GNTC campus in Rockmart seeks to setup trucking school
Grant funds from Appalachian Regional Commission, USDA sought to pay for paving costs
Georgia Northwestern Technical College ( GNTC) in Polk County is looking for help from local governments and organizations in bringing a new program to the campus in the coming years.
Polk County campus manager April Welch and Samatha Bishop, GNTC grant assistant, asked for initial support from the Polk County Board of Commissioners earlier in the month in opening stages of planning a truck driving school for the Rockmart-based campus.
Ideally situated next to the Highway 101 Industrial Park, the campus seeks to use property on Marquette Road next to the Inman Solar-run solar farm, paving over 3 to 4 acres of land to allow for plenty of space for drivers to learn how to operate 18-wheelers.
“Locating the school at our campus would fill an … need not only in our own county, but in surrounding areas such as Bartow, Floyd, Haralson and Paulding counties,” Welch said during a presentation to the county commission on June 6.
Right now Welch has gotten five letters of support from local governments and organizations, and seeks more from around the area as the college seeks grant
funds to pay for the work to clear and pave the needed driving area.
In order to get grant money from the Appalachian Regional Commission for $300,000 and a U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Business Development Grant for $99,999, the college will need help from governments like Polk County with in-kind donations, such as what Welch seeks to have before applying for the grant, a guarantee that the paving work can be done for only the cost of the materials.
Both grants are due in early 2017, Welch said.
She said the organization can get the funds needed to pay for materials, but needs the equipment and manpower to complete the paving project if the time comes.
For now, they’ll be working to secure the grants and it would be at least two years before any work can get started, Welch said.
County manager Matt Denton said before any work could proceed on the project, he’d have to come up with a cost estimate of how much in-kind matching use of equipment and manpower would be incurred on the county through participating.
Welch said she felt the addition of a trucking school at the Polk County campus would have numerous benefits not only locally, but around the region. Currently, GNTC only has a truck driving school at their Walker County campus.
She said an expected increase in the number of positions open for commercial truck drivers will mean the school will be well-placed to fill those growth needs – as much as 6 percent in the coming years – with graduates ready to drive.
“GNTC is excited to contribute to the strength of the economic development in our region, and the commercial truck driving program should be a contributing factor to the growth of the industry in our area,” Welch said.
The likelihood of getting the grant money to put the school in place is also greater because of support from Governor Nathan Deal in promoting commercial driving in the area, Welch explained.
“The CDL (Commercial Drivers Licence) program is on the list of high demand career initiatives put forth by Gov. Deal, and one of the benefits of that is that 100 percent of the tuition is paid by the HOPE grant program,” she said. “We want to be ahead of the curve in meeting the demand for commercial drivers in our area.”