That moral urgency, the call for real change,
it perfectly encapsulates it.
So this deep dive, we've really tried to explore that sharp contrast, the raw, visceral truth. People shared,
yeah. In public testimony
colliding with the often, um, detached language, the different priorities it seems of the institutional systems.
And
that really brings us to a key question for you, the listener, to think about when those urgent moral calls from the community, those deeply felt experiences of trauma, when they seem filtered, maybe diluted, moving through bureaucratic processes, what does that really mean?
What are the implications for trust?
For accountability between people and the systems meant to serve them.
And this isn't over, like we said, the full City County Council vote on Mr. Merkley's appointment is still coming up. Advocacy groups like Allies for Humanity are still pushing.
It's an ongoing conversation. These issues really need our continued attention.
So maybe a final thought to leave you with circling back to that quote from the response of reading, hope has two beautiful daughters, anger at the way things are, and courage to change the way things are.
After hearing all this, after sitting with these difficult truths, which of those daughters resonates most strongly?
With you right now,
and maybe more importantly, what action, even a small one might follow from that feeling Because true understanding we think isn't just that information.
It's also about being willing to face the emotional truths and maybe demanding change where it's so clearly, so urgently needed.
OUTRO
[KT]
That was our first episode of The People’s Record.
We hope you didn’t just hear these truths—
but felt them.
[TK]
The systems we challenge weren’t broken by accident.
They were designed this way.
And the only way to shift that design… is together.
[KT]
We’re just getting started.
Upcoming episodes will go deeper—through raw reflection and unflinching dialogue.
Every story we share is an invitation to co-create something braver.
[TK]
Visit alliesforhumanity.org to connect with us.
And join us May 5 at 7 PM for the City-County Council meeting in Indianapolis.
[KT]
Even if you can’t speak,
your presence speaks volumes.
[TK]
Until next time—
Thank you for listening.
Thank you for remembering.
And thank you for helping us keep the record.
[KT]
Because when the people speak...
we write it down.