ESCANABA – The Escanaba Downtown Development Authority has hired Ed Legault of Escanaba as its new director. As he looks to the future of the downtown, Legault said he would like to build on the success of this year’s Esky 150 celebration.

“It brought in many people to the community. It brought in people from all over that had never even been to Escanaba before. That helps the businesses quite a bit. We need to develop more and more of those types of opportunities to bring people into town. Once they come here, they’ll understand what a great place it is and they will come back again,” Legault said.

Legault said Escanaba needs to find businesses that are complimentary to the businesses already downtown in order to build a stronger core of businesses downtown.

Legault has a background managing businesses with ATT&T and CitiGroup. He brought his family back to Escanaba recently to be closer to home. He starts his new position Monday.