Hello all, welcome to WFHR's Rapids Report, probably brought to you by Cocketsceptic for
this June 25th, 2025.
Have your host James Day and Mail up here, and welcome again to the studio, a couple of
great guests for us.
We have first off Wisconsin Rapids Mayor, Matt Zachar with us, Matt, good to see you.
You're two James, thanks for having me.
Thanks for being here, and of course Wood County Board Chairman, Lance Plymo, Lance, good
to see you again.
Likewise James, glad to be here.
This is fun, getting to have you guys both in at the same time.
I appreciate you both working your schedules to be able to do this too.
That's really nice, because we do have to work together on a lot of things, and I'm really
lucky to have mayors in both ends of the county that are very easy to work with.
One of Sunday, excuse me, Mayor, I wanted to say a big shout out to our friends at Wisconsin
Rapids Community Media as well.
Be sure to do yourself a favor, go to YouTube, subscribe to their page, keep up to the great
work that they are doing.
Joe has one of the most amazing shirts on.
It's fantastic, I love it, I want to talk to him about it after the show, it's a good
stuff to trust me, everybody.
Guys, first up, how are things going?
We just got done wrapping up really, I think, the signature event in Central Wisconsin,
the cranberry blossom fest, also the connecting entrepreneurs, communities, I want to talk
about both of these things.
Let's start with cranberry blossom fest.
Seemed very successful in the area, heard a lot of great things from people.
This was your first to really, I don't want to say being mayor of and sort of everything.
So how was it for you on your end of things, Matt?
Yeah, I think, excuse me, things went great.
I give Stacy and all the folks at work at the Chamber of Commerce, hard of Wisconsin credit
for everything they did and everything they put on, especially in the two hottest days
of the year this far, that kind of threw some monkey wrenches into it.
But I was down there multiple times, just for the parade walking around and the fishing
with the police and just in and out all weekend long.
I think everything went great.
Again, it was a little bit tricky between heat and wind, but everybody was having fun.
Again, they did a great job putting it on and really bringing it together.
And they did that at the same time that they really had a big hand in helping with connecting
entrepreneurial communities, the CEC program that was on, that was the second year that
the UW Extension did it.
Last year was in Plattville.
Next year is going to be in Green Lake, May 13th through the 15th, I can't believe I
remembered that off the top of my head.
But yeah, so excited about that.
But the all event downtown, first part was on the east side, second part was on the west
side for three days, about 200, a little over 200 people from all around the state coming
in.
Really, for the most part, what I learned is it's more about the platforms that people
have built, the agencies, organizations that are built around helping entrepreneurs get
a leg up if they're just getting started or growing to the next level or getting
the financing.
And I think all those things are great.
I know we still have a road to haul, but we're moving in the right direction to really
get the people excited about taking on entrepreneurial activities and the risks and the investment
and the ideas and really moving them forward to develop new businesses in town throughout
the whole county.
We have over 5,000 active businesses in the entire county, which I thought was amazing.
I say that we try to double that in the next 10 years and I think we're going to be
in pretty good shape.
Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, small and middle businesses, so that's where
we want to go.
As well as the big, if they come in, we're certainly going to be smart enough to figure
out how to get them in the door and get them set up, so a little bit of everything.
Certainly, don't like any business to go out or anything like that, but I think that
one of the things that, whether you're looking at the numbers, reading articles like
I am or you're just in a rural community like we are, you've seen something happening
over, since really the pandemic, and I know we don't like to use that word, but since then
we've seen a shift of people, certainly trying to be smarter with their dollar and some
of these things, and with that, not necessarily not spending it, but where they spend it,
how they spend it, and you've heard the mantra from us and many people in the community
many times, buying local supporting local.
They've taken that to the restaurant industry in droves.
We've seen even here in town, places like Applebees and bigger businesses like that, not
doing very well since then, where on the other side of it, you've seen a lot of mom and
pop restaurants doing very well and surviving because most people are deciding, hey, I want
to go rural, I want to go local with my money, and especially with the restaurant industry,
just using it as an example, but with that are openings.
There's openings.
Most people, especially when we're talking about entrepreneurs, most of them have to do
with the food industry, and there is a big opening right there with that in communities
like this.
Hosting this and having this here, it's certainly for any community, and big or small,
it can be beneficial, but boy, in this right now, 2025, in an area like this is a perfect
time to be doing something like this, and just one industry I'm touching on here, is
noteworthy, I think, but there's a lot of industries, Matt.
