WAUSAU, Wis. (WSAW) – The City of Wausau will host a community engagement session Thursday night about a piece of land on the city’s west side.

The meeting is for the city to get the community’s input on what to do with the vacant space.

The property is a little more than 6 acres in size and sits at 1300 Cleveland Avenue, behind the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store on Thomas Street. Historically, it was an industrial site. Currently, it’s owned by the city.

After being vacant for many years, the assistant city planner says it’s time to plan its future use with the community’s help.

“Prior to this, we weren’t at a point where anything, where we would even be looking at, you know, being at that point where anything would be happening or developing, and as I said, we’re still not at that point where anything is developing. We just were directed by the Economic Development Committee to start to collect the information and start to look more high-level at what people would like to see,” said Carrie Edmondson, assistant city planner for the City of Wausau.

The meeting will begin Thursday at 5:30 at the Wausau Waterworks Treatment Facility on Adrian Street.

The meeting will begin tonight at 5:30 at the Wausau Waterworks Treatment Facility on Adrian Street. That’s just a few blocks east of the property.

During that meeting, people will get to vote on what they think the space should be used for.

The vacant space sits just south of Thomas Street behind St. Vincent de Paul. The city’s goal is to use that space for something that will serve the community, like a grocery store or even housing. But during this meeting, the community will also have an opportunity to share their own ideas.

“We’ll also have a writing area where, if people have ideas that maybe we didn’t think of or that we just didn’t include, they’ll have an opportunity to put that up. One of the other options is a mixed-use where maybe you have a mix of some residential and some commercial space, or maybe like childcare center or something like that mixed with residential,” Edmondson said.

After the meeting, the city will move through the redevelopment process with the Wisconsin DNR to determine the next steps to move forward.

The city currently has no timeline as to when things will get moving.

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