City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay. Good afternoon everyone. Welcome to the Northclad City Council work session here on Tuesday, April 21st, 2026 at 4:30 p.m. Of course, we are here in the council chambers. Uh, calling the meeting officially to order. Angie, would you roll call please? Here in the nick of time, here

thank you. A current copy of the open meetings act to say Nebraska is posted on the wall at the back of the council chambers. remind everyone no formal vote or action will be taken at this meeting. No formal vote or action will be taken at this meeting. The only item on our agenda today is discussion on possible fire training facility. And so we would invite our fireman. Chief, would you come up and give us the short version? I know your crew has a presentation, but could you give us the short version, please?

Mr. Mayor, Council, City Administrator, first and foremost, thank you for taking some extra time out of your your afternoon on a amazing day. Um, this this project that is before you, this proposed project is 25 years in the making. when we uh built uh completed and opened station fire station 3 out on West 2nd Street. Uh at that time uh there was additional acreage purchased out there by the city. I think about 15 acres additional property with the full intention of developing that facility into a training facility with additional buildings and and props. Uh that was the intent 25 years ago. Uh fast forward to today, we still have no training facility, so to speak, out there. We do have a burn trailer that we have used for a number of years that has been uh a great a great tool for us. uh it's it's benefited us to some degree and uh but it's it again is as many of these things they they serve for a period of time and then their life lifespan begins to diminish. That's what we're seeing with the burn trailer that's out there now. We have invested quite a little extra money over the last several years trying to maintain that trailer and keep it to standards. I think our last uh the last time we did something with it was about 12 or $15,000 just to get it up to uh get some upgrades and some uh software uh to to keep it going. That is to be done annually. Uh and you can imagine that gets more expensive every year. We are experiencing trouble again with that

that trailer. Uh so it is not fully functional. Uh we do the best we can with it. That said, um I'm I'm excited uh to be here today and to to bring to you uh our union, our North Plat Firefighters Local 831 came to us um with a proposal uh several months ago on the possibility of a training facility uh being put up out there. They had done a lot of leg work ahead of time contacting companies that provide this type of facility without uh brick and mortar without having to undertake a big brickandmortar construction project. They they found a company that uh one of the leading in the country. They're a family-owned business and they've got they've got these this particular some some version of the the facility that you have in front of you, the diagrams, they have these all over the United States. Um, and and we can go online and look at many many many different uh examples of this. But these these particular uh these are containers uh that you might see. We see them all over the place uh for for moving for storage. Uh that is the type of container this is. And as you'll see as we go through this uh there is I believe you you should have that packet. Yeah. That's got the containers. This is going to be a six container uh project and this will allow us uh to conduct live fire training. Uh and in addition to that it's going to give us the ability to do many other types of training that now we are

limited because of the type of facility that is required for different types of training and having certified facilities. um this this particular project. If you take a look at your that that fire that yeah the packet that starts with the fire frame. Um if you take a look back there about page three is where it starts. You should have a photo of a or a drawing of the the containers. This particular uh prop is going to be a six container prop. As you as you start through there, you thumb through those pages, you'll just see different views of that part this particular prop. This particular training prop doesn't rely uh on on a lot of electronics. Uh in fact, it is live fire. uh our our firefighters uh will will go in and create fires uh using combustible materials and and uh that that is the great thing about that is that we're not going to be having to do computer upgrades, software upgrades, uh equipment that gets comp, you know, component electrical components that get overheated year after year after it's repeatedly. We do a lot of this training uh and you can imagine the heat that they're subject to. So this this eliminates that need for the constant uh upgrade of of the mechanical portions of it, the electronic portions of it. These containers uh are designed in such a way and engineered in such a way that they are certified. They're certified certified for this type of training. They're certified for various other