Or big agricultural, I mean, and we've set up some really big businesses over the years
that have revolved around that and continued to, and then you have offshoots off of that.
I think, again, just going back to what we're going to say, and the biggest thing I think
we have to start teaching our kids, and it can't just be mom and dad, although that's
where it starts in the schools too, from young on up, like even if you're geared towards
being a work, you want to work for another company, you still need to run your labor like
your business, you still need to understand money, how to save up that money, how to
invest that money properly, how to always be looking at the future and what you can do
to make your life better, because if you make your life better, you're making other people's
lives better.
So, it's a big circle, and certainly in smaller communities like this, you see the impacts
pretty fast.
Yeah, it drives you.
I mean, you want to have, you don't want all your eggs in one basket, you know, and
the entrepreneur of spirits, what drives communities, and you know, even when you think of those
big misses, you know, I don't care if you're talking Apple, Dell, or they'll start
it with one or two guys in a garage, and they happen to get big, and, you know, both
the mayor and myself have entrepreneurial backgrounds.
That's where we came from, you know, started your own businesses, built those, and you
want that spirit to survive, to thrive in town, and in the event we just had, I thought
it was outstanding.
I was only there for the very end of it, but the comments I heard from the attendees,
fantastic.
So, the mayor and his team, the extension, everybody who were involved, be lauded for
that.
Yeah.
Very exciting.
And it's going to be, I think, another part of this that's exciting is seeing what develops
from it, and what, you know, what business has come from this, and I do think that it's
noteworthy, what you mentioned there, Lance, about your guy's background, certainly love
hearing your feedback about how the event went and everything, but given your backgrounds,
you know, firsthand what it takes to make or break a business, what it takes to really,
what entrepreneurs, what people need in general when they're just getting going, and some
of the gray areas that can happen there, with trying to open a business or something like
that.
And I think that's an experience though that we both bring to government, some extent.
I mean, you always hear that run government, you know, like a business.
It's a little different.
I'll tell you, it's a little different.
But a lot of those same skills and tactics need to happen.
They're still a bottom line.
Still got to make ends meet, you know, we at the local level don't get to print money.
We have to balance budgets.
And at the end of the day, one of the funniest things I always hear is when a constituent
is typically upset or yelling at you, it's the statement is always it's all about the
money.
And I go, yes, it really is.
We have to be wise with those resources.
We have to use McCordy.
Yeah.
There's an old saying, nine out of ten businesses fail, so you have to start ten businesses.
Right.
And it's true to it.
You have to, you know, it all comes down to the individual person and the perseverance
that they have to keep going.
And the least we can do as a community is consolidate our resources so that they're
not to make the path a little bit easier so they're not running all over, getting burnt
out and just frustrated to just have that hub that they can come to and you have the
ability to talk about things and be connected to the services that are there to get you started.
And I think that's a big part of it.
But in the end, yeah, it comes down to the person, the entrepreneur to just keep going,
keep swimming is what I always tell my kids.
It's got to be a balance, I would imagine, and especially coming from the backgrounds
you do.
It's a phrase and we like phrases and we go to them a lot, but I don't know that I want
my government run like a business.
I don't know that that's the right way to approach it.
I don't know that's the right way that the American people want it.
And we're seeing that, we're hearing that a lot right now.
I think that there are certainly parallels, absolutely, a hundred percent.
But I think a business, and I think of, well, this is about numbers, this is about black
and white, this is about this and this, nothing to do with feelings and government needs
feeling.
I need my government to feel, I need my government to feel what I'm going through.
I think part of the problem right now is we have a lot of people and I'm not talking
about the, you know, local government or anything like that, but a lot of the problem right
now is most of the people in power have no idea what it is like on the ground level.
Most of them have never had dirt under their nails.
Most of them have not been what it is to be in blue collar life or anything like that.
And a lot of those people are trying to run a government like a business right now.
And I'm not good with that.
And I don't think most of the American people are.
I mean, you have to have compassion, but at the end of the day, there are parallels.
And the fiscal part of it is a big part of that.
But there are things, for instance, like, you know, I'm all about competition, but I
don't know that you need three sheriff's departments, so to speak, or we don't need five
human service departments, you know, those are government entities where competition tends
to drive price.
I mean, it tends to keep it down, but you have to be compassionate.
You have to listen to people.
At the end of the day, though, you still have to pay the bills at this level.
Right.
Right.
You can't do it all on feeling.
Absolutely.
Yes.
There's another segment to that kind of, it's like the third generation of anything, right?
The first generation starts a business.
