Tarrant County commissioners are rethinking a nearly $50 million plan to build a new law enforcement training facility after initial plans left off key training resources.
Instead, Tarrant County plans to partner with one of the existing law enforcement academies in Tarrant County to expand its facilities, rather than building a brand new training center, Precinct 4 commissioner Manny Ramirez said.
The most recent study was produced by Komatsu Architecture and proposes a 60,900-square-foot facility that would cost about $35 million to build, with a total cost of $48 million. However, the plans were missing several items from the sheriff’s office wish list, including a firing range and driving track.
“For me, it was no better than just slapping a coat of paint on what we already have,” Ramirez, former president of the Fort Worth Police Officers Association, said.
Robbie Hoy, a spokesperson for the sheriff’s office, said the sheriff’s office is still studying options and the pros and cons of partnering with an existing training center.
“Not having a firing range or a driving track would take us back to the drawing board,” Hoy said.
The new plan will improve training and boost recruitment and retention while saving taxpayer money, Ramirez said.
Ramirez’s office is still working to finalize construction plans and should have cost estimates in the next few weeks. The new plan is expected to provide “significant savings,” in the total cost of the project, according to Tracey Knight, chief of staff for Ramirez.
Tarrant County Commissioners first discussed the idea of using federal funds to build a new training facility for the Tarrant County Sheriff’s office in April. The Report visited three other regional training facilities to understand law enforcement training options already available in Tarrant County.
The Report found that Tarrant County taxpayers have spent at least $123 million on building new public safety training centers in Fort Worth and at Tarrant County College since the early 2000s. Three existing law enforcement centers within 20 miles of the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office train about 5,700 officers annually through their academies and training courses.
Although plans for the facility have changed, Ramirez said, his goals for the facility remain the same.
“Provide the sheriff’s office world class training and really be the model for how to retain, recruit, and train the best jail personnel and sheriff’s office law enforcement personnel in the country,” Ramirez said.
The county’s current training center is mostly used for the county’s basic jailer academy. Detention officers make up about 80% of the sheriff’s office workforce, Ramirez said. The academy sits on the same campus with several other county resources in southeast Tarrant County and was built in the 1970s.
The department has outgrown the building, Sheriff Bill Waybourn said. Recruiting staff members are forced to set up a makeshift office in a hallway, and it can be challenging to create a training schedule using the four classrooms available in the 20,000-square-foot building.
Tarrant County commissioned a feasibility study with Komatsu Architecture in April to evaluate the potential costs of the project and draft initial site plans. Commissioners expected the facility to cost $45 million to $50 million to build, not including additional costs to staff and maintain the facility.
After seeing Komatsu’s $50 million proposal, Ramirez asked the firm to start again. This time, the firm focused on using the existing facilities of the other regional law enforcement academies that already exist in Tarrant County.
Future Tarrant County deputies currently go through basic academy training at the Tarrant County College center in northwest Tarrant County. Tarrant County College’s facility does not offer a jailer certification course; however; it does have an indoor firing range and driving track.
TCC’s academy currently serves 48 law enforcement agencies and employs 85 instructors. Partnering with Tarrant County College would give the county access to better instructors and access to potential recruits through students studying at Tarrant County College.
However, there is a premium on space at the community college’s training complex; it’s always in need of more space and instructors, Damon Ing, lead coordinator with the Law Enforcement Academy, previously told the Report.
In Arlington, the North Central Texas Council of Governments built the first regional law enforcement academy of its kind in 1968. Tarrant County uses COG’s center to train deputies, however, the COG center does not teach the basic certification course necessary for jailers employed by the county.
“They have stellar reputations already for being regional training academies, but they are lacking some resources,” Ramirez said. “There’s unique opportunities to add value to each institution.”
He expects to receive an update on those plans in the coming weeks. Time is of the essence, because the county wants to use money from theAmerican Rescue Plan Act to fund the construction. By federal law, those funds have to be allocated by Dec. 31, 2024, and all funds spent by Dec. 31, 2026.
The county has not finalized a partnership with a training facility, Ramirez said. The next step is drafting a partnership proposal to finalize plans, he added.
“We are on a very aggressive timeline,” he said.
Democrats doubt new facility will boost staffing
Despite Ramirez’s excitement for the project, county commissioners Alissa Simmons and Roy Brooks, both Democrats, expressed doubt that the facility will improve recruitment and retention within the sheriff’s office.
“I would like to have some evidence that if we do this… that is likely to lead us toward better recruitment and better retention of officers,” Brooks said.
Both Ramirez and County Judge Tim O’Hare, also a Republican, pointed to common sense to support investing in training to improve recruiting numbers.
“We get to use our own life experience and business sense to the table,” O’Hare said in response to Simmons’ concerns. “The notion that there’s no evidence that building a new training academy would help with recruitment, I don’t know how to help you there, but of course that will help.”
“There is no research saying that, if you build a brand-spanking new facility with all the bells and whistles, that is going to drive people to apply and become officers or sheriff’s deputies for that department,” said Dic Donohue, a policy researcher with the RAND corporation, focused on law enforcement training and recruitment/retention.
There are a number of other factors that appear to reliably boost recruitment though, including pay increases, wellness programs and, controversially, relaxing some hiring standards.
“Facilities tend not to not to be high on that list,” Donohue said.
Adequate training facilities are important for several other reasons though, Donohue added. Key skills including deescalation often require training in practical scenarios through resources like virtual reality and mock villages.
“If you have something built in 1950, it probably isn’t up to the standards that that folks need today,” Donohue said.
Money would be better spent working to reduce the county’s current jail population, Simmons said. The county signed a$18 million contract in September to move 432 inmates to a private prison in Post, Texas, because of staffing shortages.
“We are not doing something right here, and to keep relying on the same leadership in the sheriff’s office to fix it is just repeating the same old mistakes,” Simmons said.
Ramirez agrees that more could be done to reduce overcrowding in Tarrant County jails, which would in turn reduce the amount of stress the county’s jailers are under. However, investing in a law enforcement training facility is a separate issue, he said.
Ramirez isn’t sure when county commissioners will discuss the updated plan for the training facility. However, he has several meetings planned over the coming weeks to discuss the project, he said.
“Some of these other entities have governing bodies also,” Ramirez said. “We’re working through that. But once those decisions are made, we can move very, very fast.”
Rachel Behrndt is a government accountability reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact her at rachel.behrndt@fortworthreport.org or via Twitter. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.