There’s a joint city, county and federal effort in Ashland to build a $6 million research facility to study fish populations in Lake Superior. Rich Kremer reports from Superior.

An older, smaller facility exists but Superior Days delegates are asking the state for help to move out.

Since 1957 the U.S. Geological Survey has had a presence in Ashland, tracking fish populations and water quality for the U.S. and Canada. Ashland Area Development Corporation Director Dale Kupczyk says the partnership between city, county and fed brought in a research boat in 1997 and a new dock site in 2009. Now, Kupcsyk says it’s time for a new home.

“The facility they’re in now they share with fish and wildlife and a couple other federal entities and it would be much more efficient to have a research center next to the dock. Plus, where they’re at now, there’s not enough room for expansion.”

Kupcsyk says with a new facility there would be room to involve others like Northland College and the Wisconsin DNR. But he says this project isn’t just about research, it’s about jobs.

“If we wouldn’t have got the funding to put the dock in Ashland those jobs would have left, they would have gone to Duluth, to Houghton Michigan, Marquette Michigan and we need to keep the jobs in Ashland. There are seven full time, good paying jobs and there are three part time jobs. So, that’s economic development.”

With a tight state budget Kupczyk isn’t sure if the project will get money this year. He says this is a long term approach.

“It’s not something that has to be built tomorrow. We’ve been working on this since 1998 since we knew the boat was coming. You do it one step at a time, it took us a couple years to get the funding for the dock. We’ve got it, we built it. So, we just take the next step. If there’s funding available, we’ll do it. If not, we’ll just move to the next year.”

Kupczyk says the facility would be operated jointly by the USGS, City of Ashland and Northland College and would provide education and outreach to raise awareness of Lake Superior and its resources.

(KUWS reporter Rich Kremer will be covering Superior Days next week, filing stories from Madison).

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