Waupaca 2024 highlights

The biggest stories
• Brooks Farms and Vanguard Renewables planned to install a co-digester on land owned by Brooks in the town of Lind.

In February, they held a public forum at Par 4 Resort to help educate people about how digesters work.
In early March, the Lind Town Board held a meeting in the Waupaca High School performing arts center to address the issue. An earlier meeting was postponed because so many people showed up at the Lind Town Hall and the small building could not accommodate the crowd.

After lengthy testimony from people for and against the co-digester, the board voted against making amendments to the towns zoning code and comprehensive plan that would be needed to green light the digester project.

• The town of Farmington passed an ordinance prohibiting wake boating on Rainbow and Round Lakes in mid-January. This spurred the a group of wakeboarding enthusiasts to sue the Waupaca Chain O’ Lakes District, individual citizens and possibly the town of Farmington if the ordinance was not repealed.

On March 18, a public hearing held in the Farmington Town Hall was packed. People for and against the wake boating ordinance shared their opinions on the matter. On April 4, the Farmington Town Board voted to repeal the wake ban.

This process shifted to Dayton since both towns shared some of the same water bodies. They formed a joint committee.

At the Dayton annual meeting on April 19, citizens presented the board members with a petition against wake boating on the Chain O’ Lakes. On May 7, both townships hashed out a joint ordinance with the same language.

On June 19, Dayton’s town hall was packed for a joint public hearing. On July 23, both townships voted for an ordinance that bans wake boating on the Chain O’ Lakes.

• The computer systems of the Waupaca School District were hacked. The school board held a closed meeting on May 13 to discuss the situation.

On June 13, the school district sent out a memo to parents confirming “that an unauthorized actor did gain access to our network causing the service disruption.” The district provided them an option to enroll in an identity theft and credit card fraud monitoring program.

• ThedaCare announced the closing of its birthing unit in 2025. Concerned residents signed a petition and held a public forum discussing the implications of a being pregnant in a community without childbirth services.

Business
• Sacred Buffalo tattoo parlor opens on Churchill Street.

• Whiskey Junctions opens after an interior makeover. It was the former Courtside Sports Bar.

• The Indian Crossing Casino was sold to Jim and Lisa Pekar, Thad and Amy Marcom, and Michael Soberg. They made many new additions and features to historic building and had it reopened for a strong warm-weather start.

• Koinonia, a market for local people that make cool things, opened on Main Street in April.

• Shore Thing in King opened for the summer. The business was founded on the observation that there weren’t any good places in Waupaca to buy swimwear. The retail shop has hundreds of swimsuits plus everything needed for a day on the lakes.

• Doc Kelly’s Public House opens as an Irish restaurant. It was formerly known as T-Dubs.

• John Sturm of Red Sky Cider and Wine hosted a field day for the Wisconsin Apple Growers Association at his orchard outside of Waupaca. As his trees have matured, Sturm is closer to opening his ciderworks business.

• Popsy, a pop-up retail space, opens on Fulton Street. The space can be rented for a week by small-scale entrepreneurs to sell and showcase their good and creations.

• My First Adventure Childcare in Waupaca closes. This left 60 families to make alternative arrangements for child care. Gov. Tony Evers visited the business as part of a statewide campaign to highlight child care problems in rural areas.

• Gusmer Enterprises celebrated their 100-year anniversary. In 1924 Aage Gusmer founded the company.

• Rolling Tacos, a Mexican eatery, opens inside of the BP gas station on Fulton Street.

• ThedaCare opened a new behavioral health clinic in July at 710 Park Ave.

• The Paint Store closed. Former owner Rick Graves said during the Covid pandemic, people stayed inside and did a lot of painting and that was tremendous for business. After that, the demand for paint and painting supplies dried up.

• Beer brewer H.H. Hinder opens The Eight 10 during Hinderfest in September. Known to some as the former Zwicker building, The Eight 10 is now a venue for various events after a large remodeling undertaking.

• Stange’s of Waupaca closes after 72 years in business as the owners head into retirement.

People
• Deputy Steven Long is awarded a life-saving medal from Waupaca County Sheriff Timothy Wilz. He dragged an elderly man away from a burning house.

• Waupaca High School drama students performed “These Shining Lives,” a play based on a true story about woman exposed to toxic levels of radium. This was performed in a “thrust stage” where the audience encircles the stage with U-shaped seating.

• Jeff Anderson was named the new CEO and president of the Waupaca Area Chamber of Commerce. He succeeded Terri Schulz.

• The Hellfire Club, a local rock/metal band, starts touring around Wisconsin, including local performances in the Waupaca area.

