- Continuing on in the arts

and economic development

in Vilas County
leadership, Vilas vision.

I want to introduce
Mr. Barry McLeane,

Special Projects Manager for

the Vilas County Economic
Development Corporation, to give

us an update on Vilas County
economic development activity.

So, welcome, Barry, thank you.

(applauding)

Good to see you.

- Thank you very much.

Vilas County Economic
Development Corporation.

I've got 30 minutes,
and some people would

think five would be enough
to give you everything we do.

We, like Lola, we
were formed in 2010,

the corporation was formed.

In fact, the then agent for

the university helped
us form our corporation.

And the Vilas County Economic
Development Corporation

is a huge umbrella.

We didn't know, I didn't know
what I was getting in for

when I applied to be on
the board originally.

I thought, it sounds like
something I should be a part of.

I'd done a lot of volunteer
work for 10 years I've been up

here, and I thought it sounds
like I should be involved.

And when I did get involved,

our original executive
director, Ken Stubbe,

and I started looking
at pieces of this.

Ken had been a professional
in economic development

for a number of years,

and we looked at all
these different pieces

of economic development.

I mean, you've got--
certainly the arts.

By the way, my wife has been

a professional artist
for the last 40 years,

has worked in collections

all over the country, including
corporate collections.

She's done a marvelous job,

and so I know that everything
you said about artists

isn't true because they do
have temperaments. (laughing)

And they do have bad periods.

Maybe that's just my artist,

but I don't think so, they
go through all kinds of

different periods, but when
we were talking about this big

umbrella of economic
development, the
arts certainly came

up initially as a really
strong part of that.

Lola was a great example for us

as we moved forward
into the arts,

we started in Eagle River

with a small building there.

We rehabbed the
cranberry building.

Some of you will be familiar
with that, and we took a group

of Nicolet College students
and rehabbed that building

and turned it into an incubator.

We moved our offices into
there, and an incubator,

at the time, wasn't very
well known up in this area.

Although, there are almost
40 of them across the state.

Incubators bring
people in that are

either moving out of home
businesses, or moving,

or have an idea that they
present to us for a business,

and they need an office
or they need manufacturing

facilities or they need
storage facilities.

But what we do, as a part of
bringing them in, is mentor

them through the entire process.

We've got a good
close relationship
with Nicolet College,

so we offer what we call the
EC classes to these folks.

It's a 12-week class
where we cover virtually

everything from soup to nuts
on starting your own business.

From writing a business plan to

insurance to marketing to
legal aspects of the business.

Virtually all of it, and you
end up, after the 12 weeks in

this class, you end up
with a brief business plan.

And that is great.

Most people choose to move

forward from that point.

Some people get discouraged
when they write the

business plan and find
out maybe this isn't

the right time for them, maybe
their funding isn't quite

in place, etc.,

and that's as
important a part of our

classes as success rates.

So some of those folks we move

into our incubators and
move forward from there.

One of the other things that
has happened as a result of

Vilas County
Economic Development

are investments in Vilas County.

This building being
a great example.

This building was bought 2.5
years ago by our now chairman,

Carl Ruedebusch,
because he saw a need

in Phelps to do some things.

Phelps, of all the communities
that we looked at around,

Phelps seemed to have the
most need at the time.

And we looked at Land
O' Lakes, and we looked

at all various communities.

But this community
seemed to need some

help more than the others,
so we bought this building.

Carl went ahead and
bought the downtown store,

if any of you are familiar
with that, we took that down.

We've now got, if things go
well, we're hoping to have a

grocery store, hardware store,
lodge, restaurant down there.

I mean, all of it is on the
drawing board right now.

We'd like to get started
next spring

on the first two phases of that,

but the investment
of real estate came as a

direct result of Carl's
involvement with this group.

As well as a

couple of other folks
that have been involved.

We have a building
in Land O' Lakes now.

We bought the--

I believe it was the old
Burkett Realty building,

that is next to
the Gasco building.

In fact, I just put a sign up
on that building yesterday to

indicate Vilas County Economic
Development is going to have

an office in there, but I
really appreciated what you said

about the empty buildings
in Land O' Lakes.

We're very much are in favor
of that where all of our

buildings are, we don't
like to see empty buildings.

And if that building next door
to ours, the Gasco building,

it's been empty for a long
time, needs fixing up, we're

going to see if we can
help with that next spring.

It's got a big front to
it, there could be a lot.

Performing arts
could go on in there.

You take some walls
down and do stuff.

It's so easy to
visualize that stuff.

And then when you have the
back end financing to go

with it, you can get it
done, it can all be done.

So we have two buildings up
in Manitowish Waters as well.

We bought a fairly large
building up there that had been

empty for a couple of years,
and we've converted that into

an incubator, our Wisconsin
magazine is now in there.

