The workforce shortage has been on the minds of Fond du Lac County leaders since 2008. That’s when a study found that by 2030, the county would have more people in retirement than in the workforce. As baby boomers begin to retire and the demand for workers steadily increases, Envision Greater Fond du Lac, along with Fond du Lac County and Fond du Lac County Capital Resources, developed a worker incentive program that will pay up to $15,000 to workers who relocate to the county. Envision President and CEO Sadie Parafiniuk sat down with Insight to explain how the program works and what it could mean to the community.
Fond du Lac County was one of the first in the region to recognize and address the coming workforce shortage in the late 2000s. You were definitely ahead of the game. There was a study done looking at the workforce and it clearly jumped out that the funnel of future workers was kind of bleak. We have an aging population in Fond du Lac County. After that initial attention and some ideas were raised, there was the recession and it wasn’t as front of mind. Plus, in 2008, 2030 felt like a long time away. Now that we’re in 2021, it feels a lot closer.
How did the pandemic affect the county’s workforce? We bounced back quickly. We are home to a lot of manufacturers and they weathered the pandemic well. By July 2020, we were hearing from employers that they couldn’t find any workers. Then Jim (Cleveland, Envision’s vice president of economic development) and his team got to work trying to develop a solution. I think the incentive piece was always in the back of the mind. They found some other places outside of Wisconsin doing it, so it was like, wouldn’t that be cool to try it here? Jim and his team started seriously looking at it and did some benchmarking. For probably six to eight months, there was a lot of serious research done on what other communities were doing and what they thought would work best for our employers and our situation.
What happened next? We brought the idea to Allen Buechel, the county executive, and said this is our idea, what do you think? And he said, absolutely, but let’s try to flesh out a couple more of these things. Then we presented it to the county finance committee, and they had some suggestions too. Over a month or so, we fixed or changed some things and they then gave their approval. And after that, the full county board gave their approval. That was back in late July, but we wanted to make sure we had what was needed to officially kick it off.
How does the workforce relocation incentive program work? First, we didn’t want it just for our large employers like Mercury Marine or Alliance Laundry in Ripon. We wanted all businesses to take advantage of it, especially those in retail or hospitality that might not normally offer a relocation package. The program provides a 50 percent reimbursement to employers that offer bonuses to adult, full-time employees who move from outside the county for jobs here. There are different levels, from $4,000 for a worker earning $35,000 who signs a one-year lease to $15,000 for employees who make $65,000 or more a year and buy a house. The businesses can pay the reimbursement upfront or in stages, but after the employee has been there a year, we provide them with a 50 percent reimbursement. We have approval of up to $300,000 in county funds to pay the incentives.
If businesses want to include a relocation package in their job offer, they submit an application to us and we have a 24-hour turnaround period because when you want to make a job offer, you don’t want to wait. We’re just checking the application to make sure it’s a good fit and aligns with our guidelines. We say yes and the employer sends the applicant an offer letter, along with a document saying, here’s your $10,000 or whatever the incentive is to relocate. The person needs to rent or own a home in the county and the employer must be in Fond du Lac County. And then honestly, we leave all the decisions after that up to the employer. They may pay the incentive in a lump sum at the beginning or pay half in the beginning and then the other half after six months.
How many workers do you expect to take advantage of this offer? We’re hoping for 40. We think 40 individuals in the first year of the program will use up the $300,000. We want to be very cognizant so that it’s not just a few large employers that use up the funds. Plus, it’s for businesses throughout the county, not just (the city of) Fond du Lac. We’ve been talking about it with county businesses since mid-August. We had one business, a home health care agency in the western part of the county, come to us and say we can only offer a $250 sign-on bonus, but if we could offer $500, that would make such a difference for us in our recruitment. So, it doesn’t need to be a $15,000 package; it can be what works for your business.
We’ve had a lot of direct communication with businesses and not just here in Fond du Lac, but in surrounding areas like Ripon or Campbellsport. We’re hoping word will spread organically to people looking for jobs and thinking about coming here thanks to the incentive. And we’ve gotten a good response. People are contacting us directly, so we created a portal where people can send their resumes and information and local companies can look through those. When I left this morning, there were 88 individual applications in there — and it’s just been live for two weeks. We don’t have an end date for the program now — just the $300,000 to spend and when that’s used up, the county board said we can come back and ask for more.
