MARATHON CITY, WI (WSAU) — It may be some 3 and a half hours from Marathon City to Racine where Foxconn is preparing to build a multi-million dollar plant to manufacture LCD displays, but the impact of the project is still being felt in the small Marathon County community.
Governor Scott Walker stopped at County Material Corporation Friday afternoon to tour their new facility and talk with employees who will have a hand in making five miles of concrete pipes that will help make up the base of the project. Officials with the company say they’ll be making the pipes at their Madison, Rib Falls, and Green Bay locations to keep up with demand.
“The benefits of Foxconn are reaching every corner of the state,” said Governor Walker. “County Materials right here in North Central Wisconsin creates high-quality concrete and construction products that will be used to build Foxconn’s state-of-the-art manufacturing campus. I thank County Materials for participating in this historic project along with Foxconn, Gilbane Building Company, M+W Group, and Hoffman Construction Co., for putting Wisconsin first.”
The Governor says the County Materials portion of the project is part of over $100 million in work for Wisconsin contractors and sub-contractors as part of Foxconn’s phase one.
Representative John Spiros said he’s proud to have a part of the project originating from Marathon County. “It’s huge, and everybody should think that it’s huge. This is what’s happening in Wisconsin, we are working. In our district, we have a piece of Foxconn.” Adding that the potential exists for other companies in the region to have a hand in the project as other phases are bid out.
But it’s not just in the construction/manufacturing sector that the state needs to step its game up. Spiros says as the project begins to take shape, Wisconsin will need to look closely at its schools and infrastructure to make sure the state remains an appealing destination for workers.
“What do people look for when they come into a new community? They look at schools, and they look at number one schools. We have them here.” Spiros says the last budget was kind to education, and he hopes to keep it that way for the foreseeable future if the revenue is there. “We also need to worry about infrastructure. So we need to make sure we have both. It’s the youth coming up, and the infrastructure to keep Wisconsin moving.”
During his presentation, Governor Walker also touted the project’s potential to keep Wisconsin students closer to home. As he’s toured the state’s technical schools, he says he hears time and time again that students are looking forward to working at the plant or being a part of the building process.
According to the Governor, the Foxconn plant is the largest foreign direct investment in the history of America and the largest economic development project in Wisconsin’s history.
(Information from Governor Scott Walker’s office was used in this report)
