Welcome to Serving Locally with Me, your host, Michelle Dainis, the podcast where we spotlight service in the Longmont and surrounding communities. All right, let's connect. Hi and welcome to today's episode of Serving Locally with Me. I am here with Anthony and Lynn from the Longmont Police Range public option and I'm real excited to see what they have to share and what we're going to talk about today. So I'll just start off with saying, you know, who are you and what is the Longmont public range public option and just a quick little overview. Okay, so my name is Anthony Torres. I'm one of the range officers, chief range officer, I should say, and instructor out at the range. The range has been around for a while. It opened back in 2012. Basically what it is, it's a fire range for the law enforcement guys to train. So the way it's set up is law enforcement gets in there Monday through Friday. They do all their training to make sure they're up to criteria on all their qualifications and so forth.  So we get it Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then we open it up to the public. So what we offer from that standpoint from the public standpoint is it's an open range. You become a member, pretty cheap, pretty easy process. We do a simple background check. Depending on what package you pick, there's these different packages. It allows you so many times to come in and shoot. So we got these different packages you can pick from. And then you come in anytime from eight to four o'clock when we're open Saturday and Sundays. And it's open range.  Well, we bring a different aspect to that as well as Lynn and I being instructors, we do several classes out there. So our main class is really driven to help the city in providing CCW training, concealed carry firearms.  So that's our main class. We run one of those once a month. It's usually pretty full. They're very popular. I think we do a very good job of getting people trained up and ready to take on that quest. So that's probably our main thing. And then we'll get into some more details, but we do a lot of other classes that we offer the city. So from that standpoint, that's all we do all weekend. We make sure everybody's being safe, come in, have a good time, do some shooting. And then if you want to take it a step further, you take some of these different classes that we offer and that'll get you going in some different aspects of self-defense and so forth. That's fantastic. I like it. Give us a little background about the organization. Well, it seems like when the city was going to build the range, and it actually is some modified buildings that the city had already had that existed, that there was a decision then when the funding was allocated that said, hey, we will have this public option, right? So yes, the police train there. Yes, the police can also contract out to other organizations to train there, but also that goes to the community. So the community can shoot there. So it's not even necessarily that it's the range, right? Because we've got some classroom space that's available there. We also have a simulation or a shoot house is another name for that. So there's plenty of area there that we can do different kind of training in. So yeah, definitely we've got a team of six part-time paid range safety officers. We've got volunteers there and we'll talk more about volunteers and how we'd like some more there. But between those six range safety officers, the volunteers, and then Anthony and I are the only instructors there. Over, I'm going to say, probably the last maybe two years or so, we looked at the training that we had had as certified range safety officers, instructors, and things like that and say, hey, you know, we can, you know, there was a need. How about the women in the community? Can't we have a ladies only class? Can't we teach them a little bit more than just, you know, coming in and the basics that they would need to do for concealed carry license? So it came from a concept that was, I have my CCW now what? Now what? Right? Because people really don't know what to do from there. So with these special programs that we have, the training that we have, I think is the bridge between training in a range, and there's nothing wrong with that, but training for real life. For purpose. Yes, exactly. And let's just say right now, too, we do a lot more than just firearm stuff. So we do a lot of non-shooting, non-firearm education that we'll talk about when it's appropriate there. Awesome. That's great. So what is your focus at the public option for the range? So for the public option, really what we're looking for is providing a place for folks to come and shoot. Everybody wants to keep their skills up, whatever. If they're competitive shooting, if it's a defensive shooting, or just coming out because you like to shoot guns and have fun. So that's what we offer. That's what the range is potentially there for.   We have RSOs there to help out. If anybody doesn't understand something that may have malfunctioned or something, we have several RSOs that watch the line. So everybody's very safe, obviously, in our field. Safety is number one. And I think we have a very good team that is picking that out. We have excellent law enforcement. We have ex-modulatory, lots of different backgrounds that we bring to the table. So safety being number one, provide a safe place for the community to come and shoot guns. We take that to the second level as Lynn was stating earlier. You know, you get your CCW or you want to become better at how do I defend myself, whether it's a home in the public, whatever, you may feel that you need that training in. We can also go down that path. And that's where we put together some very good training that last, you know, a year to get just get on board and then it really kicks off. So yeah, once we get going with that, we'll take you down through the road of, you know, step by step. So how do I get better at defending myself? You know, how do I put that into a real life situation? I think that's one of the biggest things that we offer through our range, if you look at any other range. You can't, you can't. Right, right.   Our range is mobile. So what we can do is we bring out all our safety booths and open it up. It's a 100 by 50 indoor range, high tall ceilings, climate controlled. So in the winter, we can turn the heaters on and try to get it cool in the summers. But yeah, it's climate controlled. So what we got is basically a big warehouse and we can bring in mobile walls, barrels, whatever we kind of think of to put towards ourselves with the training, we can bring in cars, you know, different things that help us make our training more realistic. So for concealed carry, you can actually draw from your place of concealment. Right, right. Most ranges will not let you draw out of the holster. Yes.  You know, how do I work a wall? How do I get out of my car? Or how do I turn? Yes, exactly. Right, right. All these different aspects of training and there really is no limit. It just goes on and on and on. And that's what really gets us is and sometimes as difficult as what's the next aspect we need to teach, right? We start from crawling and walking and running and now we're sprinting and not physically, but yes, we're really moving the training on. We just did little, be a little shy with this, but she has a great following with the ladies community. So we probably have about 60 ladies currently in our class, probably about 20 of that ran through our level one class a year or so ago and they're phenomenal. The ladies from what, 21 years old to, I'm not going to say how old, I won't say it, she can, but yeah, we have a wide range in age that are coming out to protect themselves and they're very serious about, you know, I'm not going to be a victim.  