Milwaukee Biz Blog

Business is just booming in Canada, eh. That message rang loud and clear at the Milwaukee World Trade Association's 44th annual Wisconsin International Trade Conference Tuesday.

I was fortunate enough to be asked to moderate a panel discussion on Canadian/U.S. trade relations at the conference, which took place at the Italian Community Center in Milwaukee.

Here in the United States, we're slogging through record national debt, two wars, record gas prices, skyrocketing food costs, an icy housing market, the subprime mortgage collapse, low consumer confidence, plummeting retail sales, a weak U.S. dollar and tightened credit.

To validate our woes, only six of the 19 local economic indicators tracked by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce pointed upward in March.

A lot of folks like to blame the messenger, i.e. the media. But I am here to tell you straight out that the media did not cause Harley-Davidson Inc. or Midwest Airlines to eliminate hundreds of jobs. The media did not cause Dell Inc. to cut 10 percent of its workforce or General Motors Corp. to cut 3,500 jobs, including about 200 in Janesville.

The reality is we've got some strong headwinds to fight through around here, but we're doing our best to keep moving forward.

However, our neighbors to the north apparently are faring far better at this point in time.

Nancy Ward, director of the Canadian Trade Office of the Council of Great Lakes Governors in Toronto, Ontario, spoke on the panel Tuesday with great exuberance about the health of the Canadian economy.

Canada has no recession, she said. In fact, its economy is a reverse-mirror image of America's economy, with a strong Canadian dollar, a tidy government budget surplus, an oil market boom, soaring retail sales, strong consumer confidence and unemployment at a 33-year low.

"Canadians are buying lots of things," Ward said.

They're also making lots of things.

In 2004, Ontario made automotive history when it surpassed Michigan as the largest automotive producing jurisdiction in North America, according to Ward's Automotive. While Detroit withers, DaimlerChrysler, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Suzuki and Toyota have shifted production plants to Canada.

I asked Ward why America is losing so much production and so many jobs to Canada. She did not hesitate with her answer. "Health care."

America has the highest health care costs in the world. I know it deeply disturbs many Wisconsin business leaders to hear it, but Canada's government-paid, universal health care system is an economic competitive asset, when compared with America's mish-mosh system that is part private, part socialistic and all redundant, inefficient and costly.

Ward also noted that Canada has a more tightly regulated mortgage banking system, so its economy has not been nearly as shell-shocked by the subprime collapse as the American economy has been.

I know what some of you are thinking. Something along the lines of, "Those Canadians don't have to pay for their defense, because we do it for them."

True enough. But then again, there's a matter of degree. America's total cost for the war in Iraq could reach the $3 trillion mark, according to Nobel Prize economic laureate Joseph Steiglitz.

Some other observations from the speakers on the Canadian business panel Tuesday:

• Georges Rioux, Canadian Consolate General in Chicago, said the pressure is growing to create a "smart border" with the United States, using better technology and more manpower. In this era of "just-in-time" manufacturing and high fuel costs, neither country can afford to have its 18-wheelers standing idle in traffic jams at the border, waiting for inspections, Rioux said. "It's important for our tourists, it's important for our trucker, but most of all, it's important to our way of life," Rioux said.
• JoAnn Queen, senior international trade specialist with the U.S. Department of Commerce in Washington, D.C., said the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which is the subject of considerable debate in the U.S. presidential election, has been a resounding success for businesses on both sides of the Canadian border.  
• Bill Werra, business unit manager for the process division of Sentry Equipment Corp. in Oconomowoc, said his company is growing rapidly as it manufactures equipment for harvesting bitumen from the oil sands of Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada. The locals up there have dubbed their town "Fort McMoney," he said.
• Roch Lambert, vice president and general manager of the Outboard Marine Engines Division of BRP US Inc., said his company is thriving quite nicely in Sturtevant. He attributed the operation's success to its proximity to the Canadian company's development center in Waukegan, Ill.; the quality of the Wisconsin labor force; a local talent pool of qualified engineers; strong support from the Wisconsin state government; and a tight cultural fit of "outdoorsmen who like to play outside … We're extremely happy to be here."
• Greg Charlesworth, vice president of foreign exchange services for M&I Bank, said the Canadian budget surplus "is a great advantage for their currency." He predicted that the U.S. economy will "pick up" a little bit in the second half of 2008, and interest rates will rise here in 2009. However, all bets are off if crude oil prices continue rising toward the $200-per-barrel mark, he said.

