Steve Jagler, for BizTimes Media

Companies interested in starting or improving a corporate wellness plan for their employees are invited to attend the second annual BizTimes Wellness Summit.

How do companies foster the creativity needed to produce their next great business idea, product or service?

Josh Linkner believes he has the answers to that question.

Continuing improvement is expected in the southeastern Wisconsin economy in the second quarter, according to the latest Business Outlook Survey conducted by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC).

Wisconsin technology executives who responded to the most recent WisBusiness.com Tech Leaders Survey expressed considerably more optimism about the state's economy than those a year ago.

The next state biennial budget will cut funding to the Milwaukee Area Technical College by $7.5 million each year, on top of a $5 million budget cut for 2010 that it was handed in October, according to Michael Burke, president of MATC.

The Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce has supported Walker's plan to cut public spending and hold the line on taxes.

Southeastern Wisconsin manufacturers are overwhelmingly supportive of Walker's proposed budget, says Jeff Hoffman, vice president of Pewaukee-based commercial real estate brokerage firm Judson & Associates. Hoffman, the former president of the Independent Business Association of Wisconsin, primarily handles industrial real estate deals.

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett issued the following statement as his response to this report about the impact of the new state budget:

Milwaukee's commercial real estate professionals are enthusiastic about Walker's "Wisconsin is open for business" agenda and are glad to see that he is trying to balance the budget without raising taxes, according to Jim Villa, president and chief executive officer of the Commercial Association of Realtors Wisconsin (CARW).

Gov. Scott Walker’s two-year state budget plan will have significant impact on every man, woman and child in Wisconsin.

It will affect the roads you drive on. It will affect the schools your children attend. It will affect the colleges your future employees are studying in. It will affect the services you receive from your city and county. It will affect the buses your employees or perhaps your customers ride on. It will affect the charities that assist your community.

As Walker prepares to close a projected $3.6 billion state deficit by cutting annual local shared revenues by $1 billion, a new normal will be felt by city and county governments, school districts and social agencies.

Walker's budget repair bill and proposed state budget would result in a decrease in funding for local transit systems in the state, which will likely prompt service cuts and fare increases, said Kerry Thomas, executive director of Transit Now, an advocacy group for mass transit in southeastern Wisconsin.

Beginning on Thursday March 24, and repeating for nine consecutive Thursdays, until May 19, Best Place at the Historic Pabst Brewery will raise...