Fayetteville Technical Community College held a ceremonial groundbreaking today, Oct. 1, at the site of new construction at the Dr. J. Larry Keen Regional Fire & Emergency Training Complex.
The site is the final phase of the $45 million complex, located on Tom Starling Road in Fayetteville, and will complete the Burn Village portion of the 30-acre campus.
The complex already features a Technical Rescue Training campus, the only indoor swift water rescue training facility on the East Coast, and a 4-story live-burn training tower.
FTCC President Dr. Mark Sorrells pointed out the apt timing of the groundbreaking as it comes on the heels of devastation in western North Carolina from Hurricane Helene.
“What a timely investment that our community has made to enhance our public safety and to enhance our ability for emergency responders to be extremely prepared for whatever scenario they face,” Sorrells said in a press release.
This final phase of construction, which is expected to be completed in August 2025, will add:
Barnhill Contracting Co. is the project construction manager. HH Architecture is the architect.
The complex is the largest training facility of its kind in the region, providing a wide variety of specialized training experiences, and is a local and regional hub for fire and rescue personnel.
The complex is the result of a collaborative vision of local leaders and bipartisan support from local and state legislators dating back to the tenure of former FTCC President Dr. J. Larry Keen.
In 2021, Cumberland County donated the 30-acre site and an initial $10 million in funding to kickstart the effort. The project has found additional funding from state and county sources.
Keen called the complex “the premier site in the Eastern United States” for fire and rescue training.
The Technical Rescue Training campus, which opened in September 2022, includes a 26,000-square-foot building with classrooms, offices, meeting space, training simulators and an apparatus bay for three vehicles. The campus also includes a 4-story “cold” training tower, an area for confined space and trench rescue training, a grain bin/farm rescue training area, and a simulated communications tower.
The Swift Water Rescue Training Facility, opened in October 2023, contains a 140,000-gallon indoor tank equipped with 10 pumps that can create a flow of up to 7 knots. The facility allows first responders and others to train year-round in a variety of simulated conditions for rescues in floods, swift-water situations, and other water-rescue situations.
Act 2 renovations began in April 2025. CFRT will be back in their 1209 Hay St. theatre for their first production of 2027.
Pictured from left to right: Entrepreneurial Impact Awards judging panel: Sara Ballard, Venus Durant, Greg Moore, Rebecca Sappington, Derrick McArthur, Faith Hatton and John Keen. In August, I was honored to be recruited to be one of six judges
Pictured left to right: Reddick R. Mack II, Collyn Strother, Tiffany Ragin, April Mata, Veronda Jones and Lauren Falls are all featured artists for the 26:26 Exhibit on display through the end of October. Photo by GFBJ.Black Artist Forward recently b