types of training. Currently, uh, high angle rescue training. Uh, we used to do that at our fire station, too, over on Sycamore Street off that hose tower. Uh, we used to use that, state patrol used that to do repelling and and that sort of training. Uh, that is no longer that's not a certified facility. I don't know that you really want us to be hanging anybody off there uh not knowing what what may hold and what may not hold. This this comes all certified engineer certified so that we can conduct those trainings do so safely and and to become more proficient at that type of training. probably the the thing I want to stress the most about this particular project. Currently, you've heard me talk about ISO, insurance service organization, uh ratings. City of North Plat is currently a class 22 Y. um various opinions out there. Uh Councilman BS can tell you ISO is important to our city uh in terms of insurance rates. Uh not just commercial insurance rates, but homeowner insurance rates. Um currently the the the prop we have does not do us any good in terms of giving us points towards our ISO rating to to obtain ISO certified points. We have to have a threestory fixed structure. This would fill that void. We're the only class one city in the state of Nebraska that does not have a three-story uh training facility. So, we're excited about about the possibility of that. You also have to have that facility on a minimum of three

acres. We have the acreage out in that location. Obviously, our currently the training program during the first six months that our firefighters come to work for us, they're during their probationary period. Um they have got to have a minimum of 240 hours of fire training. that that consists of live fire training that consists of extrication, vehicle extrication, search and rescue, high angle rescue, uh the repelling, many other things play into when we talk about fire training other than just live fire again. And I will I will tell you that Assistant Chief Kleinowl as as the chief of our training uh for the fire department does an amazing job uh as well as our firefighters of overcoming some of the obstacles we have currently by not having uh sufficient uh props and and props that are certifiable. They do an amazing job of trying to overcome some of those things. Um, all of our personnel uh have to have 18 hours annually of live fire training. That can be difficult. There was a time when we could burn houses. Somebody had donate a house, we'd go out and burn a house. That's pretty near non-existent now. Uh, with all the rules, EPA, uh, the remediation that's required to go in and remove asbestous and different things, we're not able to do that. So, it's rare that we get the opportunity to get into an actual structure. We rely on that trailer, which really provides us a great opportunity to put them in some heat and get them used to the heat. But in terms of live fire and how that can

change uh drastically, it that that portion of it we're missing out on. Um, just to give you an idea, in 2025, uh, Assistant Chief Pell ran some numbers and the three shifts combined had over 800 hours of fire training. Something occurs at those fire stations every day in terms of training of some sort. Again, we we provide more than fire service. Obviously, we provide a lot of ambulance service. That's our primary our primary uh task out there. But over 800 hours uh between the three shifts annually, that's a tremendous amount of training. As you stop and think about that, when the union came to us again, they said, "We have got to make this a reality. We've we've we've been wanting to do this for some time quite honestly and you know this uh most of you uh you know what's been going on in our community for a number of years and there's always something that that drives these things or or causes them to kind of fall back and certainly economy plays a huge role in that. Fact of the matter is uh we've gone too long without what we really need to do and provide our folks not only for their safety but for the safety of our citizens. this project. After a lot of leg work by our our firefighters, several of them have spent a lot of time on this uh in contact with this company, finding a way to make this a little more palpable uh for all of us. I believe instead of a brickandmortar structure that could that could cost us

threequarters of a million dollars. uh they have they have come to a a place here where this particular structure as you'll see in your in the contract there. Um currently the contract that they have proposed for us is $179,000. That actually when they brought this to us a couple months ago was $158,000. So these things are inching up in price. 50% of that down at the time we sign a contract and 50% upon completion. We will the the local here has, as you'll see in their letter, has offered $25,000 to help get this thing started. We know that we have other donors out there that are interested in in pro providing funding to this. We've just kind of held off. We didn't want them to get too far ahead of this until we had been with council to get their thoughts on this whole uh project, what it might look like. Realistically, this is a three to fiveear project. This is just the initial stage. We want to get we want to get footings poured and get the props set. That company will come out and do that for us. We'll we'll do the concrete work. They'll set the props. So, it's all on up and up. eventually as as city engineer uh has provided you a kind of a a map there and and I'll let him speak to he has been out and surveyed this site to make sure that we will be well within our all the standards and that we're not going to cause issues runoff problems anywhere or or anything else environmentally. Uh this can be done. We want to eventually have the streets extended. We would like to around this building, we would like

