ASHWAUBENON, WI (WTAQ) – A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held to mark the official opening of the Resch Expo in Ashwaubenon on Wednesday.
“It’s done. It’s on-budget and on-time,” said Brown County Executive Troy Streckenbach. “It’s amazing that what we envisioned a number of years ago is actually here.”
“There were many, many meetings to figure out the design of it, to figure out what was going where, and a lot of people in the room. We got it done,” said Ashwaubenon Village President Mary Kardoskee.
Space inside of the more than 125,000 square-foot hall inside the Resch Expo. (WTAQ/Casey Nelson)
The $93 million, 266,000 total square-foot facility was under construction since July 2019. It sits on the former site of the Brown County Veterans Memorial Arena and Shopko Hall. The projected impact of the 127,000 square foot expo hall already appears to be coming to fruition.
“A project of this magnitude couldn’t happen on any corner of the street. It needed to be right here, it had to tie in with the rest. There’s a vision of how we tie the whole corridor together…It complements the whole Titletown District, the Lombardi corridor. We firmly believe, now that we see it and it’s in place, it’ll do exactly what it was intended to do,” Streckenbach added. “It’s going to draw business to this area, it’s going be an economic boom for this region. We couldn’t be more proud of the final product and the work that was done by all the different individuals who made this happen.”
Among those involved in that process, was Miron Construction. The company was in charge of turning plans and ideas of grandeur into reality. A 26-month timeline with just about 18 months of construction, especially in 2020, was a wild ride.
“The 18 month schedule was very aggressive. We’ve always believed in our team. The work force of northeast Wisconsin the sub contractors in the area are second to none…The constraints that were put on the workers working through an absolutely unreal time of 2020 that we could have never predicted when we started the project, but for them to be able to push through and deliver on time and on budget with this is absolutely amazing to be part of,” said Miron Construction Project Executive Kurt Wolfgram. “Always, schedule and budget are important. It’s important to the community, it’s important to the stakeholders, so we hold ourselves highly accountable on that to make sure we hit that.”
The center is named for Dick Resch, the former longtime CEO of KI. He paid $10 million for the naming rights.
Most of the project will be paid for through county room tax revenue. Another $15 million will come from the county’s half-percent sales tax and $4.7 million is coming from excess Lambeau Field sales tax money.
Looking into the future, those who led the charge are optimistic for a vibrant future on the corner of Oneida Street and Armed Forces Way.
“Do people realize that we could put this in any major market in the United States and they’d be happy to have it?” said retired PMI Entertainment CEO Ken Wachter. “Now that I see it, they would be happy to have it. This is probably the finest building in the state of Wisconsin, no doubt in my mind. This might be the finest building of its kind in the Midwest and we should be very happy we have it.”
“All the planners that we brought in have been incredibly impressed, and are very excited about using it. It’s not really easy to start the sales effort during a pandemic…We know there’s huge interest once things are a little more defined, as far as when events are going to be able to start happening again,” Greater Green Bay Convention and Visitors Bureau President Brad Toll told WTAQ News. “Now that it’s complete, it’s a jaw-dropper…We’re pretty confident that this will be a pretty popular building in the Midwest.”
“Mission accomplished. It did exactly what we were hoping it would create, with this wow factor. Ultimately, we think this is gonna be a success for future generations,” Streckenbach said.
“Our children, my grandchildren hopefully, will all be driving by and utilizing this. It isn’t something that is a short stay here, this is going to be a 30, 40, 50 year building. I feel the Resch Expo is just absolutely timeless,” Wolfgram said. “Something you could never, ever come into this career thinking would happen. So a lot of pride, definitely something you’re going to tell friends and family about and smile when you drive by it.”
There are also hopes of a potential future NFL Draft coming to Titletown. With the completion of the Resch Expo, and the quality of the facility, that optimism continues to grow.
“One of the visions that we had was to tie Titletown to this area to go further down into the entertainment area, and hopefully we’ll get that NFL draft someday! We’ll get it done, and it can be in this building,” Kardoskee told WTAQ News. “If we have the NFL draft, that would affect all the way past Oshkosh. That’s not just a Brown County item, that would affect the whole northeast area, and that’s huge.”
Meanwhile, the first event scheduled to take place was originally the RV and Camping Show. It was slated for next week, but was canceled due to COVID.
“The on-time would have been fantastic, perfect timing,” Toll said.
Among the first major events set to be held in the Resch Expo is the Green Bay Home + Lifestyles Experience in March. Also announced is the Great Lakes Timber Professionals Association’s logging expo, coming in 2022 and 2024.
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