Plans to bring big changes in the next few months
ONTONAGON -- If you ask Kevin Manninen about his top priority as WUPPDR’s new Regional Economic Coordinator for Baraga and Ontonagon counties, he'll tell you it's meeting with community leaders and bringing them together to help each other.
"I’m looking forward to working with them and getting solutions because we can only do this as a community," says Manninen. "Anyone, as an individual, is very limited, but if we can pull together, a lot more opportunities are possible."
Since starting the job in mid-September, Manninen has begun working closely with the Baraga County manufacturing companies in the Superior Supplier Network. He has also convinced the Escanaba and Lake Superior Railroad to consider keeping their tracks in Ontonagon if he can find a new user before they're scheduled to be removed next spring.
"One of our problems is that everyone focuses on the fact that the large business--the paper mill--closed," says Raymond Tessmer, President of the Ontonagon County Economic Partnership Corporation. "But we have people capable of working in almost any kind of business that would locate here. We need to diversify."
In addition to encouraging new businesses to set up in the Western U.P., Manninen wants to help existing small businesses expand and diversify with technology.
"Kevin has great ideas about getting businesses up to speed and selling themselves online," says business owner Brian Baccus. "We’re in a remote area, but we're only limited by our imaginations."
Manninen’s position is only expected to last for a year and a half, so he knows if he's going to bring big changes to both communities, he'll have to work fast.
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