They've expanded
from one office.

I just got the email yesterday.

He wants the fourth
office in there now.

So he's hiring a new
executive editor.

So all of that, that's
exactly what we want to do.

Our Wisconsin had been
a magazine operated
out of a home up

in Presque Isle, and so moving
those folks into an incubator

has given them the way to
expand, the way to train

new people, and a way to
offer more to the community.

In addition, FYI, Northwoods
is located in our incubator up

there, so we're the
publishing mini empire

for Manitowish Waters,
right now.

In Eagle River, another piece
of real estate we've recently

bought and we've moved out of
the cranberry building that

we rehabbed now, and we bought
the flour sack building,

which many of you have seen

that big eyeball
we've got out there.

It was supposed to
generate a lot of interest

when we first put it up.

A lot of people ended up
thinking it was kind of creepy.

But what it is is the eye
on entrepreneurs building.

That's what we've
got going in there.

And that has become,
for us, Carl bought that

building and as chairman of
VCEDC, he wanted that to be a

creative enterprise in there.

So we've got, it's full now,

we've got four
businesses in there now.

Stitch It, which was
across the street,

they do embroidery work, she
moved into that building,

but we put a gallery up front,

we put a very small
gallery up front for a good

friend of Carl's, Mark DePuydt,
or Mugsy as some of you may

know him, and, anyway, he
uses that gallery for his work

and he does quite well in there

and we're always looking
for some more artists.

We need some 3D people
in there right now,

some glass people,
we're looking for that.

Then, almost in the back,

we've got a really
great space in there

called Goose Cap Media.

A young man named Isaac Doud

graduated from Northland
Pines two years ago maybe.

I don't know, two years ago.

One of those kids
that is so tech savvy,

that it would almost be a
shame to see him go to college

because he is so tech
savvy he needed to be

involved right away
in doing things.

So we got one of the
teachers who had left

Northland Pines, Scott
Subach, who moved to Appleton.

So we formed an LLC
with Carl as one

of the partners, Isaac Doud
as one of the partners,

and Scott Subach as one of
the partners, and what we have

in there is we have 3D printers,

we have some really
high end PC software.

We've got a big, fancy high
end Macintosh coming this week,

and we invite kids in there

just to let the juices flow.

Kids that Isaac knows or
kids from the high school

that can come in and just
use that space any time

during the day just to do
things, just to create things,

just to make things,
just to have ideas.

And we've got a
gathering space up front

where they can sit down, and
all of these different folks

can exchange their ideas.

Then on the very back
of that building,

we have a, it's called
the Blank Canvas.

A young lady named Erica
Johnson moved in there, and she

offers lessons, art lessons,
in all kinds of media.

But she gets groups in
there, they're as big as 25,

and they just, she leads
the class and they draw,

or they throw pots, or they
do whatever they do, write,

and they just make signs.

They can do all kinds
of things in there,

and she's just been a marvelous
addition to our community.

Eagle River, very much
like Land O' Lakes,

is becoming very much an art
center in the Northwoods.

I mean, with the opening of
the Northwoods Center for

Performing Arts behind the
old Catholic church there,

with the photography
studio in town now,

with our gallery in town,
with the warehouse folks

that have opened up and offer
all kinds of classes there,

it's becoming a real center.

And I loved the analogy of
coming up Three Lakes to

Eagle River and up
to Land O' Lakes.

I mean I love the
idea that we can do

all of this is Vilas County.

This can really be a huge
destination arts community.

Summer or winter,
it doesn't matter.

Folks will come up for a
weekend or three or four days

in the middle of the winter

if they can come up
for the right reasons.

And the husbands or wives
can do what they want to do,

and the spouses can do what
they want to do in the arts.

I think it's a great idea,
and we've got some folks

working on that right now.

So I kind of got, let me--

- Okay.

- I've been told I better
do questions at the end.

Part of being in here.

So the real estate, the arts
have all been part of that.

One of the more boring parts
of what our mission has been

in Vilas County is,
quite frankly, broadband.

We can't expect people
to come up here and stay

for any length of time
unless we can offer them

not only broadband but I
mean going forward we're

going to have to offer
them fiber optic.

It's got to be fast
broadband, we can't just do,

you know, five up and 10 down,

We've got to offer
them fiber optic.

So, to that end, we're
offering that as of today

in both of our Manitowish
Waters locations.

We're offering it right now

at the eyeball building
in Eagle River, fiber.

Fiber means a minimum
of 20 up and 20 down.

That's, you can do anything
with that right now.

Now, is that going to be
enough 10 years from now?

No, we're going to need
100 up and 100 down,

but that'll come,
that'll all come.

Getting the initial fiber
there is the important thing

for everybody in this
room that has ever

thought about having a business,
you've got to have that.

So, this fall we hope to
have it in Land O' Lakes.

