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Beloit City Council approves development agreement for Amazon distribution center

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An Amazon distribution center is in the works for the Gateway Business Park in Beloit. The Beloit City Council approved a development agreement Monday night with Seefried Industrial Properties, which has worked with Amazon on distribution center projects nationwide.

City Manager Lori Curtis Luther said the city will still have to close the deal with Amazon, but the development agreement allows for a 120-180 day “inspection period” for the developer to enter the site as early as next week to begin preliminary grading work.

Luther said Beloit won’t have to provide any tax credits for the project. The Greater Beloit Economic Development Corporation is agreeing to sell 80 acres of property for $80 to facilitate a  one million square-foot facility along Gateway Boulevard, just south of Colley Road.

If the project goes through, construction is expected to be completed by September of 2020. The sale also has a repurchase agreement for the GBEDC to gain the property back if a facility is not built within the next five years.

Luther said the city will make a more formal announcement when they close the deal.

WCLO

Perdue says smaller dairy farmers have no guarantee of survival

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Secretary Sonny Perdue

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, in Wisconsin today (Tuesday), said the 2018 farm bill will help Wisconsin’s dairy industry, but small farmers have no guarantees.

“I don’t think in America we, for any small business, we have a guaranteed income or guaranteed profitability of survival. That depends on each and every farmer and dairy farmer.”

Perdue spoke to reporters at World Dairy Expo in Madison.

“Big get bigger and small go out, and that’s kind of what we’ve seen here. It’s very difficult when in economy of scale with the capital needs and all the environmental regulations and everything else today, to survive milking 40, 50, 60 or even 100 cows, and that’s what we’ve seen.”

Thanks to WRDN, Durand

 

 

State Justice Department urges businesses to train employees in basic cyber security

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The state justice department is recommending that businesses take some time to train their employees on basic cyber security.

Special Agent Marshall Ogren says phishing emails that try to get users to log into a phony page are one of the most common forms of attack on businesses. 

“People shouldn’t be entering their username and password into a form they don’t trust, or they should double check where they’re entering their username and password.”

Sometimes those phishing attacks get very sophisticated and are specifically targeted at an employee, in a technique called spear-phishing.  Ogren says the crooks are after classified or sensitive information that only certain employees might have.

“And what they can do is go into that email account and get email content of transactions that have happened or contract negotiations that’s happening or something like that.”

Criminals can then use that information to try and scam your banking information, or try and get paid by your accounts department using phony invoices.

It’s also important to secure the physical computers at your office. Ogren says that if a criminal or bad actor can get to an unlocked computer or server inside your building, they could get lots of classified info.

“They could have access to the entire network, and if that person is an administrator on their computer, that allows them to run highly sophisticated programs. Programs that could do quite a bit of damage.”

Ogren says it’s best to keep your network’s servers in a secure room, and to restrict the amount of access basic users have at their work stations.

Frank Abagnale on how to avoid getting scammed

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AARP Wisconsin brought Frank Abagnale to Madison on Thursday, to talk about how not be be a victim of scam artists. As a young man, Abagnale was a successful scammer himself.

“Most of all these scams are the same scams that have been going on for 50, 60 years. The difference is the technology that has made it so much easier to do and so much more convincing. To be able to manipulate peoples’ caller IDs and phone numbers, to be able to do the crime from thousands of miles away, from India, from China, from Russia.”

Abagnale, whose career as a con-man was depicted in the movie “Catch Me If You Can” starring Leonardo DiCaprio, said people continue to get taken advantage of by scammers, because they’re basically honest.

“Once you kind of educate people and give them the proper tools, they’re smart enough to protect themselves. But you can’t rely on the police, you can’t rely on the government, you can’t rely on the bank to protect you. You today have to be a smarter consumer, a wiser business person than you did 20 years ago, so you really have to educate yourself to protect yourself.

Abagnale is now a cybersecurity and fraud prevention expert,  and has been an adviser to the FBI for over 40 years.

Study finds housing shortage for Wisconsin workforce

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Not enough places to live – a new study from the Wisconsin Realtors Association finds housing availability has not kept up with a growing workforce. “The situation has been slowly developing, but basically over the last ten years in our fast-growing counties and in small towns, we’ve not built enough housing units to accomodate our population growth and the job growth, said study author Kurt Paulson.

