Rotary Club of Milwaukee Tuesday Speaker Series

Rotarians heard from Dr. Jeremy Kedziora, Endowed Chair of Artificial Intelligence at MSOE, for a data-driven exploration of three key AI trends shaping 2025. This insightful talk will covered the plateauing of large language model performance, the rise of agentic systems, and AI's evolving impact on the labor market. He also highlighted how MSOE is leading in this space, offering a glimpse into the innovative AI initiatives happening on campus.

Our region has several award winning public and community radio stations broadcasting from Milwaukee. At a time when listeners have unlimited information and entertainment choices on air and online, the stations are working hard to retain current listeners and attract new audiences. Rotarians heard from leaders of local radio with Sarah Ashworth, Wisconsin Public Radio; Jordan Lee, Radio Milwaukee, David Lee, WUWM, and Tom Crawford, WMSE as they discussed the opportunities and challenges they face in a panel discussion hosted by Rotarian Tom Luljak.

Rotarians ventured into the cold this week to hear Michael Antonelli, Market Strategist and Managing Director at Baird Private Wealth Management, for an economic outlook in 2025. Michael, a frequent speaker and the author of the Bull and Baird blog, discussed the strong year that the stock market had in 2024 and the potential impact that the new administration's policies could have on the economy in 2025.

This week at Rotary, Kevin Shafer, the Executive Director of the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District addressed MMSD's 2035 Vision for a cleaner water environment through short term projects and collaborations.

Rotarians returned to Memorial Hall for the first meeting of the new year to hear from Micaela Bomhack, President and CEO of Rite-Hite. Micaela shared the story of how Rite-Hite came to be, and how their move to downtown Milwaukee fits into the company's long term plans to better serve customers, increase innovation, attract and develop key talent, and accelerate corporate growth.

Port Milwaukee is known for being multimodal, but the current team and business partners are working to make it multifaceted. This week, we heard from Port Milwaukee Director, Jackie Q. Carter, as she shared the vision to grow the reach and reputation of this regional asset.

This week in Memorial Hall, Rotarians heard from Tom Boldt, Chairman of The Boldt Company as he provided insights about his employees, customers, and community from the 135-year history of The Boldt Company. Tom also shared his thoughts on how an organization can innovate for a sustainable future and be purpose-driven.

In conjunction with the Milwaukee Press Club and WisPolitics, attendees in Memorial Hall heard from Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley on Tuesday. Executive Crowley shared details on the 2025 budget, other current issues in Milwaukee County and answered questions from a panel of journalists including Aaron Maybin of Fox 6 News, Edgar Menendez of Neighborhood News Service, and Vanessa Swales of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

On November 5th, Kent Lovern won the Milwaukee County District Attorney election. Kent, a prosecutor for 26 years, has served as the Chief Deputy District Attorney since 2008, where he managed the attorneys and staff in the District Attorney's office and worked closely with law enforcement and community leaders. This week at Rotary, Kent shared his vision for Milwaukee County's future and the public safety challenges and opportunities in our community.

On Tuesday, Chip discussed his latest book, A Different War, which uses poetry to help articulate the horrors of the war in Ukraine and to help demonstrate the impact the war is having on the lives of ordinary people.