Warwick Fire Department to use building at former prison for training

WARWICK — Now the works begins.

Members of the all volunteer Warwick Fire Department will soon have the job of cleaning out and renovating a recently acquired maintenance garage building at the former Mid-Orange Correctional site.

The Town of Warwick has approved the 6,500-square-foot building for use by the fire department as a training facility to, for example, conduct "bail-out" drills, in which the firefighters use bail-out rope packs to propel off a building if they need to escape from a window.

According to Fire Commission Chairman Frank Corkum, that drill is one of the annual requirements for each firefighter, which, until now, meant traveling to the Division of Fire Services training facility in New Hampton.

"This building is a great asset," said Corkum. "It allows us to train in our own town and on our own schedule."

Fire Chief John Batz added that the building can also be used to train firefighters in the use of Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA) in a smoke-filled room, where a maze with obstacles has been constructed to add difficulty to finding your way about, a situation one might encounter in an actual fire.

Although training is a priority use for the building at this time, all ideas are welcome. And in the future, they plan to station fire fighting apparatus on the property to save time responding to emergencies in the rapidly developing industrial site or at nearby homes.

In 2011, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that the Mid-Orange Correctional Facility in Warwick was on its list of seven state prisons to be shut down to save money.

And in 2014, the state approved the transfer of the 733-acre property at the former correctional facility to the Warwick Valley Local Development Corporation and the Town of Warwick.

Shortly afterwards Joe Walter, fire commission chairman at that time, spearheaded the plan to acquire the building for use as a training facility.

In more recent times, Town of Warwick Deputy Supervisor James Gerstner, who is also a past chief of the Warwick Fire Department, acted as a liaison between the town and the fire department to iron out details such as insurance requirements and so forth to successfully complete the transaction.

"The town," said Supervisor Michael Sweeton, "is thrilled that we were able to offer the maintenance garage at the former Mid-Orange Correctional Facility to the Warwick Fire Department as a training facility for its volunteer members. We in Warwick are lucky to have strong volunteer emergency services organizations such as the Warwick Fire Department, which are committed to the extensive training required to be prepared to protect our residents. Having this facility for drills will keep them at the pinnacle of their profession."

- Roger Gavan