to have curbs fronts put in to mimic pulling up in a neighborhood having the same setbacks we would have in a residential neighborhood in a business location. Uh we're going to extend fire hydrant uh so we're not laying hose quite so far out there. uh a draft pond so that we can for rural fires we can we can practice drafting water uh as well as have a way of getting rid of any runoff we can we can put it somewhere so we're not wasting that either. So, there's a lot of things down the road a ways, but but ultimately tonight, we would really really want you to give consideration and and we'll answer all the questions that we can for you in terms of getting this thing off the ground for us. uh and and I have no doubt uh that uh we'll see return on this project uh almost immediately uh in terms of what we can provide our folks but also locally the the departments around us or many of our rural departments uh Grand Island State Fire School is the only place they can go to get these bigger trainings currently once a year we could become a regional center we believe that we've we've talked talked to a number of the departments that have indicated they would gladly uh be willing to to use this facility. It would be it would be a huge help to them as we continue to see uh it harder and harder for these smaller departments to let their folks go uh away for training for two or three days at a time. As you can imagine with what we're seeing right now with wildfires, that's a that's a difficult task for them. It's a difficult task for us and it's expensive task to send several people off uh to these these bigger trainings. So, we believe this can be a revenue source. I won't put an estimate on what that might look like. I

don't I'm not going to tell you it's going to fix all of our budget wos uh in the long term, but I think it will certainly play a a role in that. And as as it grows and uh we develop it, I think it will become even a greater source for revenue. So with that, Dennis, I think you have a video, don't you?

Yeah. And this is just a real It's about a minute long video from this company. As I said, there are they have these these props all over the United States. Uh there are videos available from all of these sites. They're lengthy videos with all the various trainings they've done throughout the country. But uh the other nice thing I would tell you about this particular project, this company would use a local uh machine shop to do some of the fabrication of some exterior props for us. It's cheaper for them to have somebody do that locally than it is for them to ship material out here and spend time doing that. So, we would be using some local uh businesses to to assist with this. Uh and still we we still maintain that certification. It doesn't change that at all. It's all under close inspection. So, um, with

that, I think what I would like to do first before we start getting into questions, I would like to have firefighter Tyler Mottinger come up. Tyler's kind of been behind, uh, garnering all this information. Uh, and he he is going to address you on behalf of of what this means to our firefighters and then we can get into more of the detail as we as we are able to. Thank you, Chief. got a little speech here so I don't miss any of the points. So, good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the North Plat City Council. I thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. I'm here on behalf of the North Plat Fire Department to discuss the need for a dedicated functional training facility, one that directly reflects conditions that our firefighters face every time we respond to a call. At its core, this project is about preparedness. The type of training we can provide today is limited. Our current setup does not fully replicate the conditions of the modern fire incidents, especially as our city continues to grow. What we are proposing is a training center that allows our firefighters to train in realistic controlled environments using class A materials. This creates real heat, real smoke, and real fire behavior conditions that cannot be duplicated with propane based systems. All live fire training will be conducted in the controlled regulated environment following National Fire Protection Agency standards, state guidelines. This matters because firefighters perform the way they train. When we expose our crews to realistic conditions and training, we improve decision-m, reduce risk, and ultimately save lives both civilian and firefighters. This facility would give us the ability to train on a wide range of critical scenarios. For example, we will be able to simulate below grade fires such as basement fires, above grade fires like attic fires. These are some of the most dangerous and unpredictable fire environments we

encounter. And they also require specific tactics that only can be mastered through repetition and realistic conditions. We will also incorporate an entanglement prop, something that allows firefighters to practice self-rescue if they become caught or trapped. These situations are rare, but when they occur, they are life-threatening. Training for them is not an option. It is essential. Additionally, the facility will allow for smoke filing, including vent or search operations, also known to us as vees. This is where firefighters enter through windows to rapidly locate victims, often in high-risisk environments. Being proficient in these skills can mean the difference between life and death for some people trapped inside. This is also where firefighters enter through windows to rapidly locate victims often in high-risisk environments. This structure will also support rope rescue training. As chief said, this with certified anchor points built into the design. This ensures all operations are compliant with National Fire Protection Agency standards while allowing us to train for elevated or confined space rescues. We're also planning for advanced safety and realism features such as a maze and a control drop floor. The drop floor, which simulates a partial floor collapse, will train firefighters to react to one of the most dangerous scenarios on the fire ground falling through a compromised structure. The drop floor will be designed to safely simulate partial structure collapse in a supervised training environment. Beyond fire suppression, this facility will support forcible entry training, ladder operations, high-rise operations with a standpipe and a fire department connection, an FDC, which is a connection point on a building that allows firefighters to supply directly to a building's fire protection sprinkler system. We will have the ability to train and move water to upper floors and operate in multi-story buildings, something that is becoming increasingly relevant as North

