FAYETTEVILLE — The Fayette County Commission Friday gave the go-ahead to the county’s fire coordinator to purchase property owned by North American River Runners (NARR) for use as a fire training academy.

Plans for the Fayette County Fire Academy include offering training in basic and advanced firefighting skills, hazardous materials response and various rescue procedures, including swift water. Classrooms and outdoor training stations will be available to all emergency service personnel in Fayette County.

The asking price for the 32-acre NARR property with multiple buildings in Hico is $1 million, and the commission made its approval contingent on an appraisal falling above or equal to the purchase price.

Fire levy funds will largely be used to pay for the property, which emergency services is already renting and making use of. County Fire Coordinator Steve Cruikshank says the academy will be built on a pay-as-you-go basis, with no loans involved.

A $1 million error in budget projections for the next four years had to be corrected in the middle of the meeting.

Nevertheless, the commission did not balk at a projected end of year balance of $256,254 for 2012-2013 after the purchase, down from $1.8 million in the current fiscal year.

The projections do not include any anticipated income from operation of the facility, or any grants, which Cruikshank says the academy will be able to attract.

Cruikshank says such a facility has been a goal for 20 years.

“There’s a lot of good potential,” says Deputy Fire Coordinator Chris Martin. “We have a need, and with the state mandates coming down it’s going to fit really well with our fire service in the county.”

Martin says the state fire commission mandates a great many trainings for fire personnel, which are hands-on and take a lot of time to complete. A trainee must undertake 140 hours of training before they are allowed in a fire truck.

These requirements will become a part of state law next year, creating what some say is a burden on small departments.

Martin and Cruikshank hope the fire school will reduce tuition and travel expenses for Fayette County fire departments that must travel to other cities for training.

“With the availability of classes right now, they are not coming available as soon as we would like, and so this will allow us to train continuously,” says Martin.

They also think it will help in recruiting fire personnel by creating excitement in communities and reducing the time required to become certified from nine months to two or three.

“The quicker we can get someone through training the easier it will be to recruit,” says Martin.

The project may also lower fire insurance rates in the public and private sectors, but many factors are at play and no guarantees can be made.

The plan calls for initial repairs and renovations to be made to buildings on the NARR property before move-in, and later those will be expanded to start training classes. The first priority is to be able to do a live burn training.

“We can be up and running and doing a lot of things without spending much money and reaping the benefits,” says Cruikshank.

Eventually, he says he wants to create state-of-the-art classrooms to provide the latest training available. He believes Fayette County can have an exceptional regional fire school.

Training for Fayette County personnel would be free, and a fee schedule would be set for others.

The proposal initially included renting out the facilities for various purposes like family reunions or picnics, but Fayette County prosecuting attorney Carl Harris says that would not be permitted because fire levy funds can only be used for fire protection services and equipment.

He says there is also some question about whether training can be extended to people outside of Fayette County.

Harris says it would be easier to make the argument for doing so if the services were being offered to Nicholas County, which sometimes assists Fayette in emergencies. It would be harder for a fire department in Morgantown, for example. He says next election the county can look at changing the fire levy language to be broader.

— E-mail: cmoore@register-herald.com