BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT & PLANNING

Portage is a progressive and business-friendly community that, coupled with its natural beauty, easy access to outdoor and recreational activities and quality of life amenities, is attracting new businesses and manufacturers to our community. Portage was recently named one of 50 national semi-finalists in the Frontier America's Best Communities Award program based on its economic development plans and programs.

Portage offers a geographic advantage over other communities, with the community located on I-39, I-90-94, and State Highways 51, 33, and 16.

The City of Portage offers an Economic Development Revolving Loan Fund program and a new Building Facade Revolving Loan program to help businesses meet their financing and capital needs.

To assist start-ups and entrepreneurs, the City of Portage has joined with the Columbia County Economic Development Corp in forming the new Innovations Champions group.

The Portage Industrial park has several sites available on rail (Canadian Pacific Rail).

The Portage Enterprise Center -- a business assistance center, incubator, and accelerator located in the Portage Industrial Park -- offers a variety of workforce training and development programs at the Madison Area Technical College/Advanced Manufacturing Training Center satellite campus located on site. Manufacturing and other workforce training can be custom made with potential grant funding available. The Center was sited in a March 6, 2015 Huffington Post article as one of the top eight business innovations in the country. For more information, see below.

Nerd Wallet (NerdWallet.com) recently named Portage as one of the best places in Wisconsin to start and operate a small business.

The City of Portage operates a 24 hour taxi service that provides fast, low-cost ($3.50 each way), and reliable transportation. This service provides Portage workers an affordable transportation option for all plant shifts.

The Portage Municipal Airport is a local Medium General Aviation Airport located two minutes away. The airport offers a 3,768 foot primary runway, a secondary 2,559 foot runway, overnight hangar space, private hangar rental, tie downs, aviation fuel service, and a pilot's lounge. The airport is currently in the cue for a number of upgrades and improvements.

The City of Portage looks forward to meeting with you should you have an interest in visiting and discussing this site for your new facility.

Please contact Steve Sobiek if the City of Portage can provide additional information on sites, buildings, or City assistance, answer any questions, or facilitate a meeting or site visit.