Welcome everybody to Midday magazine for this Friday, December 27th, 2024.
Have your host James J. May love here and well welcoming into the studio.
Our good friend Kayla Brumbalski, Community Development Educator with UW-Madison Extension
Wood County, Kayla.
It is always good to see how you're doing.
It's so good to see you.
I'm drinking while.
How are you?
Doing well here.
Thank you very much for asking and just a big shout out to you to the gang over extension.
We appreciate the relationship we have had with you guys for so many years.
It is one of our audiences and one of ours and just between us one of my favorite segments.
I get to do every week is talking with you guys.
We are thinking of you guys and appreciate our friends over at Extension.
It's nice to have you in today and last time of the year too.
Which is your topic today is very fitting for that as we're getting people ready for next
year and asking them to save the dates for some big events coming up in the area.
Yes.
Some good things coming up on the calendar as you're looking at that flipping the page from
December to a brand new year in a couple of days here.
We wanted to send out a reminder to put these dates on your calendar now so you don't miss
them.
So the first ones that I have are the Clean Sweep dates for 2025.
This is one of those where we always get phone calls the day, like the Monday following
the Saturday where folks will say, oh, what is Clean Sweep and we're like, it was it was
two days ago.
You just missed it.
So as much as we can spread the word, the better.
So we're looking at two dates for that this year again.
And those are Saturday, May 31st and Saturday, September 14th.
So two opportunities as you're cleaning things out, you know, as we're in the kind of getting
into the doldrums of winter now, now that the holidays are over.
So maybe you're spending some time on these warmer days, cleaning out grasses and, you
know, supply cupboards and that kind of thing.
If you find anything, that's a hazardous chemical, please don't throw it in the garbage.
You could always take it to either marathon county or portage county solid waste outside
of Clean Sweep.
They likely will charge you a fee depending on what it is for an out of county resident.
But if you are a wood county resident and you're able to hang onto it just a few weeks
longer, encourage you to come on out to Clean Sweep on Saturday, May 31st.
That will be in Marshfield at the agricultural research station off of Yellowstone Drive.
And then in September 14th, and that tentatively will be at town of Saratoga off of 73.
And Kayla, with these first, we'll talk about the dates themselves in a moment.
But just for the audience, it may not know Clean Sweep.
The forever person out there that's like my dad, that literally has a Clean Sweep pile.
Right.
This time he's done it, did it last year, I'll do it again this year, I guarantee he goes
in the basement.
He's like, oh, we got too much stuff, you know, he's trying to, and then there's the
things that you just, you don't want to just, you can't just throw away their things.
It have to be, you know, disposed of in a proper way, like at Clean Sweep or some of the
other places you mentioned before, and he puts it away.
And it's, I don't want to say it's something he looks forward to, but it's almost something
he looks forward to in a way.
It is.
It's kind of a feel good thing.
You know that you're helping the environment, you're, you know, not putting that stuff
in landfills or polluting our river, our beautiful Wisconsin River that runs right through
our community, not polluting our waterways, that kind of thing.
So Clean Sweep is a county funded program.
We get support from DAPCAP, which is the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection.
And to offer, thank you, to offer this event twice a year.
So in the past, we only did it once a year, 2024 is the first time we did it twice a year
and we had some success with that.
So we're looking to continue that.
And so it's an opportunity to bring in anything you're questioning, you know, pesticides,
things like nail polish remover or household chemicals.
Those really shouldn't end up in the trash or in, in your toilet bowl.
You know, they really, really should be disposed of in a safe way.
And Clean Sweep can allow you to do that.
Not only a great feel good thing to do for our planet, for our environment, it's also
the law.
Right.
It also should, you know, it's also important that you, you, you understand that part
of this too, where even if you, I guess, don't care about the planet, you probably care
about being fine.
You probably care about those things.
And in this day and age, they will find you, they, they will catch you.
There's, there is, I mean, just watch one CSI episode and you'll realize what I'm talking
about.
Yes.
Like you can't Jay walk anymore.
Like there's cameras everywhere.
There's, there's people up to date on these things.
And just as importantly, there are fellow community members and citizen members that are believing
this and are working towards a good cause here that we're all trying to build towards.
So I, I don't know that you're doing yourself any favors, try to get rid of this any other
way.
When it comes to these two dates, is there any, are there going to be, and we'll get more
into the details of what can be, you know, recycled at these events, we get closer to
them.
Yeah.
But for now, as people are marking them on their calendars and everything, are there specific
things at each date that you'll be able to don't get rid of at this one, but not at this
one?
Both, both dates are the same.