Placa continues to expand. We can also utilize this space for hazardous materials training scenarios and partner with local law enforcement for joint training opportunities. This strengthens inter agency coordination and ensures all responders are operating from the same playbook during an emergency. Importantly, this facility will not just serve North Plat, it will be a regional asset. We plan to invite surrounding rural departments to train with us. This builds relationships, standardizes operations, and ensures that when mutual aid is needed, we are working together efficiently and effectively. That brings me to my final point, growth. Northplat is growing. That's something that we are all proud of. But with growth comes increased demand on emergency services. Buildings are getting larger and more complex. The tactics required to operate in these environments are different from traditional residential structures. Our current training resources do not match the complexity of these new risks. This facility bridges that gap. It allows us to train for the city we have today and the city we are becoming. Investing in this training center is not just about infrastructure. It is about safety, preparedness and responsibility. It ensures about ensuring that when our firefighters are called upon, they are trained to the highest standard possible. We are asking for your support to make that a reality and I thank you for your guys' time and consideration.

Thank you. We have a room full of firefighters. Does anyone else have anything to add to that speech? Tennis,

I want to make sure we have plenty of time to to answer questions, but I would note Eric, these guys are prepared for this. They went out and and did a lot of things ahead of time. They went out and looked at the mechanism for for raising money and how we might how they might take that money then and and put it somewhere where it could be we could watch what's going on with it. Eric Serest uh that you spoke with them. He can provide you any details. We work with him already as a city, but if you have questions about how that might look in terms of money in, money out, uh he can certainly answer those questions for you. Again, come on up there.

Good evening. My name is Eric Serest and I'm the former chief executive officer of the community foundation and then the new one is here Leland Poppy. Uh we I began with this project and I want to get it at least to to the next stage. Uh this is an exciting project. Uh to my knowledge there's nothing like this in western Nebraska. Uh we are prepared if the city wants us to do this and do this project to uh have a fund here to take donations that would be uh when it's they need some money. The city is used to telling us they need the money and we we send them a check. Uh we've done this for uh playgrounds, for trails, for pickle ball courts, tennis courts, and many other things. Um I we we depend on you saying go and do this project. I want us to be clear if we are going to be involved. Are we raising money for this first stage or for the future step two the other things that Chief Thompson mentioned. I want to make sure we're clear on what part we are raising money for. I also want to make sure that before this goes forward that the community is uh aware of how people are going to be kept safe um when this training facilities used. I'm sure there's a plan and I would urge the city to make sure that they've informed the neighborhood and the whole city when training when the live fire

training is going on. How is the neighborhood pedestrians and motorists uh kept safe? Um and I'm I have a great confidence that the chief and the fire department people know how to do that. But I think it's important that that be done in a very public way so everybody has great confidence that this project is going to be a true wonderful asset for this community. We are prepared to go forward if when you are. Thank you.

Thank you Harry. Bren, do you have anything you'd like to offer in terms of what you did as you looked at that project out there, that site? What? Sure.

Um, good evening, mayor, council. Um, what you have with some of the drawings is some discussions that we've had back and forth with the fire department staff, with chief and assistant chief. And what we were looking at um principally was how can we basically have this as far away from the neighborhood as we could from properties to the south and to the east. Good thing is the city is the neighbor to the west and we have front street to the north. So we tried what we did was we located on the example you have in the back left corner. One thing that we had talked about was continuing some of the screening. If you can see on the aerial photo, there's some tree screening to the west, to the north, and also to the east, which helps. We talked about doing some additional to the south. Um, just to try to keep that area a little bit more isolated, but just to give you an idea, we're probably in the neighborhood of two to 300 ft from the street. Um, so we're at least a block back. So that was some of the consideration of trying to place it on here. The other part was it allows some additional expansion by putting it in the corner if there's some other things that need to be added or um when we were looking at this we were trying to think of ideas on how we'd want this to simulate the different areas that the fire department has to respond to whether the rural a gravel street a paved road in town out of town those type of things. So those were some of the elements that we looked in. Another good thing is with them having their own fire hydrant adjacent to the well, it should have a minimal impact to the city water system because we have a supply well real close by right off their line. You have any questions on any of those items?

