Portage attracts residents, businesses, and workers after UniverCity partnership

When it comes to community planning, Steve Sobiek, the director of business development and planning for the City of Portage, is always thinking ahead.

“What do we want Portage to look like in 10 to 20 years?” Sobiek said.

As part of a partnership between UniverCity Alliance and Columbia County from 2021-24, Sobiek worked with University of Wisconsin–Madison students, faculty members, instructors, and staff across several academic disciplines to envision the community’s future by working on economic development projects in Portage...

...Portage has a large manufacturing base that continues to grow. Businesses in Portage such as Dawns Foods, TriEnda, and Penda Corporation are looking for workers and attracting employees from Puerto Rico. In March, a developer broke ground on a $40 million transitional housing development, which Portage officials say will alleviate the city’s extreme shortage of affordable workforce housing and grow its industrial tax base...

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Ken Notes: One nice note is that creative workforce housing is scalable from one or two units to entire new neighborhoods. The key is to find some partners and get started...