So I, what I always tell people is planning out, just bring it out and we'll tell you
if we can take it or not.
There are a couple of things that we don't accept, but by and large for the most part,
we're going to take anything that you've got laying around or at least tell you where
you can dispose of it.
And one thing that is a common misconception, this is for household hazardous waste.
So typically we're talking liquid or pelletized types of materials.
We are not talking electronics.
There are separate disposal programs and recycling programs for electronics.
I know that that's a huge need in the community as well, but this is not the program for that.
So this is, you know, you've got a can of paint that you only used half of and now you need
to dispose of the rest of it.
Or as I said, you know, nail polish remover or toilet bowl cleaner that you didn't, maybe
you didn't like, you picked a new brand, didn't like it, you want to get rid of it, don't
throw it in the garbage, bring it out to clean sweep and we'll dispose of it in a safe
and healthy way.
And with so much technology, of course, is so much tech garbage, and whether it is laptops
or it is, you know, the tablets, phones, any of these things, they are now more than
ever that we need these clean sweep events to be able to recycle these kind of things.
Because a lot of our disposal sites just aren't up to date on these things and it's not
their fault.
They just weren't built for that kind of thing.
These are not things that we can put in a landfill.
Yeah, these are things that we need to recycle the right way.
And it's again, the best thing for not only the environment before your checkbook, it
really is.
Not that anybody is a checkbook, any book.
You're, you're, you're, you're, you're in, yeah, you're making a cup, yeah.
Again, clean sweep, 2025 will be Saturday, May 31st and September 14th.
Kayla, a big one that's coming up as well next year that is a very exciting one, not
just in our community, but around the whole state, is the connecting entrepreneurial community's
This is a really unique one, a really unique event that you guys are part of.
Yes, we are so excited about this.
So this is a conference that has been held in a number of other Midwestern states on
an annual basis.
Last year was the first year it was hosted in Wisconsin.
So we were kind of the last ones to adopt this, but we're excited to offer this.
It was held in Platville in 2024 and will be in Wisconsin Rapids in 2025.
This will be an awesome opportunity for us to showcase all that makes Wisconsin Rapids
a wonderful place to live, to start a business, to continue a business.
And so we're super excited to host the connecting entrepreneurial community's conference.
And you know, I made, I maintained for many years.
I think that you could make the argument our signature event here is the cranberry blossom
festival.
Yes.
And to have this attached to that is very unique and very smart if you ask me.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We like to think so.
So the conference itself is Thursday and Friday, January 19th and 20th.
It will open on Wednesday evening with a pre-conference reception.
But our hope is that, so I should back up and say this conference is a little bit unique
in the sense that it's not just hosted at a convention center.
So we'll be using the hotel need for room accommodations, but not for conference accommodations.
We actually want people to get out into the community and to experience all that downtown
Wisconsin Rapids has to offer.
So we're going with a bridging theme for the conference, bridging opportunities, bridging
entrepreneurial success.
And we're also featuring both sides of the river in downtown Wisconsin Rapids.
So day one, we'll have some sessions at the new county boardroom in the Portage County
Jail or in the Wood County Jail, not Portage County, I don't know where that came from,
in the Wood County Jail.
It will also have sessions at the library and at a couple of different sites.
And then on day two, we'll go over and have some sessions at Centralia Center, feature
potentially the YMCA, City Hall, and just give people the chance to really immerse themselves
in the Wisconsin Rapids community.
And then in the addition with cranberry blossom festival, you know, there's some great entertainment
and activities that are happening on those days already.
So that will give some of our out of town guests the opportunity to experience some of those
events.
And then potentially if they wanted to invite their family to come and join them or come
back next year for the event outside of the conference that that's our hope.
So we're hoping it'll bring in not only, you know, some awareness to local residents of
just the beauty and the big sightments around in Cranberry Blossom Festival, but also
bringing some repeat visitors.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a great way to bring attention to this too with it being attached to the Cranberry
Blossom Festival.
That is fantastic.
It's a great opportunity for businesses, whether you are up and running, you've been around
for a year or two, or you want to get up and running for all of that.
But I think there were also first, I mean, it's really cool we're hosting this here in
rap.
It's that's fantastic.
I don't want to skate past that or anything.
That is really cool.
Again, another economic opportunity for our area.
But there's these great areas that we have in life from time to time where we, you know,
you go to school for business, you learn all this and everything, you get out into the
real world and oh my god, I don't know how to do this, this or this.
It is the equivalent of, you know, kids back in the day getting, graduating and not knowing
how to fill out a checkbook or something like that.
There's just these things that slip through the crack sometimes.