They know the ins and outs because they had to fight tooth and nail in order to get everything.
That they build it up, build it up, and then, you know, their children come along and
they're kind of with them.
They're seeing how it went.
They're a part of it.
They can take it over and they can run what exists and do it pretty successfully.
But that third generation, they don't have really any idea in the fourth and so forth.
And that's when things start to kind of falter because they're just living off the success
that was built before them.
And I kind of see governments that way because most of the people in the government have no
idea how it got built and ultimately they're being handed a blank, not I would say a blank
check because we all have to be cautious of the money, the fiscal responsibility.
But at the same time, you know, they don't have to necessarily provide the most, the
best customer service.
I mean, take that as example in a business, you lose your customer service, you're done.
And a government, you can lose your customer service and you still get paid.
And that's not, that's where things, you know, so to get that back to the basic roots
of what it takes to run a business and keep people happy, take care of your customers,
that's what it should be.
And the money should fall in line and we should all respect that the money is not free
and it did come from somewhere and we should still be respectful of that.
We go with Wisconsin Rapids Mayor Matt Sacker and Wood County Board Chairman Lance Plymmel.
Mayor, just a couple of quick things, one of the touch on one, the mill, how is that going?
Any updates there?
The mill is going well, there's a lot of things that the craft mill's still coming down
at a pretty good clip, we're so excited about that.
Again, sad that it's going, but at the same time way better than watching it deteriorate
and just sitting there.
So that's going really well, there is some good interest in some very big ways,
but there's just so many moving parts and so much behind what it takes to make something
like that happen.
Certainly, we can't get ahead of the game and start talking about things just because we
want to keep everyone safe and happy and moving forward.
But at the same time, the exciting part is that there is interest behind the facilities
that we have there and how all the pieces are going to be put together to see if we can
make it work.
So we're excited about that.
Enjoying some of the behind the scenes stuff with that, as a construction kid and everything.
I love seeing all that stuff and the way these things are going and stuff, I've never
been in that building really, so they've just seen some of that has been kind of cool too.
It's nice that they allowed us to get some drone footage and stuff like that out of it
being work, they've always worked really well with us, I'm appreciative of that.
They don't have to do that.
They could very well say, stay out of our way, we don't want to talk to you.
So I appreciate the fact that we have good conversations and work well together.
So thank you for that.
And James, I hear that all over.
When I travel to the state with different entities, they say we have more cooperation
in that Wisconsin ramp as wood county areas, central Wisconsin, than we do in most areas.
Those arguments and pressure points that you have in other places, just don't really
exist here.
We tend to work together.
And I wanted to mention this that the city is in discussion about electing a city attorney.
I just wanted to touch on that and just not clear the air, but just kind of like give
the audience a little bit more idea of that.
I had a couple of listeners asking me, what is this?
I don't know anything about this, just to touch on it a little.
Yeah, so it was brought up by a councilman just to have the comments, how I look at it.
Just to have the conversation if it's something that they're interested in.
We've always had an elected city attorney.
There are only 14 of all the municipalities that we have that have a corporate council
for the municipal corporation.
So the question is, what's better, what's worse?
Some will say, well, it's nice to have the differentiation between the executive branch
and judicial branch, legislative branch.
In this case, I can see both sides of it.
I can see where I don't want the attorney to be necessarily hired by the mayor.
But at the same time, the mayor is in charge of everybody that is in the departments within
the city.
So it doesn't really make a difference.
Ultimately, they have a job to do.
And that is making sure that the city does everything in the most legal way possible.
So in the end, it will work fine either way.
So the council is bringing it up and talking about it in certainly different opinions on
each side.
You know, look forward to see which way it lands.
And in the end, whichever way it lands, we move forward and deal with it accordingly.
You know, so appreciate that.
No, I don't want to keep you guys too long.
You're both very busy and both have a lot of things going on.
And that's just you two.
I mean, I know of this Joe is and stuff too.
So, but I didn't want to take a minute because I don't know how often we get to do this.
We have both of you in here and two very important pieces of our government to be able to talk
to at the same time.
So, I'm of course going to waste that time and ask you questions.
And only I would think of.
No, seriously, we actually touched on this, Lance, I was curious of how working together,
and not so much just you two individually, but your positions working together.
We've, you know, kind of organically touched on this a little bit already in this conversation,
but I know Mary, you and I have before and Lance, you and I have many times.
How much this stuff is common knowledge to the average citizen,
to the American people.
There are certain people out there that we ask them to vote.