Steve Jagler is executive editor of Small Business Times.

When I recently wrote a Milwaukee Biz Blog to suggest the Darwin E. Smith Awards for people, organizations and government entities who made it difficult for companies to business Wisconsin, I had no idea Steve Roell, chairman and chief executive officer of Johnson Controls Inc., would step forward as a nominee.

Johnson Controls reports annual revenues of $35 million this year with a pre-tax profit of $2.6 billion.  It is the largest corporation in the state of Wisconsin. The company employs 140,000 people. A model corporate citizen.
It is a company of which Darwin Smith, the CEO of Kimberly-Clark who moved his company's corporate headquarters out of Wisconsin because of high taxes and excessive regulation, might have suggested considering removing itself from the Wisconsin corporate gene pool - by relocating to another state or perhaps, another country. 

So why is Steve Roell supporting the state hospital tax?

Let's connect the dots.

Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle and the Senate Democrats included the $400 million hospital tax in their budget repair bill. The idea was to add an "assessment" to all hospital bills. This assessment would be a tax - a 0.7-percent sales tax - on every patient who paid his or her hospital bill, either through private insurance or out of his or her own pocket. Hospitals throughout the state would collect the tax from their paying patients and send it to the governor.

The governor agreed to pay an extra $275 million to the state Medicaid health program to repay hospitals a portion of the bill for people who are unable to pay their medical bills.  The federal government matches the state's additional contribution. Under this socialized reimbursement plan, hospitals with the highest percentage of Medicaid patients would see their reimbursement rates increase the most. 

Doing the math, the governor gets to keep $125 million, under a provision in the bill called "the skim." The skim is analogous to the "grease" a bettor pays a bookmaker for placing and winning a bet. The bookie earns the grease for facilitating the transaction. In this case, because the grease goes to the general fund, Doyle gets to spend the skimmed tax money any way that pleases him and his constituents.

At this point, the proponents of the "sales tax on people who pay their own hospital bills either through private insurance or out their own pockets" claim that the matching funds coming back from Washington, D.C., is free money. Wisconsin does not receive its fair share of the federal largess, they say. Twenty other states have cooked up similar schemes.

The free money from Washington isn't free. It is, more appropriately, money that has been extracted from ordinary, everyday people. Not corporations. Not hospitals. Real people, like the folks who send some of their earned income withheld from every paycheck to Washington every week.   

So why would really smart guys like Steve Roell, Jim Haney (president of Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce) and Tim Sheehy (president of Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce) support such a scam?

The deception is even more interesting considering the primary beneficiaries of the arrangement. Besides Doyle, the hospital systems that stand to gain the most under the proposed socialized hospital tax solution appear to be Children's Hospital of Wisconsin and Aurora Health Care - two of, arguably, the most profitable, "nonprofit" hospital systems of the planet. San Aurora serves poor patients in Milwaukee, while Children's substantial niche in health care for kids, attracts everyone, rich and poor.

We all love and admire Children's Hospital for the incredible work they do. But Aurora? Why are the big businesses and outstanding companies like Johnson Controls, with the support of WMC and MMAC, supporting, the 800-pound gorilla?

Connect the dots.

Doyle is creating on a $1 billion project on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, called the Wisconsin Research Institute. Stem cell research. Cancer research. Cures for all manor of diseases. A worthy cause, no doubt.

Consider the Wisconsin corporations that would benefit from the construction and operation of the Wisconsin Research Institute? On a billion dollar laboratory project, how much would Johnson Controls "climate control group" and "facilities management divisions" stand to gain? $50 million?  $100 million? Run the numbers over the lifetime of the facility, if you like. I trust Johnson Controls has a pretty good idea. 

