(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa National Guard’s new readiness center on the southern edge of West Des Moines will provide soldiers and the public some modern amenities. Guard Lieutenant Colonel Jared Gledhill
says soldiers in the 21-68th Transportation Company can tune up their trucks on site. “We have a brand new maintenance facility so that truck company has maintainers that are part of it and they’ll be able to maintain most of their fleet here on their drill weekends and then the stuff that they can’t do will actually bring mechanics from Camp Dodge where we have a large maintenance facility that supports us on the full time side,” Gledhill says. He says each of the building’s classrooms has modern audiovisual equipment.

“The modern T-V screens, projection capabilities that are all in these classrooms, it’s going to make a world of difference when we’re doing some of our administrative things,” he says. “And then for the community to be able to come in and use some of these same amenities when they want to use this.” The 1-168th Infantry Company is also headquartered there, and both Guard Units will be able to do their weapons training. “Whether it’s the infantry guys or the truckers, they’re able to train on their assigned weapon systems right here, no live fire, no nothing, but in a simulated environment. It’s all built in, it’s all part of this building,” he says. Gledhill says the central location makes it easy for guard members across the state to get to the facility. And he says the 21-68th Transportation Company will have a fast response for missions like the ones they conducted during the pandemic.

“They were one of the units that responded. We brought them down from the Siouxland area to be able to support the state response with moving P-P-E to all 99 counties, and we ran them out of Camp Dodge,” Gledhill says. “With them right here, we can be able to respond by moving, whether it’s state support to a spot or federal support in the event of a natural disaster. ”

The facility was officially opened with a ribbon cutting at the end of last week.