Thanks, Bren. All right. So, now what questions might I answer or try to answer? Have you looked into any grants or anything of that nature?

Not specifically. We know there are a number of grants out there. Um grants for the fire department are pretty limited. Most of them are through uh FEMA uh uh through in fact we have a we have a grant right now in the works for assistance to firefighters to staffing. Uh those are limited. There are private organizations out there that do some grants. Uh they're they're complicated at at very best. They they really are. Uh and and so they require a lot of a lot of research to find just the right company. Uh and and that you're meeting their what their purposes are. uh and geographically uh they don't all uh reach clear out to central Nebraska. Some of them are for east coast, west coast, various things. Uh we've we've I I know from from previous uh just some investigation and all there are some insurance companies out there that that do offer some small grants. Uh a good example locally uh every year we get uh typically about every year we get some some monies from uh farm credit services offers different grants throughout the country and so we've been recipients of small grants there. So that is an option that we would continue and to pursue. Uh we would we would look at uh obviously the fundraising that these these fellas are prepared gals are prepared to do uh and and donations. I I say I've had several people uh that that heard got wind of this have mentioned that their

desire to to assist uh with some funding. Now, again, that may be one-time funding, that may be uh some continuous, but uh we we would just have to see. And then as uh as is in your packet and visiting with uh with city administrator and the mayor, you know, we would we would look at some some other existing funds, perhaps some of our CARES money, uh some some contingency if needed. But again, we're going to approach this not in trying to get it complete uh overnight. It's a long-term project. We just need to get it in place so we can start uh using it and start building on that. And then as as other departments, agencies see what we have. It would be our hope that they would contribute as well uh to assist them with some of the training they have to conduct. And it's hard to find uh places to conduct some live fire training in a different sense than our live fire training. These guys paintball, you know, doing that kind of sort thing. Uh so we're not breaking walls and and things in our our buildings. So uh I think serve a purpose there as well. A couple of our law enforcement agencies have expressed interest in being a part of this. So

So you have it's 179, you have I've already donated. Uh is your thought that you would do some fundraising and then see see what you come up with or are you asking the city to to cut a check for the rest of it to get this process started?

We need to have this contract signed. They've already extended this contract for us uh by by over a week to make to to lock this price in. And it would be our our hope that we would commit to that the city would commit to cutting that initial check uh based on the the $25,000 uh pledge from the firefighters and the use of funds. Uh again, that would be up to city administration and council where we go for those initial funds, but that that is our intent to get this thing. We would like to have to to lock this thing in. We really need to have a contract signed in the next day or two.

What do you think in laying contingency fund? Where would this come from? Because it's not budgeted. Correct. It's it's not a budgeted item. We are right now we've been pretty um tight with our contingency for this year. So there' be money in contingency. Obviously, we have a very healthy cash reserve that we could look at. um probably shy away from the CARES money at this time for some other projects, but um at the end of the day be up to the council, but I think we could we could look at the contingency or we could look at a little bit of um cash reserves either one, which kind of the same thing, and it wouldn't hurt our budgetary situation at this point with the hopes that, you know, there' be some good good fundraising and some good support from the community that would um knock that amount down.

What do we have in contingency and cash reserves? Cash reserves were about uh 15 million I believe. Contingency. I still have probably 200,000 left for this year. I wouldn't want to use all that if we didn't have to, but I mean it's there. And right now we're trending to be under budget like we normally are for the whole for the whole general fund as a whole. Probably five or six hundred,000 under budget. And revenues are probably on pace to about meet what we budgeted. They're a little sluggish this year, but we should should still be sitting fairly well. What were we shooting to have in cash reserves? What's the the

It's about I think we shoot for 33% of our general fund um total budget which that's about 37 million. It's 372. So I know 14 13 14 million. I think we're right at where we need to be for cash reserves right now. Oh, are we?

