Year-round facility helps train crews

WASILLA — Ken Peltier thinks he’s solved one of the major problems that face instructors who want to teach heavy equipment operators.

Like the industries it serves, the school used to shut down each winter. Not anymore. Come December, the trust will have a 16,000-square-foot building in which to train. Students will be able to run bulldozers and backhoes and loaders inside. They’ll even be able to simulate paving using wet sand and dig trenches to practice trench work at the new facility on Cunningham Road, off Palmer Fishhook near Palmer.

“I don’t want to use the word ‘sandbox,’ but it really kind of is,” said Peltier, administrator for the Alaska Operating Engineers/Employers Training Trust, which trains heavy equipment operators and mechanics.

And, he said if that idea sounds crazy to you, you’re not the first.

“I got a lot of funny looks down the table when I first brought it up,” he said of the board meeting when he first proposed the arena.

Most everyone seemed to think it would cost an arm and a leg to heat, Peltier said. And those people were right. It probably would. But Peltier said the secret is that the building doesn’t have to have heat. All the space needs is to be enclosed.

“It’s not frozen because the frost and the moisture can’t get to it,” he said.

Training schools that run similar facilities in other northern states have proven that a roof will do. Despite that, Peltier said, no one else in Alaska has built one.

“No state needs this more than us,” he said.

The facility officially broke ground Thursday, but there’s been work ongoing at the site for some time. An apprenticeship class built the road to the facility and laid down pads for the buildings. Peltier said that in addition to the training arena there will be a shop with equipment bays and welding bays. There will also be a third building with classrooms and offices.

Eventually, the trust intends to move out of its current facility just off the Palmer-Wasilla Highway and into this new one. It will sell the old one, but Peltier said he’s only secured two thirds of the funding he needs. To get those classrooms and offices he’s going to need to find some more funding.

The project kind of brings Peltier full circle. While he’s a fairly well-known musician in his off hours, for his day job Peltier is a heavy equipment operator. He went through the first training program at the current facility, and now he’s helping run the program and build the new facility.

“I just couldn’t be prouder,” he said.

The Alaska Operating Engineers/Employers Training Trust is a joint effort of the Local 302 International Union of Operating Engineers and the Alaska Chapter of Associated General Contractors of America.

Peltier said the training program brings students to the Valley from all over the state. More than 330 potential students apply each year and between 30 and 40 are selected to attend.

“It’s very competitive and we take it very seriously,” he said. “It’s not a 30-day deal where you pay your fee we give you a certificate and pat you on the back say good luck.”

The program includes 12 weeks of classroom training and then 6,000 hours of on-the-job training, at which someone from the school will be keeping an eye on them.

Despite starting 30-40 careers each year, Peltier said the school has somehow managed to keep a low profile locally.

“It’s kind of a well-kept secret,” he said. Between food and lodging for students brought in from other communities, not to mention utility bills on the facility, “We put $850,000 a year into the Valley.”

Which, he said, is something people engaged in the kind of anti-union agitating he’s hearing more and more of lately should keep in mind.

“Local 302, out here we’re super involved in training Alaskans,” Peltier said. “It’s for real. It’s not a campaign.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.