Campbell County fire officials sought to replace the countyโs aging fire training center and highlighted a strong year for wildfire mitigation efforts during the Board of Commissioners Fire Board meeting Wednesday, Oct. 22.
Fire Chief Jeff Bender told commissioners the Alan Mickelson Fire Training Center is nearing the end of its lifespan and poses safety concerns for firefighter training and certification. An engineer evaluated the facility five years ago and estimated it had about five years left. Since then, the department has spent about $100,000 on repairs that Bender described as โband-aids on a broken leg.โ The facilityโs burn room has also deteriorated from years of use before modern safety standards were implemented.
Officials said a new engineering assessment is needed, costing between $10,000 and $20,000. If the structure is deemed unsafe, local firefighters would need to travel to Casper, Laramie or Cheyenne to complete mandatory live fire training.
To address the issue, the department proposed building a new training center on the Station One campus lot. The full project was once estimated at more than $30 million, but the first phase โ focused on essential needs โ is projected to cost about $9.6 million. It includes a new four-story training tower, a three-story live fire building, a pump test station, a two-story residential-style training house and site preparation such as roads, grading and utility work.
Construction would take up to two years once funding is secured. Commissioners expressed interest in starting early site preparation in the 2026โ27 budget cycle and discussed spreading costs across several years.