We're sitting pretty good. Councilman Garrick, I would also mention that uh we we haven't obviously because we haven't received any approval. We we've kind of held held our firefighters back. Don't go out and start uh raising funds because until we have the move go ahead on this, we certainly don't want to be getting people committing dollars uh that that we really can't accept. And so so there's that. uh the other part. So I should say the that first half that first payment due uh at contract signing the second not till it's complete. And they're telling us right now delivery on those pods is probably sometime in July. So they could they could they might have them on site sooner. But uh in terms of getting out here getting them put together and doing all they need to do, we're probably looking at fall sometime before we would even be entertaining a second payment. So hope it would be our hope that with approval we would we would have some time to to go out and and raise some more funds. So

well I I can tell you this looks fantastic. I mean looks great for our community. I got no problems with what you're presenting here. It's just a question of how do we pay for it? How do we how do we figure that out? In my with what Chief Thompson said, it may may be possible that second payment would hit next year's budget. So I mean could be close probably, but I think either way it's it's a doable situation depending on what the council want to do with cash reserves and things. So l your chief investigated this might be a silly question, but is it insurable?

It is an insurable thing because it's a training facility. It's a little bit different, but it is an insurable thing that there's not a lot to it that as far as structure- wise, you know, that because of the way it's designed for damage, but I mean it is an insurable thing and it you know, we already insure our people when they go to trading other places. So, it be somewhat similar. Would it um is it something that's prone to a lot of damage and repair? In other words, would you foresee a significant line item to, you know, reweld in a new wall every year or things like that? In other words, I don't have a great feel for how much damage a facility like this takes on.

You get to turn that over to Chief. I don't know about that answer. I will tell you that say the trailer we have now that that burn trailer we have right now

in terms of of damage from fire and heat it isn't so much to the to the compon the facility itself the structure itself as it is to all the additional components that make that particular facility run. These are much heavier props uh and and are designed for extreme heat, extreme fire. That's not to say that down the road we aren't going to they they'll be inspected to make sure we don't have any failures anywhere, but uh ultimately they're they're designed for this very thing. Uh and and have a long history they have a long history of of success with this this type of building. So Okay. No, thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, go ahead.

Maybe my last my last question for now. The um Oh gosh, I lost my train of thought just for a second. Um, what was I thinking about? Oh, would it be would the would we have to fence the area off?

Um, I don't believe we do because it's all on our property in the back there and maybe something if we ever had problems. We could look at fencing, but I don't think we we don't have we don't have problems with our existing things that we have back in that area for training. We have the the tanker back there and we have the the pod back there. We haven't had problems with that. So, I don't believe we would. And I think to that point and to Eric's point, I think it's so important. We have uh a good relationship with our neighbors out there. This probably would go quite a ways to improving that in that the setbacks as Brent was mentioning. Uh currently when we do some of our trainings out there uh closer to the street and things uh they get a lot of overspray on their homes. Doesn't make them happy when their cars are covered in water spots and their windows on their houses. And you can imagine and we're very careful when we do that type of training uh that we we're looking at weather conditions before we undertake something like that. So we're not blowing water. We're not blowing smoke uh in in directions that are going to be uh a problem for neighbors. We're we're very careful about that. And we've always we've always got people that are interested in what we're doing and and we've always they've been good about it. You know, we we want them to see what we're doing out there. We want to be visible and and so we we certainly uh try and uh at a safe distance allow them to watch. We keep people out there to keep them at a distance. So so those things are addressed ahead of time.

You mentioned other uses for this facility. Is that you're thinking like police? Yeah, I law enforcement has indicated that uh repelling uh some of the things they do there, some of the the tactics that that these agencies use that are unbeknownst to us some of the stuff they have to do. But uh but active shooter uh training, they they could be used for that. So I think it serves uh another another purpose there and perhaps they can be a little more intense with their training versus being in our schools. uh and charging up down holes and things. So, uh they we've had indications that that they would be willing to to use them and might be able to help us with some funding, too. So, we're excited about that prospect. And again, we work with them day in and day out. It it seems like a a win-win.

