The Guardian Center has taken giant steps toward building a large homeland security training facility in Washington and Wilkes County.

The company has become very focused on a particular client base with a very specific set of missions, Guardian Center CEO Geoff Burkart said, and he recently brought a group of homeland security and military leaders here for a tour of the two proposed sites to show them how his facility could supply their need for sharply focused training.

“They were very impressed,” he said. “They were able to get their feet on the ground and see just what we’re planning and the venues where we’re going to do it.”

The new direction is training for domestic disaster response. “We continue to fall over ourselves in the first hours, days, and weeks of a disaster response,” Burkart said, “and The Guardian Center is being designed to help test those plans until we get it right. I think we have a strong message, strong support, and we’ve been fortunate enough to make some great contacts among people who are really trying to make sure we don’t shoot ourselves in the foot every time we have a major disaster in this country.”

The center will offer training focused on the national domestic mission under the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA, and the U.S. Northern Command, he said. “So we asked certain specialized emergency response elements of the Georgia National Guard, and people from FEMA, the Georgia Emergency Management Agency to come have a look at our concept.”

The visitors looked over the Danburg Road site and the former school property on Gordon Street in Washington by helicopter. “We asked [Wilkes County Commission Chairman] Sam Moore to host the group at the main campus property, and asked Mayor Willie Burns to host the group on the old school property, and we gave a presentation on what we had planned for each site. We feel like they were very impressed with what we had shown them, and with the cooperation we’ve gotten from the county and city leaders.”

The visit gave Burkart an opportunity to reemphasize that the center is being financed with all privatesector investments. “We don’t want any taxpayer money for the people who build this thing out,” he said. “In September, I travel to New York to talk to investors, and we have investors to talk to in Chicago and Los Angeles, too. We continue to get closer. I’m much more confident of full funding now.”

Burkart said that in the two years he has been working with Wilkes County to bring The Guardian Center to reality, he has come to appreciate and rely on local leaders. “Sam Moore, Ashley Barnett at the Chamber, Mayor Burns, everybody has been working hard to bring us here, and we’re anxious to get to work with Wilkes County people and resources out front. We’re looking forward to building something great here.”