“When you don’t built enough housing units of any type . . . obviously then prices rise, rents rise, and people have difficulty finding any sort of affordable or decent housing options in the communities where they work.”

Paulson said there are changes that are helping in some states. “A lot of them do have to do with altering zoning regulations, and other sorts of local government land use regulations that kind of limit the ability of housing construction, whether that be reducing lot sizes or decreasing parking requirements, other sorts regulations that drive up the cost of housing that ere not related to public health and safety.”

The study found that many lower-income residents are paying more than 50 percent of their income on housing.

Evers leading trade mission to Japan

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Governor Tony Evers is leading a trade delegation to Japan. They’ll meet with Japanese leaders, visit the headquarters of Japanese companies doing business here, and help promote state exports during the nine day trip.

“Japan and Wisconsin have a longstanding relationship and deep ties,” Governor Evers said. “I look forward to renewing those relationships, learning more about our Japanese partners, and increasing opportunities for Wisconsin businesses.”

The 28 member delegation will be in Tokyo on Monday and Tuesday in the annual Midwest-Japan Association Conference, before moving on to Yokohama and Chiba City. It’s Evers’ first international trade mission since being elected.

Kind says Congress needs to ‘claw back’ trade authority from President Trump

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Third District congressman Ron Kind says President Trump has been irresponsible in pursuing his trade and tariff policies. The LaCrosse Democrat said during a conference call on Wednesday that Congress has deferred to the executive branch on trade policy for decades.

“I think it’s time now for Congress to start clawing back a lot of that authority, especially given how irresponsibly President Trump has used this authority.”

Kind said the failure of Trump’s trade wars is evident, in its effects on Wisconsin farmers. “I think many of them were hopeful that this guy knew what he was doing, that he had a longer term plan on strategy, but I don’t see it… I’ve never seen it.”

Kind said there is bipartisan support in Congress to restrict the president’s powers to set trade policy and enact tariffs. China announced Wednesday that a new round of trade talks will begin in October. President Trump insists that China wants to reach a new trade agreement.

Evers taps Missy Hughes to lead WEDC

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Governor Tony Evers has named his choice to lead the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. A statement from Evers’ office said Thursday that he’s appointing Missy Hughes as as Secretary and CEO of the state’s development agency.

Hughes has a background in agriculture. She’s been Chief Mission Officer and General Counsel for Organic Valley/CROPP cooperative since 2003.

Mark Hogan had led WEDC since 2015 and stepped down effective this week. Hughes won’t start until October 1. A provision passed as part of the lame-duck legislative session following Evers’ election prohibits him from immediately appointing this position.

New farm bills aimed at supporting struggling farms introduced at Capitol

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Three new farm bills aimed at helping struggling Wisconsin farmers were announced at the Capitol on Tuesday.

One of the bills would create a permanent position at the UW-Extension to help farmers with estate planning. Baraboo assemblyman Dave Considine says that’s critical in keeping family farms running. 

“Just a few years ago, my family had what we called our ‘farm talk’, or our succession planning meeting. I also hear about succession planning in almost every farm I tour.”

Another bill will offer funds to get entirely new farmers out into Wisconsin’s fields. Beloit Assemblyman Mark Spreitzer says the average age of a Wisconsin farmer is past 50, and is only getting older.

“To continue Wisconsin’s strong tradition of farmers that feed our state and beyond, we must recruit and retain the next generation of beginning farmers.”

The last of the three bills would offer matching grants to small farms looking to diversify their crops. Milton Assemblyman Don Vruwink says the wide variety of farm operations in his district shows that Wisconsin ag isn’t just beans, corn and cows. 

“People who grow mushrooms, I have a cherry orchard, a blueberry farm, a raspberry farm, a lot of different diversity. And that’s what this bill is designed to do, is to help these people continue to expand or continue these operations.”

All three bills already have support from both Republicans and Democrats.

Midwest Express announces destinations, warm cookies

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Midwest Express has announced its first destinations when the airline relaunches flight operations.

Flights will be from Milwaukee’s Mitchell airport to and from Cincinnati, Grand Rapids, and Omaha. Earlier this month, the airline signed an agreement with Elite Airways LLC to begin non-stop flight service by the end of the year.

Midwest Express will establish its own reservations system, customer service operations and in-flight amenities — including cookies. The last flight on the old Midwest Airlines was in 2009.