Rod, did you have a question? Yeah. uh the 179,000 for the the the pods itself and then it says seven or $8,000 for the concrete footings. Then the rest of all of that that you want to do, is that going to be budgeted throughout the next few years to get it done? If you don't get the donations or you're are you going to be coming back to us wanting another 200,000 to finish it or

I think it's something that we will certainly be out soliciting funds, doing doing fundraising. There's no doubt about that. That's that's what we would really like to see uh is is that uh big donors uh small donors as well get involved in this and see the need for it. But certainly we've discussed that potentially uh down the road. We've got a lot of things coming up. You're going to you're going to see some some vehicles that we're replacing coming up on on uh budgets and all. We're we're cognizant of that. We're going to be very careful of that. We know that we may not be able to complete this thing in the same time frame that we're saying right now. It may take a few more years due to and become a part of a budget, but we're we're open to that and willing to to work with that any way we can to make this a reality.

Is it going to be usable if it's not completed? It will be usable. A lot of this is again to mimic the the situations that we encounter as we pull up in front of a house at 3 in the morning on a residential street. Much of that is just so it's it's that's what it is. We have water so we can we already have a water source out there. We just would like to get a hydrant closer. Uh but we can we can run water back there. Um, so most of what it takes to get this off the ground is the the concrete to set them on, anchor them, and we can start burning. So I take it the seven or 8 thousands just the pillars in the ground that it's going to set on. There's not going to be a sidewalk around it.

It's got to be on a minimum of 6 ines of concrete, um, a pad and and some some small footings. Yeah. So they're they're saying 60 yards. And we believe we believe uh that because of some relationships we have uh and some communications we've had uh with some some folks around town that we might uh be able to do some some bargaining there too and and help they'll help us with some of those costs. So go ahead. Um Chief, thanks for coming in. How much are we spending now for training?

Oh my goodness. You know, we're let me put it this way. We're we're missing out on a great deal of um very precise the next tactical level of training because it is so expensive to send our folks off. We don't have the facilities. So to send if we were to send two or three people uh say to Omaha and use their training facility, we're we're going to have a week's a week's worth of rooms, we're going to have travel, we're going to have lodging, food, a number of things. Chances are they would work with us in terms of instruction costs and all, but um we are we are really pretty pretty darn self-sufficient in terms of what we're getting done in a roundabout way and providing amazing training. But we know it's not the level of training as as firefighter Mottzinger alluded to building the construction process anymore, the materials, furnishings is completely different than it was 20 years ago, 30 years ago. And so we're we're we're needing to get better at at identifying those those burn processes and how the tactics of how we get in there, get in there safely, get out safely, rescue people uh in in ways that we we perhaps haven't uh the houses are tighter. They're built tighter today. And so rescue victims are at a higher risk uh because typically these fires today aren't recognized near as quickly as they used to be.

Well, you mentioned something about sending the guys off for training and the cost. How often do you do that? Is that something that's annual or

rarely because of the cost? Uh unless we can get it done under grant through grants that exist. There's very little of that. There's a lot of hazmat grants that we get people off to trainings. Fire trainings is a completely different uh animal. It It's just not there. Fire school in Grand Island annually. We get several of our volunteers off to that. Again, by the time we we send we try and get our newest members, a couple of them a year off to that, but by the time we uh get somebody sent down the road, we back fill their positions so we're meeting minimum staffing levels. It's It's hard to do. It's very hard to do.

One other question that I have actually a couple more, but these look a lot like the same kinds of containers you see running up and down the railroad tracks. They are nonetheless. Um, they're a field. Yeah. Now, I don't know what you mean by a fire. I mean, are we talking about a raging inferno in some of these? If that's the case, the paint's going to get burned off. You're dealing with a steel container that's going to rust. It seemed like you're going to have to do some periodic sand blasting, repainting. How What kind of maintenance are we looking at on these things?

Well, I don't know if you've been out by station 3 recently to see our fire trailer out there right now. That that thing's never had anything done to the outside of it. It's 20 years old. Uh it's it's starting to show its wear. paint. There's some paint gone. It's It's intact. It's scorched. Uh these particular units have uh additional steel plating uh inside of them that is that is added to them to to increase that in insulate a little bit better. Uh and certainly uh yeah, there's they're going to we're not going to we're not going to light an entire container up and we're going to mimic certain kind compartment fires, room and contents fire. Uh so it it's not like we're just going to go out there and stuff it full of stuff and watch it watch it burn. And we we absolutely know there's going to be some maintenance. a lot of this again commitment from from our staff to to help with a lot of this stuff to make this a reality.

