MIRACLE
Milwaukee Interagency Resiliency Access Center for Learning & Equity
For years, Walnut Way and a growing table of public, nonprofit, and community partners have been working toward a Healthy Homes “one‑stop shop” and resilience hub model that brings fragmented services into one trusted, community‑controlled place. That vision did not begin with this funding opportunity; it has been shaped by the closure of Milwaukee’s historic CAP agency, multiple pilots, feasibility work, Healthy Homes implementation, regulatory interventions in energy rate cases, and interagency coordination across Milwaukee and Wisconsin.
Today, that long‑building vision is ready to be implemented as MIRACLE — the Milwaukee Interagency Resiliency Access Center for Learning & Equity — a community‑controlled hub on the North Avenue corridor in Lindsay Heights/Bronzeville that brings together Healthy Homes services, clean energy, workforce pathways, and digital access under one roof.
MIRACLE is a Healthy Homes one‑stop shop and resilience hub designed to serve Lindsay Heights and the wider North Avenue corridor, with a model that can extend across Northside Milwaukee over time. The campus is envisioned as a single, trusted front door where residents can connect to whole‑home health services, weatherization, electrification, home repair coordination, energy affordability strategies, workforce opportunities, and digital inclusion support through a coordinated partner network.
The physical anchor for this hub is a 1 MW solar and battery installation paired with place‑based service delivery, so the same site that generates clean power also delivers Healthy Homes work in people’s houses. The McKnight opportunity is intentionally centered on this 1 MW anchor project, even as Walnut Way continues to advance a broader North Avenue corridor strategy that can scale to multiple properties and additional megawatts over time, with a long‑term goal of 50 MW to reduce energy burdens for those most in need in Milwaukee.
Why this moment matters
This project sits at the intersection of several workstreams that are already underway: federal Healthy Homes implementation, Wisconsin PSC‑backed solar feasibility work, active property negotiations, and a growing interagency partner table. Walnut Way’s materials emphasize that federal Healthy Homes resources are already flowing, a PSC‑funded 1 MW feasibility process is active, and the project is being advanced with support from partners including the Governor’s Environmental Justice Office, the Clean Economy Coalition of Wisconsin, UWM, Elevate, Slipstream, Blue Skies Environmental Solutions, WRTP/BIG STEP, MLKEDC, and others.
The Budget
“The MIRACLE Campus capital stack is designed to be both catalytic and repayable. Walnut Way is pairing a CDFI property loan for site acquisition with flexible, recoverable capital to close the remaining building and construction gap, bridge to federal Direct Pay tax credits, and unlock additional public and private resources. Federal Healthy Homes dollars are already flowing through an $850,000 earmark to support whole‑home health upgrades, while grant programs such as Focus on Energy and PSC funding help round out the clean energy components. The 1 MW system and hub are structured so that federal Direct Pay, behind‑the‑meter savings, and tenant revenues together provide a clear pathway to repay recoverable capital and sustain operations.”
