If you happen to see a distinguished silver-haired man driving around Waseca in a restored 1957 Oldsmobile, chances are its Gene Miller. The owner of many businesses in this small southern Minnesota town and its surrounding counties has a great affection for the '57 Oldsmobile ever since  he drove one while attending New Richland High School. "I had a '57 Oldsmobile in high school and I really liked it," said Miller, who now owns six fully restored models. "It's a classic car from a classic era."
Miller's passion for collecting and renovating old things doesn't end there.
Take a look around Waseca and you can see the man's signature on any number of things, including businesses and housing for the disabled.
The building most synonymous with Miller is the Miller-Armstrong building to the Club 57 Bar and Grill, jonnie beans Internet Coffee House and Wine Bar, Miller's Bed & Breakfast, the offices of ELM Homes
 and the newly opened Starfire Grill, which is housed in the warehouse adjacent (and connected) to the renovated building.
When Miller moved to Waseca in 1972, restoring and renovating old buildings never crossed his mind. He and his wife Bonnie actually had their sights set on something in the human service field. That dream became a reality when they opened a large group day care center, which became wildly popular.
That popularity and the Millers' devotion to helping people expanded into Waseca-based ELM Homes. This company, born out of the desire to help people with disabilities lead a normal life, provides housing, household managment, nursing assessment, leisure and recreation and transportation to hundreds of people in southern Minnesota. The company owns 60 group homes scattered about in Waseca, Steele, Faribault, Freeborn, Blue Earth, Nicollet, Le Sueur, Scott and Dodge counties.
"It's been very rewarding," Miller said. "There are so many positive things coming out of it."
In a 35C interview, Miller talks about the success of ELM Homes, his love of renovating old buildings and old cars and how his signature project is now a Waseca icon.
Q: You wear so many hats, so what do you list your occupation as on your business card?
A: Healthcare Administrator, because that is our major business. The other parts are related to that.
Q: You started ELM Homes in the late 1970's. What were the circumstances behind that?
A: The year 1979 is when we opened our first home. I was a schoolteacher and had my degree in American History and sociology and my wife Bonnie has her degree in social work. We were always interested in the human service field.
I was teaching down in Rushford and we wanted to be closer to our family, so we opened a group day care center in 1972. That was a new concept to have a large group day care center. But because of the industry in Waseca, it was pretty popular and it expanded quite rapidly.
In 1977, we moved into a new building. We built a new day care center over by E.F. Johnson. We were licensed for 80 children in 1977. We were providing transportation for some of the children and we were working with social services on some child protection issues and busing some children in for child protection. We started providing the busing services for Jobs Plus. We knew there wasn't anything in Waseca County for disabled adults at that time. If happened at a time when there was a deinstitutionalization of a state hospital, so we just kept meeting a need at that time and expanded pretty rapidly in the human service field.
We still have the day care center today. It's called ELM Care Day Care and my daughter is the director now. It's licensed now for about 60 children.We downsized it when E.F. Johnson closed. It's changed with the population, but we still have 50-60 clients.
Q: What is the concept behind ELM Homes?
A: We either build or refurbish homes. When we first started out, we did a lot of refurbishing and remodeling of homes. Then about 10 years ago, the population started changing. There were more people with physical disabilities, so we built homes with wider doorways, wheelchair showers, that kind of thing and provided services for whatever then needed, contracting with different counties to provide anything from medical to social activities. Basically, it's 24-hour care in those homes. So, we own homes and provide a service. Right now we have about 60 homes. because of the economy, some of that has changed, but it has stayed at about 60.
Q: You mentioned the economy. How have you had to readjust to a slowdown?
A: It affects the staff. The most difficult part is when the government passes along a decease and then we have to pass that down as well. It has meant fewer services provided and more people on waiting lists that need services. There has been a slowdown in the licensing of new beds, too. The hardest thing is that whenever there is a decrease, we have to adjust all of our salaries.
We have individual service contracts with each person. How it works is usually a county case manager will come in and say we have this individual who needs there services and asks us if we have the appropriate living arrangements that is compatible with roommates and meeting the physical or behavioral needs. In the past, we may have tried to develop something new, but now, we loop at the homes we have to see if there is someplace they can fit in to. A part of that negotiation is they need this much staff and they have these medical needs, so we negotiate a rate to pay for all of the services.
Q: How many people do you presently take care of?
A: The term has changed from resident to client to consumer. We provided for about 240 consumers. Our staff size is about 550 people in a nine county area.
Q: What is the mission of ELM Homes?
A: The mission is to provide as normal a living arrangement as we can. It used to be that historically people had a child who was disabled and they couldn't find the services and the only alternative was a state institution. History has shown that state institutions weren't a good choice for most people. So, the mission was to provide homes for people who were deinstitutionalized. Now, with those closed, our mission is basically to provide alternative services at some time and find them the most normal living arrangements we can.
Q: Let's switch gears to another passion of yours - renovating old buildings. What buildings in Waseca have you renovated, and why is this an important part of your life?
A: I really enjoy developing and renovating and restoring different houses and properties. We have several projects where we have taken old hotels and turned them into apartments and even a church we've turned into apartments. That's part of the reason I like my job.
I taught school and I enjoyed that, but it was the same routine every day. That was stressing me out. At that time, I didn't realize how important liking your job was. So, I started looking for some alternatives. I started buying homes and started remodeling them and I enjoyed that. While I'm not a licensed contractor, I can take a project and hire subcontractors.