Next, consider how many companies represented on the WMC and MMAC boards of directors stand to benefit directly and indirectly from the construction and management of this $1 billion expenditure? Google the lists of their directors. Make your own evaluation.

For me, it took a fair amount of time and research to connect the dots. Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch (R-Onalaska) has his heels so dug in on this one that the sales tax on people who pay their hospital bills is unlikely to pass the Assembly.

The question is why would smart, big business leaders go along with something that they know is wrong?
One of the reasons local business leaders join business associations, such as MMAC and WMC, to help sort through the almost incomprehensible machinations of government, particularly at the state and local government levels. They let us down on this one. They ought to know better. They thought we would not connect the dots.
 
Dennis Ellmaurer is a principal of Globe National Corp., a Milwaukee firm working exclusively with sellers of small businesses in southeastern Wisconsin. Ellmaurer also is a chairman of The Executive Committee, facilitating three CEO groups in southeastern Wisconsin.

Good things are happening in Milwaukee everyday, but this week something great was stirring - talk about Milwaukee regaining its status and prominence as a healthy city through the Well City USA initiative - and we are setting our sights on 2010!

Well City Milwaukee, a collaboration of the City of Milwaukee, the Greater Milwaukee Committee and the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, is a three-year project focused on workplace wellness that will culminate with Milwaukee becoming a "Well City USA" as designated by the Wellness Councils of America.

If you weren’t at the Well City Milwaukee celebration breakfast and progress report meeting Wednesday, you really missed it. Nearly 250 people gathered in support of this initiative and the positive energy and enthusiasm was palpable.

Even Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett was a little surprised I think, by the growth of the movement in the short time since the initial launch last year.  We loved hearing about his personal "waist management" program including a personal record of exercising 144 days in a row - now there is a commitment and a role model.

So what’s it all about and what’s happening? Forty-five Milwaukee area businesses have committed to being champions for workplace wellness by implementing quality wellness programs for their employees.

Slowly, employees get healthier and it spreads to other employees. The business community feels good about it too and shares the positives with other CEOs and it spreads to other companies. Our workplace environments become more supportive of healthy lifestyles and that sustains the good behavior. On a personal level, health feels a lot better and it shows - so family members and friends get on board and before you know it, health is infecting our community instead of chronic disease. 

It’s a vision, sure, but Well City Milwaukee has the potential to change the norms in our community and set the bar.

This vision is for the future, but here is the current reality of what Milwaukee employers are reporting right now:

• Tremendous CEO and senior level support
• Empowered wellness teams .
• High participation rates with health risk assessments and health screenings.
• Walking groups, subsidized fitness center memberships, on site exercise facilities.
• Healthier food choices in vending machines, cafeterias and  break rooms .
• Reduced smoking due to smoke-free policies and quit resources provided.

Milwaukee is on the right track - we recently were recognized by Men’s Fitness Magazine for being fifth among the top 25 cities for men’s fitness and ranked eighth by Cooking Lite Magazine in the top 20 cities recognized for healthy restaurant choices and farmers markets. Opportunities are here - let’s take advantage!

Well City Milwaukee is bound to be a success because it’s a win/win for everyone involved. First and foremost, it’s about the people in our community. Second, it’s good for employers, for health care, for our wonderful city, and … The clock is ticking on this project, but it’s not too late to be among the leaders who are transforming the lives of our community members. Go to www.wellcitymilwaukee.org for more information or to search for or post a wellness event on the community wellness calendar.

Janet McMahon, associate vice president of Healthy Lifestyles at the YMCA of Metropolitan Milwaukee, is the executive director of Well City Milwaukee.

When money is involved, debates and arguments inevitably follow. The plan for a State of Wisconsin assessment on hospitals is no exception, and because it involves health care, the issue can be more complex than others.

By now you probably know that the Greater Milwaukee Committee has expressed support for the hospital assessment, and more than a few may wonder why the GMC is doing so.

Hospitals in Wisconsin, and especially in Milwaukee, must and do provide care for anyone in need, regardless of their means to pay. This means costs without corresponding revenue, and to make up for that deficit, hospitals must charge other patients more than they might otherwise have to in order to maintain their services.

