JACKSON, Wyo. — A fire station north of town is one step closer to coming to fruition after the Teton County Board of County Commissioners (BCC) approved a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Friends of Gros Ventre Fire Station (FGVFS) on Tuesday.
The MOU, which was passed unanimously by the BCC (with Commissioner Len Carlman absent), is a nonbinding agreement that serves to establish the terms and conditions by which FGVFS will donate funds for the construction of Fire Station 8. The station is set to be built at 947 Sandcherry Way, a parcel just off North Spring Gulch Road that is currently owned by Teton County. FGVFS has committed to raising and donating $8 million for the planning, design, permitting and construction of the fire station.
FGVFS is a nonprofit that was formed to spearhead the private-public effort, and to accelerate the building and operation of a fire station north of town. Since 2023, the initiative has been led by three directors: Rocky Barber, Jim Ramo, and Joe Wenger. According to a press release from Teton County, the future fire station will cover neighborhoods north of the Fish Hatchery, north of Spring Creek Resort, and east to Kelly.
“We’ve been working with the County back and forth, and back and forth,” Ramo told Buckrail. “So for us, it’s really exciting to get this done. Finally. It’s been kind of a two-step process. This is the first step; the second step is to raise the money.”
Barber noted that the third step will be to eventually construct the station. FGVFS intends to raise and donate the expected $8 million for the construction, and the organization will make “reasonable efforts to secure funding or pledges” beyond construction funds to go toward the initial operational costs, per the MOU. Teton County will be responsible for any construction costs exceeding $8 million. A potential timeline states that construction could begin as early as 2027, with operations beginning in 2029.
Commissioner Luther Propst explained to Buckrail that past strategic planning on fire priorities has identified upgrades to the Wilson and Hoback fire stations as higher priority than a station north of town. That could be attributed to the fact that a majority of land north of town is either National Park Service (NPS) or U.S. Forest Service (USFS) land, not private residential. Wilson and Hoback fire stations were both approved to receive Specific Purpose Excise Tax (SPET) funds in 2022. The FGVFS website states that Fire Station 8 would likely fall onto the priority list below Wilson, Hoback and Alta, making it to the top of the list in the late 2030s. For reasons relating to fire and home insurance costs, as well as long wait times for fire and EMT responses, FGVFS was created to accelerate the process.
Propst commends the dedication of FGVFS: “I’m just delighted,” he said. “What a demonstration of commitment to community.”
The MOU states that Station 8 could initially be staffed by volunteers when it opens, but permanent staffing by full-time employees is the intention and primary objective. Jackson Hole Fire/EMS along with Teton County will be tasked with determining when and how to implement full-time staffing at the station. Fire Chief Mike Moyer told Buckrail that the expected operational costs for a volunteer station would tally about $104,800 annually. That includes a $5,000-per-volunteer cost for 10 volunteers to receive stipends, uniforms, insurance, and physical fitness tests and checkups. The rest of that annual total would go toward utilities, snowplowing and more. The cost to run the station with full-time staff could run upwards of $1.1 million per year.
“As far as the staffing, we would be primarily looking to recruit volunteers that live in that area,” Moyer said. “We do have a couple of volunteers up in that area now that are attached to Station 1 downtown because that’s the closest station. So those folks would transition to Station 8. We sort of have a plan to recruit over the next couple of years — recruit and train volunteers from that neighborhood, from that part of the county, to create that base population of volunteers.”
Moyer said there are opportunities for expanded partnerships as the blueprint moves forward. JH Fire/EMS already works across jurisdictional boundaries quite often with both the NPS and the USFS. The fire department currently has 78 volunteers in Teton County and 46 full-time staff including 30 operational firefighters.
Also at the BCC meeting, Commissioners passed a one-year extension of the 2025 Agreement for Fire and Emergency Medical Services, which allows the Town of Jackson and Teton County to jointly operate JH Fire/EMS. The agreement has been extended in one-year increments since 2024, while a fully revised version — expected later this year — is being created.
