Anniston, AL – On Monday, March 6, 2023, The Anniston Fire Department was honored to hold a ribbon cutting ceremony to commemorate the completion of the Anniston Regional Training Center expansion. Surrounded by the Mayor, the Anniston City Council, Assistant Chief Phelps, and Fire Fighters and Command Staff, Chief Jeff Waldrep addressed the large crowd gathered to see the new facility. Chief Waldrep thanked everyone, both inside his department and out, for their support and help during this large undertaking. He went on to say that this facility will be utilized by current and future firefighters to gain advantages in training and education.
Anniston’s Mayor Draper then took to the podium and expressed his happiness for the new training facility and what it will do for the firefighting community and what it can mean to the entire community on an economic level. Mayor Draper also discussed the importance of maintaining development, within the city of Anniston, and to continue to growth. He also said how excited he is about the fire training facility being able to people from all over Alabama and the entire United States.
Chief Waldrep, Mayor Draper, and the City Council then lined up for the official ribbon cutting. When Chief Waldrep utilized the ceremonial scissors and cut the ribbon everyone was invited inside to tour the new facilities.
The Calhoun Journal spoke with Chief Waldrep to discuss some of the new plans that will be implemented for the expanded training center. He stated that they have already scheduled 35 certificate classes and is happy that they can now open classes to more students because of the classroom size [see original article for sizes]. “We had to turn some students down to attend classes because they filled up so quickly, but now we have more room to offer students.”, stated Chief Waldrep. The Chief was also happy to say that the facility will be providing a “Hands on electrical fire class with the National Fire Arson Investigation Institute. Arson Investigator, Captain Jason Brown and the assistant fire marshals will all be attending the class as well.”
The Chief went on to explain that the facility will also be branching out a little to offer classes to professions that are not firefighters. “We will be offering courses that will be available to different professions such as code enforcement.” He believes this can help to close some of the gaps between the different professions who’s work often overlaps.
Chief Waldrep believes that the Anniston Regional Training Center is successful because of the many partnerships they have with different educational facilities and specialized groups. The partnerships enable the training center to offer a wider variety of training classes than if they were to work alone.