Government assistance, particularly for Medicaid patients, has been lacking in Wisconsin. Wisconsin continues to rank low for federal dollars we receive. Hospitals have seen no increase in Medicaid reimbursement in nearly 13 years, and during that time, operating costs have risen dramatically. Statewide, Medicaid reimbursement covers only 48 percent of the actual costs of providing care.

The way it is now, cost shifting from the underfunding of the state Medicaid program has to be covered by business community, patients and ultimately, the taxpayers. The hospital assessment actually eases this burden and allows hospitals and government in Wisconsin to take advantage of the same Medicaid maximization opportunity that nearly half of all U.S. states have already profited from.

It really becomes a federal fair share issue, something Wisconsin needs to be more aggressive with wherever possible.

Since the benefits work for hospitals, the state, patients and the taxpayers, the Greater Milwaukee Committee wishes to lend its support.

Richard Greene is the director of operations for the Greater Milwaukee Committee, an organization of the region's business, labor, academic, philanthropic, nonprofit and civic leaders.

For the second time, our elected officials are meeting to see if they can come to agreement on our state's budget. The last budget bill our governor, senators and assemblymen worked on ended up a day late and dollar short.

Let me rephrase that … nearly 150 days late and now $652 million dollars short.

As early as August of last year, tax experts like Todd Berry from the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance were saying the budget our elected officials were working on back then was at least $200 million in the red. And yet, our elected officials deliberated for months on a budget they finalized in late fall only to have our state's Legislative Fiscal Bureau say several months later that it was over $600 million dollars off.

How do independent experts like Berry know we are going to be in a deficit nearly six months before our state's Fiscal Bureau officially tells our legislature? More importantly, why didn't our elected officials do something about our spending back in the fall? Instead, we are now back at the drawing board trying to fill more holes in our budget because our elected officials don't know how stop spending.

Whether you are a Republican or Democrat, holding the line on spending is not a partisan issue, and the Independent Business Association of Wisconsin wants our elected officials
to do just that - hold the line on spending.

According to the Fiscal Bureau, the deficit is over $400 million and ideas like a hospital tax, accounting tricks such as delaying state aid to schools and some spending cuts are all being considered. The state, and more importantly the state taxpayers who will be responsible for the decisions of our elected officials, should demand that we get rid of our deficit in the same way we handle deficits in our own homes - cut spending.

Of all three proposals, the Assembly Republicans cut spending the most (roughly $360 million of spending cuts, compared with roughly $80 million by the governor and only $40 million by the Senate).

While we applaud the Assembly's efforts to cut spending, it doesn't go far enough. If our deficit is $415 million, then we should cut spending by $415 million. It is frustrating to see accounting gimmicks used in an effort to balance a budget - like the proposal of delaying state aid to schools. That only pushes the problem of spending too much into a different budget year.

What is really disturbing is the hospital tax proposal found in two of the budget repair bill proposals. Proponents claim the hospital tax will result in higher Medicaid reimbursements to hospitals, which will lower health care costs and all of this is possible because we get free money from the Feds in their federal match of our increased Medicaid payments.

First, who do these politicians think the feds get their money from? Yes, you guessed it, from us taxpayers. It's not free money, it's our money. Secondly, do these same politicians want those of us who pay for health care to trust hospitals that they will lower health care costs because they are getting higher Medicaid reimbursement rates?

After the last 10 years of double-digit increases to health care costs, consumers don't trust anyone, least of all providers who continue to build these extravagant hospitals. There is nothing in this proposal that guarantees hospitals won't simply pocket the increased reimbursement rates and add to their already large profits.
And let's be perfectly honest - even if hospitals are required to detail the increased payments and show how those dollars are being used, because we don't have true transparency of costs, such detailed accounting is meaningless.

If this is our government's attempt of reforming our Medicaid system, it's a poor one at best and is certainly a Band Aid approach to what should be a major overhaul of a failing system.

Our elected officials didn't get the budget right the first time around - let's hope they get it right this time. It's up to us, the electorate, to hold our elected officials accountable, since we are the ones financially responsible for their actions.

