WAUSAU, Wis. (WSAU) — The Wausau Region Chamber of Commerce is going to be spending the next six months working to prove why Wausau is one of America’s Best Communities.
The city was named one of 50 quarterfinalists in the competition at last night’s city council meeting. The program is sponsored by Frontier Communications, Dish Network, the Weather Channel and CoBank.
Wausau Chamber government affairs director Sara Guild says the program seeks plans and ideas on how to make your community great. “Implement some kind of a project or multiple projects that will enhance their communities. But in addition to that, they also have to show what makes their community America’s Best Community.”
Each community is putting together what amounts to a grant application for the process. “We felt that one of the best things that Wausau could benefit from is a better wayfinding system. So essentially a way to better showcase what is in Wausau, what we already have here.” Guild says Wausau will be receiving $35,000 in planning grants and $15,000 in matched grants in order to move forward with that plan.
Wausau now has six months to use that funding to plan that wayfinding program, and to produce some promotional materials to show off what it is that makes the city great. “Figuring out how we’re going to step this up and what can be done, and how we can continue to do it if we don’t make it through. We want to make sure we still have the support from the community to bring some of this to fruition.” Guild says that if Wausau does make it to the top eight, there’s another $100,000 in the works to continue developing the program.
The top prizes for the program are $1,000,000, $2,000,000 and $3,000,000 awards for the cities who take third through first.
