If you are a firefighter, a police officer or a similar emergency responder, the West Virginia University Extension Service will soon ask you to help design the state’s proposed Emergency Response Training Center.
During the next two weeks, you will receive a questionnaire that will give you the opportunity to express your ideas�€your needs and preferences�€about emergency response training.
The questionnaires will be delivered either to the e-mail in-boxes or the U.S. Postal Service mailboxes of West Virginia’s volunteer firefighters, career firefighters, fire chiefs, police and other law enforcement officers, emergency medical services personnel and community emergency response team members.
Emergency responders are being asked to take about 15 minutes to answer the survey questions. The returned questionnaires will give designers the many details they must study to draft the comprehensive plan for the state’s first Emergency Response Training Center.
The proposed site is nestled among the 525 acres of the WVU Jackson’s Mill State 4-H Camp and Center for Lifelong Learning, a year-round meeting and camping facility in Lewis County.
The state-of-the-art training center is expected to attract emergency responders from throughout West Virginia and surrounding states.
WVU Extension operates Jackson’s Mill and WVU Fire Service Extension. Extension’s collaboration with W.Va. Regional Education Service Agencies and other entities annually provides training for more than 17,500 firefighters and other emergency responders.
Still in program and design review�€no opening date has been set�€the center will meet diverse training needs. Therefore, planners want emergency responders to indicate how far they are willing to travel for training, the types of facilities they already use, the types facilities they need, the different criteria they need to meet their local qualifications and their interest in special seminars.
The survey form provides opportunities to indicate needs for a variety of training facilities and equipment�€including emergency vehicle driving course, simulated city streetscape, railroad car dome, tanker trailer fire, collapsed structure simulator and fire arms training simulator.
For more information about the Emergency Response Training Center survey, contact Jeff Simpkins, director, WVU Fire Service Extension, at 1-866-WVU-FIRE.