The other question that I have regards your water container. Yes. Um how do you plan on maintaining? I mean is that going to be a lined pit or or is it going to soak away or what are we thinking? That's something that that Brent and I, assistant chief have talked about a little bit. We're not completely sold on exactly how we will do that. If it will be a some sort of a liner, if it would be a poured uh type of pit, we we've got some options there and and and then drainage to get it empty at certain times a year so we don't have stagnant water sitting there. That's a big concern of ours and we would be very careful of that. we might be able to use some of that water for irrigating the trees, the tree lines that are out there uh existing. So certainly something we're we're not completely uh fixed on how we're going to do it, but it's and again down the road that's a a prop. So we've got some time to investigate that. Make see a best practice.

The stagnant water was I guess big concern for me. Absolutely. Mosquito breeder. Yeah. Course in the drought you don't have to worry about that. Yeah. Yeah. But um um and and is that just going to drain water from your fire fighting exercises or is that going to drain water for the site?

That that would be mainly it would be the runoff from the from the structure. Anything that we put on it so it had a place to go. Uh we we're looking at that real carefully to make sure that we don't nothing that we are going to put on that fire is is going to be a contaminant to soil or anything. So it is water with some obviously some carbon residual from burning but but beyond that it's not going to be harmful to soil or anything but uh in the in the long run uh it would help the site completely uh in terms of drainage out there. We have some drainage issues out there. So you're saying that this may contain more than just your fire

eventually it would I would imagine. Yes. Okay. Just just thinking about irrigating trees of doing this thing would maybe make some sense to run some power out that pit so you turn a pump on the tree. And that's that's another you're right though but that's another thing we think long term that we would like to have power out there. So thank you.

Thank you. real quick. Um, thank you for coming in and presenting this to us. Um, how often do you foresee the fire department using this and is it going to like is it going to take more staff because you're partnering with other communities and other people to come in and train or is it outsiders always going to be training with you?

We will use this. Well, I can tell you we we would be using it weekly uh sometimes daily uh because of what we need to be doing and proper facility would make that uh much easier to do. And knowing that we have a facility that's going to operate that day currently because of some issues, maintenance issues with that that prop we have. Some days it doesn't work, some days it does. Certainly uh staffingwise it would be uh our intent uh as it is now when we get together with departments uh our folks would help instruct uh a lot of our our uh firefighters have uh certifications specific training in in instruction uh of these types of tactics and all. So we would use them to assist with uh these smaller departments. we would use their folks to assist with with training and providing instructors depending upon the type of of training that we're doing. It would be again it would be a a project that we we work together on to benefit all of us. So, uh but in terms of adding staffing, not for this facility. Okay.

We'll talk staffing another time. Okay.

And then real quick, um I would like to hear from the police department if they wouldn't mind on how they would utilize the facility. Mr. Mayor, City Council, we've looked at the facility and you know, we are not opposed to a new North Plat Fire Department training facility. It'd be great, but I I it'd be a minimal use for us. Um, if we do SIMS training, um, if we do virtual reality training, we do virtual real virtual reality training inhouse. Um, and we would do SIM training. We would try to do that at the school setting because that's where we're going to be. Uh, we have no SWAT team. Uh, so repelling wouldn't be something that we would do with it that we would use it for.

Does the state patrol do anything along those lines? I'm sure the state patrol would u yeah they have a SWAT team. That is correct. Thank you. Okay, we're at about five minutes before our next meeting starts. Does anybody have any really important questions? This item is on our consent agenda, so someone could pull it off potentially for further discussion if they so chose. One more quick question. Go ahead, Rod. Where's the closest training facility? Is it Omaha now or is there one in Grand Island? Carney. Carney. Carney. Carney similar to this

there's brick and mortar uh so but but does the same thing. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you everyone. We appreciate your time here tonight. We're going to adjourn this meeting. We will begin the regular city council meeting in about five minutes. Thank you. Thank you gentlemen. Thank you. Water's not Jesus Christ.