Southeast Wisconsin

Corporate Report Wisconsin, Feb 2007

BROOKFIELD

City plan commissioners backed a renovation plan for Brookfield Square Mall. A new two-story mall entrance with glass and a tower would be built, and the mall's eastern side along Moorland Road would be revamped with a upscale streetscape as Mayfair Mall in Wauwatosa did in recent years. On the western side of the mall, the food court entrance would be remade.

BROWN DEER

About 180 employees of Metavante Corp. have been or will be let go. The company provides financial technology to keep records for banks, and is a subsidiary of Milwaukee's Marshall & Ilsley Corp. Metavante employs about 2,800 in Wisconsin and 5,600 total nationwide and in Canada. It was not announced where the jobs would be eliminated.

KENOSHA

The Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Transit Authority decided to table a sales tax idea and keep studying ways to fund a commuter rail system connecting the Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee corridor to Northern Illinois and Chicago. The RTA will seek additional funding recommendations from the mayors and county executives in the three-county area. It will also ask the state for funds and bonding authority. The group heard a report that the KRM link would benefit Southeastern Wisconsin by helping to attract more than 75,000 jobs and $8.3 billion in economic development. The RTA was created by the Legislature in 2005 to come up with ways to fund commuter rail and public transit in the area.

MENOMONEE FALLS

Magnetek Inc. (NYSE: MAG), maker of digital power and motion control systems, said it will relocate its telecom power systems production and engineering from Dallas, bringing in 60 jobs that will increase its total in the area to about 300. It leased 44,000 square feet near its headquarters here. The headquarters was moved here from California in 2006 after it sold its Power Electronic Group there.

METRO MILWAUKEE

The area's Internet data capacity increased in January when U.S. Signal, Grand Rapids, Mich., lit seven additional access points on its 81-mile fiber optic ring extending around Milwaukee. The locations included downtown Milwaukee, Menomonee Falls and Waukesha.

MILWAUKEE

An aging industrial corridor centered on North 30th Street has been dubbed the "Greenlight District" by Mayor Tom Barrett to indicate that the zone has a green light to use tax incremental financing and other city, state and federal economic development funds to attract new businesses. It is one of the city's bleakest landscapes, with former rail yards and vacant industrial sites like the former Tower Automotive complex. The effort will span several years and could cost as much as $75 million. Existing initiatives in the 30th Street Corridor include the Milwaukee Industrial Trade Center on the former Tower site, and projects with Eaton Corp. and Harley-Davidson.

The Milwaukee Common Council unanimously approved a $29 million financial aid package to pave the way for redevelopment of the former Pabst Brewing Co. site just north of downtown. The tax incremental financing will pay for demolition, environmental cleanup, new streets, and other public improvements to the 26-acre site. A previous plan by Wispark, a subsidiary of Wisconsin Energy Corp., failed to win Council approval for $41 million in city financing, and the site was bought by developer Joseph Zilber in August. Plans call for residential, office, and retail uses. The Council also approved plans to provide $8.5 million in TIF funding for North End, a $175 million mixed-use development on the Milwaukee River at the site of the former Pfister & Vogel Tannery.

SUMMIT

Controversy continues over Aurora Health Care's plans to build a new hospital on the Pabst Farms development in western Waukesha County. The town board was expected to approve revised plans for a 110-bed, $189 million hospital and clinic facility, adding 22 beds and $23 million to construction plans proposed two years ago for the same site. The hospital was first proposed in 2001 for a nearby site in Oconomowoc, and many in the area do not think it is needed. Aurora has 13 hospitals in Wisconsin and has built new hospitals in Kenosha, Two Rivers, Green Bay and Oshkosh since 1999.

WAUWATOSA

City plan commissioners unanimously approved plans for a nearly $130 million project that would transform six acres of vacant lots formerly occupied by car dealerships into a 20-story condominium tower, an upscale 10-story hotel, a medical office and a fitness center east of Highway 45 on Burleigh Street. The city has a master redevelopment plan for the Burleigh Triangle area, and the Common Council will hold hearings on the plan, which will need tax incremental financing.

WEST ALLIS

Ground was broken in January for an estimated $15 million condominium and retail development in the Sk Points/Farmer's Market area here. The five-story Belmont Center will have underground parking, 22,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and 42 condominium units.

STATEWIDE DEVELOPMENTS

SOUTHWEST

BELOIT: A proposed $200 million casino project here got the go-ahead from the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to create a federal land trust for use as a gambling site. The off-reservation development by the northern Wisconsin St. Croix and Bad River Chippewa bands was endorsed by 61% of Beloit voters in a 2000 referendum. Next, the BIA's director of Indian gaming must approve the project, and the final step is an OK from the governor of Wisconsin. The plans include a casino, hotel, convention center, waterpark and outlet mall on 75-acres near Interstate 90, just north of the Wisconsin-Illinois border.