• Local author Richard Sweitzer’s fantasy novel, “Ode: the Scion of Nerikin,” was awarded a star rating by Kirkus Reviews. Less than 10 percent of books receive this recognition.

• The Waupaca Rotary honored Greg Biba as a Paul Harris Fellow. He is an author, educator and musician. A special meeting was held in his honor and numerous people spoke about the many lives he touched.

• Bob Adams and Lori Verhalen were elected to the Waupaca Board of Education and Betty Manion and Steve Klismet were reelected.

• Sheriff Tim Wilz gave a life-saving award to communicator Kirk Merrill, Deputy Eric Kamholz and Deputy Mitch Butterbrodt for saving the life of a woman who came very close to suicide.

•Tara Pionkowski published a children’s book, titled, “What Do You Want to Be?” The story takes the form of a conversation between a father and his daughter.

• District Administrator Ron Saari announced his retirement. The Waupaca School Board hired Craig Gerlach as an interim administrator for one year.

• James D. Gilles, a WWII veteran, celebrated his 100th birthday.

•Jacob Waller becomes Waupaca’s new fire chief.

• Brian Hoelzel announced thatwill retire as Waupaca’s chief of police. He served the city for 31 years.

Milestones
• The Waupaca Middle School Dance Team took first in pom and jazz at the state competition in Port Washington.

• The Waupaca High School Dance Team won the state championship in pom and jazz in La Crosse. It was the dance team’s 15th state title.

• The Waupaca Middle School Destination Imagination team scored big at sectional and state finals to qualify for the global finals.

• Waupaca’s Catch-A-Ride program reached a milestone of providing 10,000 rides for those who need to get to someplace.

Projects
• Brainnard’s Bridge Park was closed for part of the year as a DNR fisheries work crew rescued the island in the Waupaca River. It was slowly eroding away. The crew reinforced its banks, redirected the river’s flow and added some beneficial habitat structure for trout.

• Greater Waupaca Area parks and trails finished their Masakaew Trail and also their Waupa-Wega Trail.

• The Middleton House opened a transitional lodging place for women in need. It was created and operated by Foundations for Living.

• New lights were installed in April at Community First Lakemen Field in April, and later in the year, the infield was refurbished. It’s part of a long-term plan to give the historic field a needed makeover.

• Friends of Cahoots is formed and raising funds for an outdoor pavilion at the Waupaca location. The nonprofit was created to help with capital projects for the adult daycare service.

• Chaplains Peter and Wilma Akright founded Hub Waupaca, a nonprofit that serves inmates at the Waupaca County jail.

• The Waupaca Police Department acquired a new drone and three officers took an FAA test to get their drone operator licenses. They used it to find runaway children, find a man with dementia and to monitor a suicidal situation where a man was armed with a handgun.

• Friends of Hartman Creek State Park helped rescue and repair the Dike Trail, a path pockmarked with sinkholes caused by burrowing muskrats.

• The Waupaca Area Public Library launched “Table of Contents,” a podcast produced by local librarians.

• In May, the Waupaca Foundry cast the heavy-metal panels that will showcase the glass-infused tiles that were created by hundreds of Waupaca residents. It was a milestone for the community-based art sculpture project.

• The new Public Works building opened in June with an open house that showcased all of the department’s equipment and vehicles neatly arranged in the cavernous building. The event also unveiled Koronk Way and Haberkorn Court, two local sports legends with streets named after them. The streets meet at the corner of the Public Works building.

• Mark Kunstman, a resident on the Chain O’ Lakes, refined his one-man experiment of using beetles as a bio-control agent to reduce the spread of purple loosestrife. He raises the beetles in his backyard and lets them loose to feast on the invasive plant. This season’s before-and-after results showed the beetles tearing up stands of loosestrife on the Chain O’ Lakes.

• The Revival, a boutique on Fulton Street, got an impromptu mural when Jules Muck, a travelling artist came through Wisconsin on a mission to paint murals in all 50 states. Muck finished the mural that is a portrait of a woman in less than a day.

• The River North Ridge subdivision broke ground with Tycore as the general contractor. The goal of the city-led project is to create more homes—both houses and apartments—to boost Waupaca’s housing market.

• The Waupaca School District moved to e-ticketing for sports games through a GoFan, a company that runs a platform where spectators can order tickets via a smartphone.

• With a grant from the Wisconsin Dept. of Transportation, the pedestrian bridge crossing the Waupaca River at Riverview Park will be saved and rebuilt.

• A $4.1 million grant was award to the city of Waupaca by the Wisconsin Dept. of Administration Flexible Facility Program. The funds will upgrade the Waupaca Recreation Center and turn it into a multi-use facility.