Profile: Northwest Indiana Forum.

• Author: Skertic, Mark
• Position: Regional Spotlight: Northwest

There wasn't much more Thomas McDermott could have done to surprise Hoosiers.

A Republican, he managed to win three consecutive terms as mayor of Hammond, a Democratic stronghold for decades. Under his leadership the city's Lake Michigan shoreline was transformed from a scraggly stretch of beach into The Hammond Marina, one of the nation's largest.

Every few years state Republican leadership talked about the possibility of McDermott in a statewide office. After all, he had proven that the GOP didn't have to give up on Lake County.

But then in September 1992 McDermott dropped a bombshell. A year into his third term he was resigning from the office of mayor and leaving to accept the position of president of the Northwest Indiana Forum.

Many expressed dismay that he would leave an influential political position to join a group that some considered little more than a glorified chamber of commerce. A little more than a year later, people living in the communities that fall in the shadow of Lake Michigan have a different perception of the Forum.

"I'd say that this time last year if you asked the average person on the street what the Northwest Indiana Forum was, in most cases they didn't know what it was or what it was doing. I think we've increased its name recognition a thousand-fold," McDermott says.

Membership also jumped, from about 200 members to more than 400 since he came on board. But the group has grown in other ways, too.

The Forum is a coalition of businesses and industry that works to expand and diversify the economy of Northwest Indiana. Its efforts focus on the northern-most counties, Lake, Porter and LaPorte, but it also works with the more rural counties of Jasper, Newton, Pulaski and Starke.

Prior to McDermott's joining the Forum last year, it had been involved in business retention and recruiting efforts. But its profile has been raised in the past 12 months by a deliberate effort to push for economic development on several fronts.

The Forum was one of the primary groups that successfully lobbied for the legalization of riverboat (or in this case--lakeboat) casinos in Indiana. While the casino legislation--and the subsequent referenda communities held on the question--was a major topic of debate, the Forum also embraced another controversial issue: health care.

The Northwest Indiana Health Alliance begins this year with 100 small- and medium-sized businesses participating. Membership was limited in the first year so that the...