I usually have two or three projects going at once. Right now, we have two that we are actually working on the one that is sitting and we are waiting for. The economy has made certain projects risky. We had financing to build some twin homes. We bought some church property with quite a bit of land here in Waseca (Evangelical Free Church) and sub-divided it into six lots, plus the church, then we built twin homes on two of them, and we were going to build on the third one, but I'm not sure I can get it filled. We have the financing, but I'm putting it on hold. I don't want to build a $250,000-$300,000 building and then have to property sitting empty or having to rent it out. So, yes, that part of it has slowed down.
Q: The Miller-Armstrong building is one of your biggest projects. Why this building?
A: We had our offices out on the east side of town and were feeling pretty cramped in there. My background is American history. I've always enjoyed collecting certain antiques. My wife would say the garage is full of junk we probably don't need. When I heard there was a court order to tear the building down, I decided to buy it. It was supposed to be torn down in 2000, and we bought it in November 1999. We basically saved it. They gave us about a year to decide what we were going to do with it.
Because we're in a small community, we thought it should be a multi-use facility. On the third floor we have a big conference room and four hotel rooms. The second floor is all offices and we have Club 57 sports bar on the first floor and then a coffee and breakfast cafe called jonnie beans in the basement. The rooms work well for weddings and class reunions for people coming from out of town.
Q: How did you determine plans for the building's use?
A: That first year, we just walked though and brainstormed and brought friends and contractors trough. It really revolved around our office needs. That was the primary need, our core business. Then we needed a large conference room for training and thought if people came in from out of town, they would need a place to stay. It was a gradual process. Downstairs, we debated different things. One of our goals was to provide jobs for some of the consumers we worked with. We thought between the bed and breakfast and Club 57 and jonnie beans and those things, we could create 10 part-time positions.
Owning all of the homes, we kind of work with food service anyway, so I didn't think there would be as big a jump as there was for providing food for 240 clients or consumers to a customer-based food service, but it's quite a difference.
Q: You realized an eight-year dream when you opened Starfire Grill last year. Was that part of the original plan?
A: The Starfire Grill is housed in a separate warehouse built in the 1930's that was a part of E.F. Johnson's original factory next door. They did all of their crating. Originally, they had carpenters in there building wooden boxes to export things overseas.
It was kind of our goal for somebody who came to town or anybody to have a fine-dining dinner, they could go to the bar to see some live entertainment, they could stay in the bed and breakfast for the weekend if they wanted to. We started Club 57 first and a lot of people in the community were expecting casual fine dining and then they were kind of disappointed that it was more a bar and grill. The Starfire is a continuation of the development, so now it is all done. You can come in and have your breakfast, stay for dinner, stay for entertainment and spend the night.
Q: Has the economy affected business at the Starfire Grill?
A: I just tell people that I'm pretty pleased with the business we have based on the economy. I don't have anything to compare it to because we opened up that time. We've been busy at least two or three nights a week. There are some weeks that are slower. If the economy was better, would that change? I think probably.
Q: Why did the Starfire Grill project take eight years to come to fruition?
A: It was too much to try to get done at one time. We actually did it in stages. We were in here working in the offices probably a good year before Club 57 opened up.
Q: You like to restore old buildings and collect old things. Tell us about your collection of vintage cars?
A: I'm not a mechanic myself. Unfortunately I have to pay for most of it to be done. I envy these guys who can take an old car and fix it themselves and rebuild the motor and do all of the work.
I had a 1957 Oldsmobile in high school and really liked it. So when i could afford it, I bought one, and as I saw any come up that were pretty reasonable, I purchased several over the years. I have five pretty decent '57 Oldsmobiles and I bought another one as a parts car and a couple of young guys working to become auto body and mechanics wanted to restore it as Richard Petty replica because Richard Petty and his dad had a '57 Oldsmobile. That gives me six now. The sixth one is painted Richard Petty blue with a 43 on the side. It's kind of a conversation piece. That's the connection with Club 57.
Q: Are there other restoration projects in the planning stages?
A: Several years ago, the city had the original freight depot that went along with the original depot. It was sitting on the edge of town and they said they would basically give it to anybody who would restore it. So I put in a plan to restore it and moved it back along the original railroad tracks just south of the original depot, which is now Zinnia's. I put a foundation under it, but I haven't begun restoring that. That would be the next project. It may be the last one.
Q: What is your vision for that restoration?
A: Probably something to do with antiques and collectibles. We were cleaning it out and we found tickets from 1898 that had fallen behind the walls. So we want to restore it so it looks like the depot on the outside and keep it original looking on the inside, at least as much as we can.
Q: What's next for Gene Miller?
A: We have two buildings, we have also purchased the E.F. Johnson building across the street and we've been working on that for a while.
The E.F. Johnson building is 37,000 square feet and part of it was condemned because of solvents that leaked into the ground. We spent a lot of time and effort to get all of that tested and analyzed and came up with a plan to correct that and make it safe. We have sealed it so it isn't leaking to surrounding buildings.
I'm not sure what is going to go there, but it will be a big project.Our long range vision was sub-dividing it into some smaller business and perhaps a larger conference room. It will have to be sud-divided into several different things.
Those two projects are going to take me into retirement.