Bob Collison is a business owner and the current chairman of the Legislative Committee of the Independent Business Association of Wisconsin (IBA), the oldest state-based business association concentrating on issues facing small and independent businesses. For additional information, visit www.ibaw.com.

The Social Security and Medicare Trustees this week handed Congress a fresh reminder of its historic opportunity to transform these programs before it's too late.

Congress has known for years that our largest entitlement programs - particularly Social Security and Medicare - simply cannot survive as currently structured. Without reform, these programs will grow themselves right into extinction, thereby eliminating the retirement security and health safety net for the very people they were designed to serve.

Congress knows it must act. If we act now, we have the opportunity to reform these programs in a rational, well-thought-out way. We can make them better, stronger, more responsive, more resilient, more sustainable, and more in line with the way our economy really works. There is no reason to wait; each year of delay increases the likelihood that Congress will be forced to make deep cuts in benefits or raise taxes or debt to unsustainable levels.

The alarm has been sounded - this is the third consecutive Medicare warning. Hitting the snooze button, yet again, is not the right choice. Congress is lucky enough to have yet another major opportunity - in the FY09 Budget Conference Report - to do the right thing.

Americans should demand we take it. Because our actions on this issue, or lack thereof, will have an impact on these critical programs - and our nation's economy - for generations to come.

Congressman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) represents Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District.

State Sen. Jon Erpenbach (D-Middleton) conducted a five hour long hearing Monday on Senate Bill 562, the Healthy Wisconsin AUTHORITY and Plan. For someone who has 25 years of experience helping people finance high-quality (but expensive) health care, I was struck by the theater of the proceedings and paucity of substance.

As just one example, I heard numerous individuals testify as to the "obvious" advantages of spreading risk over a larger pool to achieve lower costs. Over and over we heard about state employees having the best benefits anywhere and lower costs because of the buying power of this large group (260,000 statewide; 70,000 in Dane County alone).

Trouble is, that's not true. Where was testimony by the insurers (who cover both state employees and those of small business) that would reveal a significant disparity of costs on a per member per month (apples to apples) basis.

Let's also hear the testimony of impartial actuaries who would more accurately describe the utter predictability of morbity in any group over a thousand or so lives.

I can only conclude there is a reason such experts are not called to testify. It has to be the same reason this bill was reintroduced in the final week of the legislative session to be voted on, I'm sure, without further study and debate. The reason: politics.

Serious people in the private sector are hard at work trying to lower health care costs through hundreds of small steps that take time to bear fruit and can't be wrapped up into one neat reform sales pitch.

Their efforts are mocked as unverifiable and too little too late.

The real mockery should be reserved for those who think such a complex problem can be fixed in one piece of legislation. And for the utter deception of their sales pitch, they deserve the political results they nurture.

Jon Rauser is president of The Rauser Agency Inc., Milwaukee.

Healthy Wisconsin is on everybody's lips, primarily because health care is into everybody's wallet. It's getting worse, but doesn't have to be that way.

Healthy Wisconsin changes the way medicine is paid for; not the way it is provided. Its only problem now is political.

Healthy Wisconsin's strengths:

• Its biggest change is in the structure. Rather than employers paying a middleman insurance company, they instead pay a flat 10.5 percentage of wages (which replaces the 15 percent many are now paying for employee health insurance). That's a 4.5 percent savings.
• Employees would pay 4 percent of wages, which would be offset by a 16-percent increase in benefits, such as adding limited vision, dental for children, mental parity, pharmaceuticals, and the extension to family coverage for all. Complete portability is provided when changing or losing jobs, and pre-existing diseases are a thing of the past.
• Employers are no longer involved in heath care, and Wisconsinites are no longer obligated to take an employer plan or even a family plan. Every family member can make their own choice between either a health care network (HCN) or the traditional fee-for-service (FFS).
• Doctors and hospitals remain private and send their bills to a central payment administrator rather than to the 450 statewide insurance companies (or 1,500, if we allow cross-border insurers). This drastically reduces their billing overhead and these savings are included in the total $1.8 billion projected.
• The systemic changes eliminate the costs that add nothing to health care, like insurance broker commissions, actuarial costs, costs for cherry-picking and gatekeeping, high executive salaries and the ever-rising shareholder profits. Even the insurer's high costs for lobbying and campaign contributions to politicians that were passed on to the patient are eliminated under Healthy Wisconsin. These are all gone, though it also explains the massive opposition from the insurance industry and their politician supporters.