We ask them to, you know, help us keep democracy alive and breathing and everything,
but so many of them don't understand a lot of the levels of government or things.
How many times Lance, have you been asked to do something that you're not in charge of?
You and I talk about this all the time, you know, you know, you get those causes.
And there actually is an educational piece that the County Association put together
that we can do in the schools, but it's questions.
And I don't want to sound crude, but you know, who picks up your garbage?
What happens when you flush the toilet, you know, who takes care of that?
Who runs the jail?
Who handles human services, crisis intervention?
And I'm sure the mayor, Matt gets those cause.
I'm sure, you know, yelling and screaming that he should take care of it.
And they have nothing to do with it.
And likewise, we get the same, same issues.
So there's a big educational piece that goes along to knowing what level of government is responsible for what.
And it's our job not to say, call the other guy.
You know, we try to provide certain answers.
And I thought we could talk about a little of that today for the listeners.
And are there examples of times where you two have worked together?
Are your offices have had to, you know, coordinate or anything like that?
I think they work together a lot.
Yeah.
You know, well, a real good example is our planning is owning office, you know,
there are people down in their planning offices, all those projects that happen.
Not just downtown, but with extra territorial zoning, those type of issues come up all the time.
Social service issues that come up and that's your background, isn't it?
You know, that come up that their police officers may handle originally end up in our departments.
But the one thing that I appreciate most is, you know, whether we agree on an issue or not,
the phone lines are always open.
You know, the mayor picks up the phone, I pick up the phone.
We have these conversations because we know that the boundaries don't end at a line.
It's a community.
I can't even tell you where my district actually starts and ends.
It's somewhere in rapids and grad in rapids, but I represent the entire county.
And I'm sure the mayor, same thing.
Now they sit in that chair instead of that of an alderman.
Yeah, I just see, again, think about how calm the world would be if there were no humans, right?
But the reality is we're here and there's a lot of us.
And we all have our own opinions.
We all have our own way of seeing the world.
But we also are being influenced quite a bit by social media.
Like there's a whole new world right now in that sense.
So you get some pretty divisive people on both sides of the aisle.
For me, you know, people ask as I was running, you know,
are you a Republican, you Democrat?
It doesn't matter.
Like that's not my job.
My job right now is to make sure I can communicate effectively with everybody that's involved in the conversation,
which is effectively everybody in the community.
So the more Lance and I can just get to know each other and trust each other,
that even if we have to go, you know, I believe one way he believes in other way,
we know that it's not out of like vindictiveness for each other,
just because it's some people just have fun with it, I guess.
But ultimately, our job is to make sure that the community moves forward,
whichever way we decide.
Again, we're, we've been here for 150 years.
We're going to be here for a long time to come.
We're going to be making decisions all the time.
We adjust accordingly.
That's just the way life is and that's the beauty of representative democracy.
And I think is, you know, as Matt, as the mayor's coming to office,
I don't know that I've ever seen anybody coming with as open a mind.
You see, you know, no preconceived notions, no axe to grind,
just I want to learn.
And that's really refreshing.
And I think I've been through five mayors.
Wow.
And that's really a testament.
They've all been really good.
You know, we've had a very good relationship,
but Matt really, you know, comes in and goes,
sometimes I ask that question, I know what I know, but what don't I know?
And that's the biggest thing that I find out every day.
The more I learn, the less I realize I actually know.
Yeah.
Which makes life interesting.
I'll say that.
I appreciate the time, guys.
Thank you so much.
I do want to remind the audience as well that there's a great video series
on Wisconsin's Rebs Community Media's YouTube page.
And mayor has been doing some good stuff with them and the chamber has been
doing a nice series too with local businesses.
And in case you haven't caught, be sure to check them out.
They're really good interviews and really good and informative stuff.
So go ahead and go over to YouTube, type in your search bar,
Wisconsin Rebs Community Media, subscribe to their page and keep up to date
on all of this great work.
Thank you guys so much for the time.
Thank you.
Our audience has followed questions or anything.
Lance, how can they get a hold of you?
All my information is available on the county website.
My phone number is my email address is I do not have a Facebook account
nor have I ever.
So don't consider that an official means of communication.
And mayor help up for you.
I'm so way better to, it's better to talk to me in person.
715-315-2925 is the best way to talk to me.
Appreciate what you guys are doing in the community and appreciate you hanging out with me
today.
Thanks a lot for the time.
Thanks, Lance.
And thanks to all of you out there for joining us here for another edition of Rapids
Report Brought to you by Cracket Sceptic here at WFHR.
