State Building Commission approves West Tennessee flood training "WETT" center at Lone Oaks Farm

The State Building Commission approved a revision in scope and authorized the early-design phase for a Water Education and Training Center (WETT Center) proposed for Lone Oaks Farm in Hardeman County.

TDEC Deputy Commissioner and chief of staff Karen Simo presented the item on behalf of the West Tennessee River Basin Authority, and Dusty Mays of Kimley Horn and Associates led the design presentation. Mays said the facility will include three wings (exhibit, education and water treatment), dual flumes for flood simulation—a "sandbox" for applied learning with soil media and a swift-water flume for rescue training—and a settling pond and pump system that routes water under the building to serve the flumes.

Mays described the building as an applied learning facility that will host fabrication-style, hands-on exercises, classroom seminars and a simulator room that allows trainees to operate virtual equipment before testing it in the field. He said the building is designed with open-air breezeways, an oculus to convey rainwater into a permeable capture surface and an interactive water display that illustrates water movement across Tennessee's divisions.

Commission questions focused on classroom size, throughput and operational funding. In response, Mays said seminar rooms would accommodate "small class sizes" and later quantified that as roughly "30 or 40 people" for a seminar room; David Blackwood, director of the West Tennessee River Basin Authority, said the facility could move "60, 90 people" through the site and described the facility as intended to be "a regional facility" and "a Tennessee facility." Blackwood also said training would be fee-based and that the facility is planned to be fully self-sufficient in operations.

Project siting details presented included a location on Lone Oaks Farm north of a nearby lake and adjacent to the newly constructed 4-H and youth STEM center. The presentation described the Lone Oaks campus as roughly 1,200 acres and said plans exist for on-site or nearby lodging; the project team said lodging options on the Lone Oaks campus are available within roughly 15 minutes.

Schedule information presented to the commission indicated a planned construction start in October of this year with a substantial completion date in April 2027. During discussion, commissioners and state financial officers raised questions about interagency mutual-aid training and whether the facility size and business plan would be sufficient; the project team said they had consulted emergency response groups and developed a business plan intended to support operations without state operational funding.

The commission approved the revision and early-design authorization by voice vote. No individual roll-call vote tally was recorded in the transcript.