Healthy Wisconsin provides major savings to most businesses and therefore fewer will outsource jobs to countries that have no employer contribution for health care. More businesses will open, remain open and relocate to Wisconsin as a result. The Wal-Marts and McDonald's of the world will now start paying their fair share, but few taxpayers will object to that.

While some small business owners objected to the earlier version of HW, the new version provides a three-year phase-in period, which should be quite palatable. As well, a cap of $102,000 in wages taxed has been placed on two-earner families.

In spite of the frivolous scare tactics used by the proponents of a status quo approach to health care, Wisconsin would not become a magnet for the unemployed or immigrants. Most already have free Medicaid coverage in their own state, thus relocating families is a foolish option.

No matter how important the Healthy Wisconsin proposal is to the people and businesses in Wisconsin, there remains an insurance industry that wants to continue drawing profits from the medical field, and politicians who receive their contributions. Hopefully they will all realize that as Healthy Wisconsin improves the state's economy, other insurance markets will emerge and the state will grow accordingly.

Prior to retiring four years ago, I owned a company with 70 employees in four states (40 in Wisconsin). Had Healthy Wisconsin been in effect at that time, I would have indeed closed my offices in three states and moved the jobs to Wisconsin.

Importantly, after selling my company, the buyer did move offices. They closed Wisconsin and moved the jobs to the East Coast. Had HW been in effect at that time, I seriously doubt that would have happened.

How many more jobs are we losing because of our high health care costs? My guess is, a lot.

Jack Lohman is a retired business owner from Colgate and publishes http://MoneyedPoliticians.net. He is the author of "Politicians - Owned and Operated by Corporate America."

A coalition of irrepressible people is convening behind the scenes to drag this beer-drinking, cheese-eating, brat-loving town into a mindset of wellness and personal fitness.

Executives from small businesses in metropolitan Milwaukee are invited to attend an upcoming meeting to learn more about how they can launch wellness programs for their employees.

The Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC), in association with the Wellness Council of Wisconsin, will host an orientation to introduce small businesses to the Well City Milwaukee initiative and expand participation in the program.

The meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, March 19, from 7:30 to 9 a.m. at the MMAC
offices, 756 N. Milwaukee St., Suite 400, Milwaukee. The event is free and open to small
businesses with less than 50 employees. Businesses can register at www.mmac.org/calendar.

The orientation is designed to help small businesses learn more about the Well City Milwaukee initiative, understand its benefits to employee health and an organization's bottom line, and get started on the road to workplace wellness by participating in the program.

Mary Steinbrecher, director of MMAC's Council of Small Business Executives (COSBE), said, "Small businesses are critical to the overall success of our region. Nearly 97 percent of the 39,000 businesses in the Milwaukee metro area have less than 100 employees. For Well City Milwaukee to be successful, we must reach out to small businesses so they can take advantage of the tremendous benefits of workplace wellness to their individual businesses and to the region."

Past efforts to engage small businesses in workplace wellness have been hampered by CEO concerns about the costs associated with designing and implementing wellness programs in companies too small to support dedicated human resource functions.

However, because of its affiliation with the Wellness Councils of America (WELCOA), the Well City initiative has a framework for small business that is results-oriented, easy to implement and affordable, Steinbrecher said.

The orientation meeting follows on the heels of the MMAC recently being awarded WELCOA's Well Workplace Award in the small business category. The MMAC is the first small business in Wisconsin to receive the national honor.

Janet McMahon, executive director of Well City Milwaukee, said, "The MMAC has set the bar for small businesses by being the first in Wisconsin to achieve the Small Business Well Workplace Award. They have a great story to tell. Their insights and creative approaches to employee wellness have produced the positive outcomes small business owners are looking for. I'm confident their story will convince other small businesses to join Well City Milwaukee's efforts to make Milwaukee one of only a handful of cities to achieve Well City status."