We've helped with
ChoiceTEL's grant

that they're now coming
to Land O' Lakes.

We hope that'll all go smoothly
coming all the way up there

and spread to all the
downtown area, fiber.

And then Carl, if he has
to hire it done himself,

we will have it here in
2017, the year after that.

We're dead certain about
that, particularly with the

development that we
see going on downtown.

So, economic development
is so many things

and can be so many different
things to different people.

It's all about what you perceive
that you need to stay here,

to run a business here, to
operate here, or to have

your friends from Milwaukee
and Madison and Minneapolis

come over here and say,

"Why don't you rent my house
for an extra two weeks."

Yeah, I can run my
business out of here.

So, so many businesses are
run out of homes anymore.

I think that's pretty
much what I've got to say.

Are there any questions about
what we do or how we do it?

We have a pretty significant
board of directors, and we've

started with a really
impressive board of directors

and we've built on that.

We've had some retire,
and we've brought some in.

Mark Long with
Discover Wisconsin

has just joined our
board of directors.

From out here in
Phelps, Wally Beversdorf

has just become part of
our board of directors.

So these are all good people.

We've got tribal members
on our board of directors

that are also excellent,
excellent people.

And they work with
us very closely.

Debbie.

- My question was, as far as how

the Economic
Development Corporation,

is that a nonprofit?

And then like you were
mentioning who, I'm sorry,

I forgot his name
already, who bought here.

- Yeah, we're a nonprofit.
We are.

- Carl, I'm sorry.

So Carl, does the then, he owns
it as an individual entity?

- Carl does, Carl is one of
those rare individuals that

he's made a lot of money in
the construction development

business down in Madison,
does buildings in 25 states,

and he is, I mean seriously,

It's hard to believe in
this day and age sometimes,

but he seriously is
about giving back.

He doesn't make any
money on this building.

He doesn't make any money on
that building in Land O' Lakes

or the first building in
Manitowish Waters, and he's

certainly not making any
money in Eagle River.

I mean, he does all the
remodeling, buys the building.

He is genuinely a person that
gives back to the community.

So I am just fortunate
to have met him

before I died, I
have to tell you,

because people like that just
don't, they just don't exist.

You don't run across
them very often.

- [Voiceover] That's very cool.

- Yeah. He's a great
guy. Any other questions?

We're available all the time.

I have cards right up on
the, back here on the thing.

So please come see me if
you have ideas or thoughts

about a business or anything
you want to talk about

business-wise, we're
happy to do it,

and we're happy to
provide mentors for any,

you don't have to have
a location in one of our

buildings to get the mentorship
that you might want for

legal or marketing
or whatever it is.

Yes?

- So you have
Vilas County in your name,

but is it strictly Vilas County?

What was the driving force?

What made the group start up?

- Originally, some members
of the County Board had...

These organization have existed

in other counties for some time.

I don't know how effective
they were, I really don't know.

But members of the County Board,

certain members, decided they
wanted to give this a try.

So the initial try, they
went to Kelly Haverkampf,

who was the extension
agent at the time,

and sad see what you
can put together.

See if you can put together
a board of directors.

We had to go through all the
procedures that just kill me.

I can't stand to go through
how to set up the corporation,

the mission statements.

I just hate that because I'm
really hands on with stuff,

but we did it and
I was part of it.

I became part of the board,
and by the time we were done,

then we started saying,
well, we should do this,

this, or this based
on the county.

The county gave us a stipend of

100 thousand dollars a year

for the first three years
we were in business,

and they have since continued
that for obvious reasons.

The investments
made in Vilas County

are bringing back more
than that in tax dollars

right now than
they invest in us.

But we've also reached
out to the community

and had a lot of private and
corporate donations to us.

So that's how we
formed, the need.

It was just simply a need.

And, you know, as often
happens with corporations

like that, particular
501(c)(3)s,

people don't really know

what they're getting into when
they first get, but you say,

well, we could do that or, you
know, this is part of that.

This is a gallery wall for
us, this is our second one.

The first one we started
was up in Manitowish Waters.

I was up there and I
just said, you know,

we've got this great space,
let's paint it a color

and have a different
artist in here every month.

And Manitowish Art League
jumped all over it.

We literally have,
for 2.5 years now,

had a different artist
on that wall every month.

Some two-dimensional,
some three-dimensional,

some woodworkers,
but it's great.

We have a reception
for them every month.

They love it, we get
lots of people in there.

So we are well known
up in that area.

The same thing we
want to do here.

The last exhibition we had
here was the high school kids

from Phelps High School,
and they did a great job.

We've got an artist coming in
in May from, is it somebody

from, Lola I can't remember.

I think so. I can't remember
her name right off hand.

But anyway, we've, you
know, that's what we do.

I look forward to
seeing you again.

(applause)