Longtime RDA head Hanna stepping down
Hanna takes role in Dean and Barbara White Foundation
After 12 years as CEO, he will take a role in the Dean and Barbara White Foundation.
Bill Hanna, who has helped develop some of Northwest Indiana’s biggest projects in recent years, announced Tuesday he is stepping down as the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority’s president and CEO to take a new job.
Hanna, 47, has been the RDA’s chief executive since February 2009. His last day there will be Feb. 12.
He said his new job will be executive director of the Dean and Barbara White Foundation, which has financed or helped pay for improvements in Crown Point, Merrillville and other communities.
“I’ve had opportunities before, but not like this one,” Hanna said of his new job. “I want to continue to work on making a difference for the people of Northwest Indiana.”
In recent years, Hanna has worked primarily to help arrange financing for the South Shore Line’s biggest projects in more than a century — the West Lake Corridor from Hammond to Dyer, and Double Track from Gary to Michigan City — that together will cost about $1 billion.
Final federal funding approval, after earlier assurances of state and local financial support, came in late October for West Lake and earlier this month for Double Track.
“It was a huge achievement to do something people had talked about for 30 years,” Hanna said of those projects.
Northwest Indiana is one of the few areas of the country to get Federal Transit Administration funding for two major projects in the same year, he added.
“He’s certainly been a great partner of ours, to push these two transformational projects across the finish line,” South Shore Line President Michael Noland said. “Those are going to be big shoes to fill.”
Hanna, as usual, credited the people he worked with.
“We were able to show off the ability of people to work together on catalytic initiatives,” he said. “The partnerships were remarkable. A lot of folks in strategic positions really stepped up.
“I was very honored to be able to serve them.”
He said the support of Holcomb, former U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, the Indiana General Assembly, and U.S. Sen. Todd Young were crucial.
“There’s not many times you see state-level partnership with a congressional delegation,” he said. “I think we were the only ones walking onto Capitol Hill with that kind of solidarity.”
Along with the South Shore Line projects, Hanna has emphasized t he importance of Transit- Oriented Development—creating housing and commercial developments around new and existing South Shore stations. The RDA has held a couple of community open houses on TransitOriented Development possibilities in West Lake Corridor communities and also is working on those along the existing South Shore line.
During Hanna’s tenure, other RDA projects have included shoreline development at Wolf Lake Park in Hammond, the North Harbor redevelopment in East Chicago, and improvements at Whiting’s Lake Front Park and Gary’s Marquette Park, as well as completing the expansion of the Gary/Chicago International Airport runway. The RDA also helped with the Chicago Dash bus line from Valparaiso to downtown Chicago.
“Bill’s dedication and hard work has led to decadeslong dreams in the Region becoming realities,” Gov. Eric Holcomb said in a release from the RDA. “With game-changing projects like double tracking the South Shore line and the West Lake Corridor extension, Bill’s long-lasting, positive influence on Hoosiers is undeniable.”
Don Fesko, chairman of the RDA’s board of directors, added in the RDA’s release: “Bill possesses the skills to create a vision and make it a reality. We have long understood that Northwest Indiana needs to work together to accomplish important goals, and Bill was the catalyst to make that happen.
“He was able to align local, county, state and federal officials and legislators working together to make Northwest Indiana a gateway to Chicago. He has delivered results, and his leadership will be missed by the RDA.”
Hanna grew up in Morgan Township, south of Valparaiso, and still lives there. He and his wife, Christian, have three children.
Before taking the RDA job in 2009, Hanna was Valparaiso’s city administrator.
He has an undergraduate degree from Colorado Christian University, an MBA from National-Lewis University, Chicago, and a law degree from Valparaiso University. He served in the U.S. Army as a paratrooper and as a member of the honor guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.