MSOE spends $100M as it targets growth
Downtown campus looks to increase its enrollment
With an eye towards increasing its enrollment, Milwaukee School of Engineering has spent more than $100 million to expand the university’s downtown campus since 2017 − with its latest development, a new softball stadium, close to being completed in time for next month’s opening day.
MSOE, which focuses on engineering, nursing and business degrees, has additional projects in the works − including the $14 million redevelopment of an office building now leased to the federal government.
The result is more vitality on downtown’s east side generated by a small university with an oversize impact on the Milwaukee area’s economy.
“They’ve been a very positive influence,” said Ald. Robert Bauman, whose district includes downtown. “And they often operate below the radar.”
“We really want to grow and expand,” said MSOE President John Walz.
Walz and Bauman both spoke at a recent Common Council Zoning, Neighborhoods and Development Committee, which recommended allowing property tax-exempt status for a building MSOE purchased on March 1.
The city normally prohibits new tax-exempt projects within the Park East Redevelopment Plan area, where the building is located at 310 E. Knapp St.
In return for waiving that prohibition, the university will make an annual payment in lieu of taxes to the city for an initial term of 10 years. That payment starts at $100,000, and increases by 2.5% each year.
The university plans to convert the two-story, 58,400-square-foot building into the new home of its Civil and Architectural Engineering and Construction Management Department.
That $14 million project could start by early 2024 after the relocation of the building’s current tenant: the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s immigration services and enforcement field offices.
The civil engineering program will move to the Knapp Street building from the basement of MSOE Campus Center, 1033 N. Broadway, which Walz
called a cramped, windowless space. The program could be in its new home by the start of the 2024-’25 academic year, he said.
A major investment on downtown’s east side
Walz also told committee members that MSOE has spent more than $100 million on campus developments over the past six years.
That includes such projects as:
● The Dwight and Dian Diercks Computational Science Hall, which opened at 1025 N. Milwaukee St. in 2019.
● The 2020 expansion of the Ruehlow Nursing Complex, located in the Campus Center.
● The 2021 renovation and expansion of Hermann Viets Memorial Tower, a residence hall at 1121 N. Milwaukee St.’
● The We Energies STEM Center, a K-12 student outreach program that opened in 2021 at 1444 N. Water St.
● The new Raiders Field softball stadium, which opens in April at 408 E. State St.
Also opening from 2020 through 2022 were the Robert Spitzer Dining Commons at the Campus Center; a renovated Welcome Center at the Campus Center, and University Terrace, a plaza and green space between Diercks Hall and Viets Tower.
And that comes on top of the 2014 conversion of a failed commercial hotel project into MSOE’s Grohmann Tower apartments, 233 E. Juneau Ave., and the 2013 opening of Pamela and Hermann Viets Field, a soccer field built on top of a 780-car parking garage at 1305 N. Broadway.
One other big project of note: the 2004 opening of the Kern Center, 1245 N. Broadway, which includes arenas for basketball and hockey, a running track and a fitness center.
More projects on the horizon
Those earlier projects occurred under the presidency of Hermann Viets, who retired in 2015 and died two years later.
Walz was inaugurated as president in 2017 as MSOE was developing a master plan to “feel more like a campus,” he said at the time.
Six years later, Walz said the university is considering additional projects beyond the future civil engineering facility on Knapp Street.
Those could include additional upgrades for student residence halls, renovations to the Allen-Bradley Hall of Science/Fred Loock Engineering Center, 432 E. Kilbourn Ave., and improvements for athletic facilities and other student amenities, Walz told the Journal Sentinel.
“We’re always wanting to improve the student experience,” he said.
One such student life project: the Patricia E. Kern Conservatory of Music, which is being created within a former private residence, at 308 E. Juneau Ave. The university bought the building in December for $600,300, according to city assessment records.
The conservatory will house such programs as the concert band, jazz ensemble, string orchestra, concert choir, pep band and jazz combo. It is to open by the beginning of the 2023-’24 academic year.
MSOE also could eventually develop a 1.8-acre parking lot, bordered by North Water Street, North Market Street, East Juneau Avenue and East Knapp Street, that it bought from BMO Harris Bank in 2015 for $3.5 million.
Some ‘very generous’ donors
The developments are funded largely through some “very generous” donors, Walz said.
That includes Milwaukee developer Ken Breunig, who graduated from MSOE with an associate of applied science in architectural and building construction engineering technology in 1978 and a bachelor’s degree in the same field in 1979.
Breunig’s investment group bought the Knapp Street building in 2021 for $4.75 million before selling it to MSOE for $1,090,500 − in effect donating the property.
His classes at MSOE included one in real estate investment economics − leading to Breunig’s first investment property purchase within three months of graduation.
“I am honored now to be able to contribute back to MSOE for the start that they gave my career,” Breunig said.
Enrollment challenges
MSOE’s investments are coming even as the university, like many other higher education institutions, saw its enrollment hurt by the COVD-19 pandemic.
The university has 2,729 full- and part-time students − a number that reflects a rebuild after MSOE lost enrollment, including a large international student contingent, in recent years, Walz said. Enrollment for the 2019-’20 academic year was 2,746 students.
MSOE within five years could see around 3,000 students, he said.
But MSOE, which is not a research university that grants doctoral degrees, doesn’t want growth to get in the way of its mission of “hands-on education,” Walz said.
“We never want to get beyond what we’re good at,” he said.
A benefit to Milwaukee, state
That focus is benefitting Wisconsin, including the Milwaukee area, said Walz and others, including city Development Commission Lafayette Crump.
“It’s pretty special to have an institution like that in downtown Milwaukee,” Crump said.
MSOE provides around 500 full- and part-time faculty and staff jobs, not counting research employees, according to a new economic impact study commissioned by the university.
MSOE’s spending on its operations, research and construction, along with spending by its students and campus visitors, totaled an estimated $79.7 million throughout southeastern Wisconsin in the 2020-’21 academic year, the study said.
Also, student and employee volunteer work amounted to a $9.4 million impact, while MSOE alumni generated $232.1 million in added income for the regional economy, the study said.
In addition, around 60% of MSOE students come from Wisconsin, Walz said, but around 70% to 75% of alumni get their first jobs in the state.
“We like to say we’re a net importer of talent,” Walz said.
“From an economic development perspective, MSOE is an important part of Milwaukee’s competitive edge when it comes our new and existing businesses having a top-level talent pool to recruit from,” said Matt Dorner, Milwaukee Downtown Business Improvement District economic development director.
Milwaukee Tool, which is adding a new downtown office, is among the area employers which regularly hire MSOE graduates − with more than 200 university alumni, said Matthew Bertsch, senior vice president of engineering.