For an entrepreneur to be able to not only lean on other entrepreneurs or people that know
this inside and out, ask questions, find out things.
It gives you a, maybe a step up or a step ahead.
It gives you an opportunity to really make this work.
There are so many stats out there that they can tell you about this style of business has
a one in five chance of working or this one, you know, restaurant industry and looking
at that.
Anything we could do to help out our local entrepreneurs and help them get a leg up, help them
give a chance to really achieve and really succeed.
That only benefits all of us.
Even if that's a business you never walk into, that business is putting into our economy.
Right.
And while, and this has come up a bit recently, but while our area here in Wisconsin
rapids, certainly there's people that will tell you we could use this, we could use that
and we could use more of this and more of that.
If you have some perspective and compare Central Wisconsin to some other states, to even
some areas of the state itself Wisconsin, we're doing really good.
We're doing well here.
And I think one appreciating that is also, it's just as important as how we build on that
and not taking our foot off the gas.
And this is a big part of that.
Supporting entrepreneurs, giving them the knowledge, the opportunities to spread their
business out there to maybe even get new partners to go along with their business.
Maybe they've got something that's up and it's so close to being there, they just need
one more person and maybe back them or something like that.
But how do they run into that person?
What opportunities in life do they have to really have that?
This is it.
This is one of those opportunities.
Exactly.
We really can't even put in the words what this can mean in the future going forward.
And I mean relative close future to our economy, to our community.
As well as just bringing in fun new businesses and everything that our creative community
has.
Right.
We've got so many great brain ideas out there.
It'll be really fun to see what grows from this conference as well over the years.
Because this isn't going anywhere.
This is going to be around for a long time.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
And we're just thrilled that we were selected at a number of other communities across
the state to host the conference.
We see this and actually we talk about this a lot in sports and with high school athletics
and everything.
Such a unique opportunity being basically two hours away from everything.
True.
Yeah.
It's smart for them to host it here as much as it is for us to, you know, enjoy it if
you're able to have it.
Right.
The again connecting, connecting entrepreneurial communities conference going to be Thursdays
and Thursday and Friday June 19th and 20th in coordination with the Cranberry Blossom
Festival.
We'll be keeping up to date and letting you know all the logistics of that as we closer
to it.
But I am just so excited about that.
That is going to be a lot.
Cranberry Blossom Festival is already one of the most fun, unique opportunities.
We have in this area.
That being along with it, it's just makes it even stronger.
That's great.
Absolutely.
We are speaking with our friend Kayla from the UW Madison Extension Wood County and Kayla
one other thing we wanted to make sure to remind everybody about is maybe my favorite
thing you guys do.
Science by the river.
That's tough for me to say, by the way, you guys do a lot of really cool things.
But October 4th is going to be science by the river.
The last couple just seems like you guys are really fine tuning this and getting it right
how you want it.
We are.
Yeah.
It's been a lot of fun.
So this is something that I get to do with my colleagues, which is really interesting
because our extension team, we all have such varied responsibilities and expertise that
rarely do we actually kind of cross over and get to work with each other if that makes
sense.
So my background is not in conservation or science or natural resources.
But for this event, I get to work with many of my colleagues and partners who have those
expertise and it's just a really fun way to engage the community and to celebrate.
All that is great about scientific discovery and the science that we have right here in
our community.
So super exciting event.
We are fine tuning it year to year.
I was telling Anna, who is one of my colleagues and co planners of the event, that my family
and I brought bikes and biked part of the trail.
And we spent so long at each station that we didn't actually have time to make it through
the whole trail before it ended.
So next year we're talking about potentially tweaking the length of the trail, recognizing
that two miles, four miles round trip, if you start and end at Bad Hansen Park is a bit
maybe too much, certainly gives you a chance to experience the beautiful river walk and have
some fun along the trail, but maybe making those closer together.
So we're just super excited about the opportunities that will continue to come as the event grows
and get some more popularity and more people to know about it.
I would say the first, maybe the first six months I was doing this job, it took me
a while to wrap my brain around, but what UW Extension is?
And the organization that this is, and the nonprofit that it is, and then understanding
the relationship that we've had with with WFHR here and everything, and having you guys
on it, once a week we have a UW member on, and I'm sitting back after a couple of months
of doing this and I'm like, I'm still meeting new people.
There are so many amazing minds over there that have so much knowledge and know so much
about the key particular subjects.
I love the idea of an event that brings some of that together, that meshes some of that
together.
For one, I think that, and I don't think I'm alone in this, I think it really does highlight
UW Extension and what this is and why it is such an important thing in our communities.
