Off and Running: Works Begins on MATC’s Athletic and Training Facility in Milwaukee’s Deer District

This is a real evolution for our student- athletes. With this new athletic and training facility, the sky's the limit for our athletics programs.

In about 18 months, on a gravelly patch of vacant land in the shadow of Fiserv Forum, Milwaukee Area Technical College’s athletic programs will have a new home.

The countdown to a new athletic and training facility, a leisurely, three-minute stroll from MATC’s Downtown Milwaukee Campus, started Thursday, April 9, when college administrators, developers and local officials broke ground on the $110 million, seven-story project called Fieldhouse Flats.

Located at West Juneau and North Vel R. Phillips avenues in Deer District, Fieldhouse Flats will include 269 market-rate apartments and a 28,5000-square-foot parking structure with 278 parking spaces. 

MATC’s athletic facility will be on the first floor and will include a 28,000-square-foot, double-court gymnasium that seats up to 1,000 spectators, a fitness center, locker rooms, concessions, meeting rooms and state-of-the-art training spaces for all students and staff. 

Currently MATC’s basketball and volleyball teams play and practice at Alverno College, about 7 miles from the Downtown Milwaukee Campus.

“This project creates a true collegiate athletic experience,” MATC President Dr. Anthony Cruz said at Thursday’s groundbreaking. “This is a real evolution for our student-athletes. With this new athletic and training facility, the sky’s the limit for our athletics programs.”

See TV coverage of the groundbreaking

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The new facility will help MATC better serve current students, attract new students and expand the number of sports offered at the college, Dr. Cruz said.

Right now MATC has 10 sports teams with about 135 students participating, Dr. Cruz said. 

The project is being co-developed and co-owned by J. Jeffers & Co., and the Milwaukee Bucks.. Jeffers previously developed Westown Green, MATC’s student housing located on North Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.

“We’re a mission-driven developer,” Joshua Jeffers, founder and chief operating officer of J. Jeffers & Co., told the guests on Thursday. “That means our projects should do more than fill space. They should solve problems, create opportunities and move a neighborhood forward. This project checks all those boxes.”

The mixed-use development, designed to provide affordable housing for workers in the city along with MATC’s facilities, is a slam dunk for the community, elected officials said.

“What makes this development especially meaningful is that it ties together housing, it ties together education and it ties together community space all in one development,” Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson said. “MATC anchoring a significant portion of the development is strengthening the connection between where people live and where people learn.”

Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley wholeheartedly agreed. “This development will further activate this neighborhood, grow the local economy and support local workers,” he said.

Milwaukee Alderwoman Milele Coggs, who represents the city’s 6th District, called the project collaborative, inclusive and intentional. “It’s something that I am proud to be a part of,” she said. “The partnership with MATC is a phenomenal thing. It demonstrates a level of collaboration that you rarely see.”

Michael Belot, senior vice president of business operations and chief real estate development officer for the Milwaukee Bucks, called that collaboration unique, especially having MATC as a partner.

“That brings education, athletics and community programming directly into the Deer District,” Belot said. “When you combine housing, education and activation in one place, you create a district that truly works for all, every single day.”

Jeffers and Belot first conceived of the project over breakfast in February 2023, Belot said. Representatives from MATC, the City of Milwaukee, the Bucks and Jeffers gathered in January 2025 to sign the lease agreement and celebrate the project. Jeffers closed on the property at the end of March 2026, clearing the way for construction to start this month.

On Thursday, representatives of the partners gathered at the development site, donned hard hats and shoveled up the first dirt for the project. 

Construction is expected to take two years, Jeffers said. MATC is scheduled to have access to the athletic facility in the fall of 2027, he said.

That is welcome news to MATC Athletic Director Randy Casey, who coaches the men’s basketball team and joined the college in 2008. 

“We have been trying to make something like this happen for so long,” Casey said at the lease signing last January. “I am really looking forward to that first game when we can step on to a floor that’s all ours.”

About MATC: As Wisconsin’s largest technical college and one of the most diverse two-year institutions in the Midwest, Milwaukee Area Technical College is a key driver of southeastern Wisconsin’s economy and has provided innovative education in the region since 1912. More than 35,000 students per year attend the college’s four campuses and community-based sites or learn online. MATC offers affordable and accessible education and training opportunities that empower and transform lives in the community. The college offers more than 180 academic programs — many that prepare students for jobs immediately upon completion and others that provide transfer options leading to bachelor’s degrees with more than 45 four-year colleges and universities. Overwhelmingly, MATC graduates build careers and businesses in southeastern Wisconsin. The college is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission.

About J. Jeffers & Company: J. Jeffers & Co., headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is a mission-driven real estate development and investment firm. With a core commitment to historic preservation, adaptive reuse, along with architecturally sensitive new construction, J. Jeffers & Co. strives to create value for both our investors and the communities we work in. The firm specializes in complex transformations and financial transactions, working to make a broader development impact that extends beyond the physical structure and includes increasing property values, creating jobs, and preserving historic structures.