APPLETON, WI (WTAQ) – Appleton is about to see in an influx of tourism and tourism dollars as the summer event season is underway.
Events fill the Appleton and Outagamie County weekend calendar all summer long.
Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson says the bigger ones like Mile of Music, EAA, and Octoberfest bring in people from other states and there is one key piece to making that happen.
“Our airport is one of the most important and significant pieces of economic real estate in Northeast Wisconsin,” Nelson said. “Our airport has a 700 million dollar economic impact every year and that number is going up.”
He says expansions and job growth opportunities have taken place in recent years and it is not on the tax roll.
“All of that is happening at either the federal level, a private level or a grant based level. We have a $30 million dollar expansion at Gulfstream and I believe that it will make us the largest or the second largest next to their headquarters in Savannah, Georgia.”
He says the key to successful events is everyone working together for the good of tourism.
