A panel of local developers working on some of the most significant development projects in southeastern Wisconsin will highlight the 12th annual BizTimes Milwaukee Commercial Real Estate and Development Conference.
The event will be held from 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 14, at Potawatomi Hotel & Casino in Milwaukee.
The keynote speaker for the event will be Lawrence Yun, chief economist and senior vice president of research for the National Association of Realtors. He will give an overview of the national real estate outlook.
Also, a panel of prominent local developers working on some of the largest development projects in the region will be featured at the conference. They will include:
- Mark Irgens, chief executive officer and manager of Irgens. The firm is building 833 East, a 17-story, 358,000-square-foot office tower under construction in downtown Milwaukee. The firm is also working on a mixed-use development plan for the Ruby Farm property in Brookfield. Irgens has been directly responsible for more than 200 major real estate projects in the office, research and development, industrial, urban mixed-use, senior housing and health care market sectors valued at more than $2 billion. Those projects include the GE Healthcare building in Wauwatosa, several other office buildings in the Milwaukee County Research Park in Wauwatosa, the 875 East Wisconsin building in downtown Milwaukee and the ASQ Center building downtown.
- Jerold Franke, president of Wispark LLC. The firm is leading a team of developers for the 85-acre Drexel Town Square development, which will create a mixed-use downtown area for Oak Creek. The project will include a Meijer store, a Four Points by Sheraton hotel, several restaurants, upscale apartments, a Main Street, a town square and a new city hall and library. The firm is also developing the 220-acre OakView Business Park in Oak Creek. Franke has been president of Wispark since 2000. In that role he has overseen the development of several master-planned business parks, including the LakeView Corporate Park in Pleasant Prairie and GrandView Business Park in Yorkville.
- Scott Yauck, president and CEO of Cobalt Partners LLC, which is working on a mixed-use development in Menomonee Falls called Whitestone Station, which is one of the largest brownfield redevelopment projects planned in the state. Plans for the 65-acre former industrial site located west of the U.S. Highway 41/45 and Pilgrim Road interchange include a Costco store, additional retail buildings and 320 upscale apartments to be developed by Fiduciary Real Estate Development.
The panel will be moderated by Dr. Mark Eppli, interim James H. Keyes Dean of Business Administration and Robert B. Bell Sr. Chair in Real Estate at Marquette University.
Marquette and the Commercial Association of Realtors Wisconsin are event partners for the BizTimes Commercial Real Estate and Development Conference.
To register for the conference, visit www.biztimes.com/creconference.
