[12.16.2016] Executive of the Year - Honorable Mention: Developer Scott Yauck Expands Mark on Area (Milwaukee Business Journal)

Developer Scott Yauck spends a lot of time walking through his White Stone Station development in Menomonee Falls, watching what was an empty manufacturing property take new life as a place where people live, work and shop.

Yauck himself has roots in the White Stone Station area southwest of Highway 41 and Pilgrim Road, where retailers, apartments and a hotel are either open or under construction. He remembers “many long days and nights” laboring on the property when his Custom Metal Products manufacturing company operated there until 2004.

“That is the genesis of it,” Yauck said. “It certainly has taken on a life now.”

Yauck, president of Milwaukee developer Cobalt Partners Inc., forged ahead with two major town center developments this year. He has worked on White Stone Station more than 10 years, assembling land, cleaning and clearing it of industrial buildings and contamination, and making a partnership with Menomonee Falls to move the project forward.

He made even quicker work assembling and preparing 48 acres in Greenfield for his $165 million 84South town center development at 84th Street and Layton Avenue. The first buildings at 84South started construction this fall after nearly a year of site-clearing and infrastructure work.

Yauck also has roots in Greenfield. His first development was a five-lot subdivision Yauck built on his grandfather’s land in the city while in law school.

Both White Stone Station and 84South have additional groundbreakings planned for 2017, and Yauck said he is firming up his next big ventures.

“We’d like to continue,” Yauck said of the town center development concept. “We’re working on one or two, and one we would hope in the coming months could become public that would be similar in size and scope to White Stone Station and 84South.”

Yauck said it’s exciting to see the bricks and mortar rise out of the ground, but he takes a particular interest in the front-end labor. That’s really the yeoman’s work. It involves juggling land acquisitions, working with state agencies on cleanup or wetlands issues, securing loans and attracting retailers to fill buildings.

Yauck is hands-on with those efforts, with only five people on Cobalt Partners’ staff, along with a lineup of consultants.

“There is a lot that goes into these projects and it’s good to be leading the charge, but without a great team it wouldn’t happen,” Yauck said. “We’ve gotten nearly $300 million of development underway with a small team.”

Both of Yauck’s current projects are dependent on partnerships with the local communities to provide money for infrastructure and other components. Greenfield Mayor Michael Neitzke said he speaks with Yauck several times a week to coordinate 84South.

“He’s extraordinarily bright and extraordinarily honest and forthcoming,” Neitzke said. “He has a great vision of what real estate will look like not just in a year or two, but in five or 10 or 20.”

2016 accomplishments

• Opened 81,000 square feet of filled retail space, started construction on Home2 Suites by Hilton, and prepped for 2017 start on 91,000 square feet of additional retail space in White Stone Station in Menomonee Fall.

  
  

• Completed infrastructure and secured several retail tenants for first buildings under construction in 84South in Greenfield.

  
  

• Served as chairman of the Milwaukee Gateway Aerotropolis Corp. board, served on boards of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School Milwaukee and Jewish Community Center of Milwaukee.