The idea to be able to use some of those brains of you guys over there and put them to work
and get that knowledge out there for other people is so cool and set a great thing and
the idea of doing and making science fun.
It is fun.
I think science is awesome.
I think it's a lot of fun and if not reminding adults of that, getting kids to spark into
that and just who knows where they go with those ideas and those minds.
Just I remember the first year of doing this and it was just a little while after that
that I had some kids and from something from I think one of the high schools around
here.
And just out of the blue, they mentioned how they were really enjoyed the event and they
wanted to learn more about science like immediately, like that Monday when they went
in the class and they were in grade school at the time.
So who knows where that mind goes and that's just one example.
Science by the river is able to do a lot.
I understand the idea of wanting to condense it and make it, you know, something that you
could do in a certain amount of time and everything that's understandable.
I also love the way that you're already doing it to be honest that people aren't able
to take in maybe every station that's okay, maybe there's so much.
As you said that, I would not, you know, you guys know what you're doing over there.
I'm not at all trying to tell you what to do by any means.
But I love all the uniqueness and everything I couldn't imagine taking one of those things
out.
Like they're all really fun and really interesting ways and they also really give us
a chance to I think appreciate extension and all the good work that you guys are doing
and all the great brains we have over there.
Absolutely.
We didn't think that we would take any away.
We would shorten the distance between that.
Yeah.
As I was saying to them like, wait a minute, maybe she needs, but yeah, I'm glad that we have
this conversation.
See, this is helpful to us as we're planning.
This is what we need to know.
And also, like just you cheering that with us and letting us behind the curtain a little
bit, it speaks to how in tune extension is with our community and how much you guys care
about it.
I look at this often when I have businesses and nonprofits come in.
There's a big difference of, and we're spoiled in this area.
I would say 99% if not 100% of the people I have come and talk to are get this.
But there are businesses and there are organizations that this is what we're doing here.
Take it.
And then there are the ones that are like, what do you guys like?
What do you guys interest in?
What are the community needs?
What are, extension does that.
Extension is listening and paying attention to its community.
So just the fact that you have this event and I think all of us would be fine if you just
kept rolling out the same thing every year.
The fact that you're paying attention to that much.
And like, well, maybe we may make it a little bit the distance shorter.
So you know, it's easier on families walking around or maybe some of our senior members
can take it in more or something, whatever the case might be.
That's smart.
That's just smart business, but it's also really caring business.
It's pretty cool.
Have you been learning as you've been going along with this too since you said like this
has been really awesome.
Yeah.
Cool.
So I have a five year old.
We'll be six in January.
And one of the things that we learned this year, we did the Inspector Cabbage Station,
which is actually with my colleague, Janelle, who is a horticulture specialist.
And you're testing out the acidity and base levels of cabbage juice.
And it was just really fun to, you know, match it up with the color sheet and say, like,
which color do you think this is going to turn based on what's in the water?
And yeah, there's a great photo of myself and my family all kind of open.
What?
We didn't expect that to happen.
The other really cool story that I'll share just quickly is that we this year had the
ham radio group out of Marshfield, I think.
Forgive me.
I don't know exactly where they're from, but they were able to connect with the International
Space Station just like randomly as they were passing over and a kid in Wisconsin Rapids
and elementary school kids from Wisconsin Rapids got to talk to the astronauts on the International
Space Station.
And you want to talk about making a difference in a kid's life, like how cool is that for
that kid to be able to go back to school and say, this is what happened.
And then potentially to, you know, you talk about that spark, like, what is it that will
get a child to pursue a passion?
Maybe for that kid, they're going to grow up to be an astronaut.
And they're going to say that their, their interest in aeronautics started at science
by the river.
Because you just don't know if those that even happens without these events, without these
opportunities and everything.
It's a great story.
Thank you for sharing that.
Yeah.
People are here these events or they have thoughts or ideas or just want to have follow-up
questions about things.
How can they reach you?
How can they find out more?
So extension wood county, you can find us by googling and you'll come to our website.
We have got a Facebook page.
We've got some newsletters that you can sign up for.
Lots of different ways to engage and we encourage you to do so.
Encourage you to find that out.
Find out more.
Everybody reach out to the UW team.
They're always looking forward to talking with you.
Kayla will talk to you next year.
Happy holidays and a happy New Year's to you and yours.
Thank you so much for joining us and please spread that to all the extension family for
us.
Wonderful.
We'll do.
Thank you, James.
Thank you.
And we will be out for the week.
But we'll be back next week with more Midday magazine.
A big thank you to Pam Hilke and the amazing scheduling she does week in a week out right here
at WFHR.
