Data & Drafts: Data Deep Dive into Affordable Housing and Neighborhoods

The Polis Center is hosting another Data & Drafts session at the Indianapolis Public Library - Central Library on Thursday, October 29, from 6 PM to 7:30 PM. This one focuses on affordable housing and neighborhood data, and it's presented in partnership with WFYI Indianapolis and the library itself, all rooted in the SAVI program.

If you've never been, Data & Drafts is a recurring "happy hour with data" series. It's meant to be a less formal alternative to the library's SAVI Talks—more of a conversational, hands-on session than a presentation. The idea is that you walk through how to assess data quality and its limitations, and use open-source tools to pull out meaningful insights. There's time to ask questions and talk about how the approach might transfer to your own work, so it's built for experienced data users and the data-curious alike.

This particular session looks at housing affordability and neighborhood data, showing how reading market trends can inform decision-making when you're buying a home. It's the same format as previous ones: you're not just watching someone else work with data; you're seeing how to do it yourself. The series has already tackled other local issues like immigration, childcare access, criminal justice, and racial equity, so this fits right into that pattern of applying data to things that actually affect people's lives here in the city.

The Polis Center is an applied research center within the IU Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering in Indianapolis. They analyze data to provide actionable insights on public health, education, housing, and natural disasters. This session is part of that ongoing work, and it's free to attend. Just a couple of practical things to keep in mind: it's for ages 21 and up, and beer is provided by Bier Brewery. Doors open at 5:45 PM, and the session runs from 6 PM to 7:30 PM at the Central Library, 40 East Saint Clair Street.