People such as Mary Scheibel of Scheibel Hlaska Inc. and Arvid "Dick" Tilmar of Diversified Insurance Services Inc. are twisting some arms behind the scenes to build support for the cause. And they do it very well.

To be considered for Well City status, 20 percent of a community's working population must be employed by Well Workplace Award-winning companies. The goal of Milwaukee's city-wide initiative is for enough employers to become WELCOA-designated Well Workplaces by 2010 to earn the Well City Milwaukee designation.

Jolly good luck to us.

For more information on the Well City Milwaukee initiative, visit www.wellcitymilwaukee.org.

Also, southeastern Wisconsin business executives are encouraged to participate in the Small Business Times Fittest Execs Program, in which they can receive free health and fitness appraisals by the Wisconsin Athletic Club and Medical Associates Health Centers. The program also will give a Corporate Wellness Award to an employer that has launched an effective employee wellness program. Participants in the Fittest Execs Program will be saluted at the Small Business Times BizTech Expo on Thursday, May 1. For more information, visit www.biztimes.com/fit.

Steve Jagler is executive editor of Small Business Times.

We are two months into the new year when inevitably we start to slack off on our New Year's resolutions. Exercise is almost always on our resolution list and usually the first to lose momentum.

Most of us don't skip exercise because we don't care about our health. We struggle because there are so many roadblocks. Sometimes those roadblocks are legitimate, but often they fall into the category of excuses.

In her book "Every Excuse in the Book," Jeanne Murdock addresses every excuse you can imagine as a roadblock to exercise. Her book is packed with information on exercise and practical tips for getting into a solid routine. When it's time to exercise and you don't feel like it, simply find your excuse in the book and follow the advice she suggests.

Having Murdock's book as a resource is like working with a fitness coach who won't let you slack off. The most common excuse seems to be lack of time. Work, family, household responsibilities and over-commitment press upon us and rob us of time we need to take care of ourselves.

To overcome the lack of time, excuse experts suggest making a list of activities you must do every day, and a list of things you want to do and then numbering them according to their importance. It goes without saying that exercise in on the must do list. To make exercise a must do you may have to spend less time doing things you want to do, like watching television, reading the newspaper, or cleaning the bathroom.

From my point of view, except for meal preparation and laundry, most household activities can either go on the want to do list or can be delegated to others. After all, which would you really prefer; a clean bathroom or better fitting jeans? If exercise has not made it on your must do list consider scheduling time in your day-timer as if it were an appointment you made. When you make an appointment with someone else you generally do everything you can to keep it. The difference is this is an appointment you made with yourself. Shouldn't your commitment to yourself be as important as those you make to others?

Most experts agree that we need 30 minutes or more of moderate intensity activity every day to get the benefits of exercise. A well-rounded exercise routine includes:

• 30 to 45 minutes of aerobic activity daily.
• 30 minutes of strength training two or three times a week.
• 30 minutes of flexibility and balance training two or three times a week.

This might seem like a lot to most people, but thirty minutes can be broken down into two 15 minute segments. Even 15-minute bursts of exercise can get you heart rate up, can stretch and strengthen muscles and go a long way toward improving your health. A recent study from the University of Cambridge showed that even people who exercise for less than 30 minutes a day can reduce their risk of dying from any cause by 20 percent, compared with those who don't exercise at all.

Fifteen-minute workouts can be done on an exercise ball, with a yoga workout, or brisk walk. 

Sit down right now, and make a list of your must do and want to do activities and see where exercise fits in. Most of us are going to live into our seventies or mid eighties.

The question to ask yourself is do I want to live those years immobile and dependent upon medication, procedures, and frequent visits to the doctor or do I want to be healthy, active, and independent? Research shows that regular exercise can add an extra ten to twenty years of high quality life.

Connie Roethel, RN, MSH, is a wellness expert and president of Core Health Group, in Mequon, WI.  She can be reached at (262) 241-9947 or croethel@corehealthgroup.com.