City losing effective business advocates

Suddenly, Wauwatosa is facing a bit of a challenge with brain drain of pro-business professionals.

First, former Mayor Jill Didier left for a post as economic development coordinator for Milwaukee County. Then late last month, Meg McKenna left her position as executive director of the Wauwatosa Chamber of Commerce to become director of development for VISIT Milwaukee, Milwaukee's convention and visitors bureau, which serves the metro area.

Mayor set the tone

When announcing that she was taking the position and giving up her job as mayor, Didier said she viewed it as a way to bring an atmosphere that evolved into a well-reasoned approach to development in Wauwatosa to the rest of the county. Didier told Wauwatosa NOW at the time that the city managed to create $50 million in economic development projects over the past two years.

She cited The Enclave and the Mt. Tosa residential developments, a supermarket on Mayfair Road and an Alterra Café on the east side as results of some of that work. She also pointed to increased spending by people visiting the village area in general and a revitalized Hart Park stadium.

Working with the Common Council, her administration allocated Community Development Block Grant funds to create master plans for the East Tosa and Village areas to guide development.

"I helped instigate the plans, and I allocated money in capital resources for the next five years to start implementation," Didier told reporter Stephanie Scott.

Didier pushed early on for changes to the city's development processes, leading to the city's economic development director position, filled by professional Paulette Enders, who has pushed to further streamline those processes, as well as the Community Development Authority, among other proposed changes.

Didier did not make everyone happy during her tenure, particularly those who preferred to see the city not change. Overall, though, she was an effective steward of what makes Wauwatosa special, while improving it at the same time.

McKenna revitalized chamber

Also a big loss to the business community was the resignation of Meg McKenna as executive director of the Wauwatosa Chamber of Commerce. During her two years at the helm, McKenna breathed new life into a group that had, in some respects, been treading water. Not the least of which was working with its board to retake the name Wauwatosa Chamber of Commerce, the last step in abandoning a failed attempt to expand the reach of the group to other area communities.

Since it is an organization driven by membership, perhaps her greatest impact had been to increase the number of members by 33 percent in each of the last two years, adding 70 members in 2010 and 60 in 2011. McKenna was proud of the fact that the group reached its new member and retention goals.

As was the case with Didier, McKenna was in demand because of the work she did in Wauwatosa. At the geographic center of the suburbs, the city is home to several tourist attractions, diverse housing stock and a dynamic economy. All these elements, along with her ability to build chamber membership by improving its programming, made McKenna a fit for a regional post, with Visit Milwaukee.

Bill Feagles, past chamber president, called McKenna the perfect person at the perfect time, crediting her sales and networking skills for attracting interest in the chamber and building its recognition within the community. "She was constantly talking up the chamber," Feagles told Wauwatosa NOW.

McKenna said she will dearly miss running the chamber, but also felt the need for a bigger challenge and the ability to continue to promote Wauwatosa. She will appear at the group's annual meeting from 4:30 to 7 p.m. Jan. 26 at the Radisson Hotel Milwaukee-West, 2303 N. Mayfair Road.

In the interim, to maintain stability and momentum, the chamber's Board of Directors has appointed former mayor Theresa Estness to an interim director post and promoted Kari Miller to assistant chamber director. Miller has worked as office manager for the past six years.

Robert Warde is a freelance business writer living in Wauwatosa. He has been a journalist for more than 27 years and a business journalist for the past 16 years. Reach him at

robert.warde@yahoo.com.