Right, right, right. I'm going to help out the community, whatever their decision is and we take them through the training and, you know, shooting from a car from, you know, mimicking a store, you know, everybody's heard of some different things happening locally with king supers and so forth. We can mimic what it would be like to maybe work your way through a store, different things like that. So that training alone is invaluable. Lynn touched on what we do to make sure I don't have to pull my phone out. I don't want to be in that scenario. So we look at, right, so we start looking at situational awareness and we start looking at what we call our refuse to be a victim courses. And those are really geared toward getting out of there, recognize something's wrong and getting out before that that situation, you know, pops off. So we teach a lot of things of, you know, what to look for, non lethal forms of protection, pepper spray, bear spray, there's all kinds of different things that people will use and just anything you find in a garage as well kind of thing. But we're really trying to really focus on everything prior to me having to pull my firearm and defend myself. What can I do to keep myself out of that scenario? And that's where a lot of our training is geared towards. We just finished out, we were talking earlier, two day class on that on more situations like that that we're going to try to implement. But I think that's the most valuable part. It's not I want to pull my gun and defend the world and be Superman. I want to be able to get out of it, recognize it, move on and sadly to say read about it in the paper tomorrow kind of thing.  So I think we cover everything from, you know, again, where can I keep myself out of trouble? What happens when I get in trouble? And then we would get into the parts of what happens after that people don't think about the aftermath of if I was in an incident where I had to defend myself with lethal force, what happens after that? And people don't realize that's really where the turmoil begins. You got to get the lawyers involved, you know, you're going to be arrested, all kinds of different things may happen and all the different scenarios that can play out in that realm would give you a- As it should happen, it needs to happen. These things need to happen. So that way it's right, it's correct and everybody is taking care of what is that process. That way it's not scary and that way you know what you need to do and that's it. Yeah, because you could actually make it worse. Make it worse, right, right. I'm trying to do the right thing. I want to, you know, work with the police officers. This is what happened, but in terms of setting things up differently, you may say something that wasn't quite right in the right terms of what you meant and that's what we teach. Just protect yourself. Right, you got to protect yourself after you've defended yourself. So it's a mindset, and you need to have the right mindset too. Right. If you're going to carry, you know, so if you're going to carry any kind of a concealed firearm or whatever, you need to be thinking the right way about it. So we like to do a lot of kind of talking. And we stress it that way.  I'm going to be the hero. Usually after our classes and we go through the whole teachings and everything by the end of the day, I'll see a lot of people kind of going back and going, you know what? I might not carry in public. I might just work on it for my home defense because there's so much more that comes into your life that you really didn't realize it's going to, that's going to affect you after that incident happens. And some people are going, you know what? I don't want to deal with that. And which is perfectly great. No, yeah, exactly. You're not ready for that. Don't do it because you're going to take your families involved, your friends, your lose friends. It's amazing what's going to happen. We look at cases like, you know, Kyle Rittenhouse and stuff like that, everybody knows who he is because of the situation. You don't want to be that person. And if you don't want to be in those shoes, you've got to be careful where you go with that. So we lay it all on the table. We try to show them all the goods, the bats, everything, the aspects or everything that it entails. And we go forward with that.  It's not a toy, right? It's a tool and it needs to be treated with respect. Yes. And the more that you're educated about it, the more, yeah, you're educated, you know, and so you can do it safely. You can do it in a good manner and actually help people instead of, you know, making, making things worse. Right.   And if, again, if you do it wrong, not only could you injure somebody who wasn't part of this scenario, because again, you're going to get riled up. It could be scared. Things are adrenaline, adrenaline people running. You don't know what that situation is. Can you deal with that? And we try to stress that in our training.  Right. Get your heart rate up, get your thinking a little bit and you'll see that come out in people. And that's, again, we're now we're getting you ready to feel how do I handle myself in those conditions? How are you going to react? Right, right, right. Right, because you don't know, you don't know until it happens of what you're actually going to do. You can you can have all the ideas in your head and visualize it. But what are you actually going to do? What are you physically capable of doing? And then mentally, how is that going to affect you? Right, right. And I think that's one of the things that benefits us from being instructors that we study a lot of those cases. We work with a lot of different groups to diagnose, you know, different situations that we'll go through and we'll dissect and go, you know, what went right? What went wrong? What can we learn from this? Now, how do I take that? And I teach that to our personnel and say, Hey, this is what we learned from this situation. We need to work on that and be aware of that. So I think that's what really benefits us. And also being with the police range, even though we're kind of two separate sides of the coin, you know, law enforcement is running around all the time, you know, if I need to pick somebody's brain and, Hey, you know, what are your thoughts on this? We have unlimited resources. Is there a mix of do you guys do you guys mix up the public and the police ever with them? No, no, no, no, no, no, we're not qualified to. Oh, okay. Well, I was just so that way they can so the public can interact with the police officers. Yeah, they're around. Again, we deal more with retired law enforcement that have come out. And we'll work with those guys. They'll help us out. You know, but for the most part, it's they really like to tend to watch their cadets and things like that. We're more of for the person who's never shot a gun, never held a gun, come see us. You know, we're going to start out slow. We're going to go and write the right things to do law enforcement. They're coming out of out of the academy there. Let's go. Right. And they have a different mindset, right? So it's your regular person mindset versus a police mindset, a military mindset. So you can get all kind of content that's inside this space right on the internet. So you just need to be very careful about who you're trying to get your contact. Yeah, yeah, where that information is coming from. Yeah, we've seen that we do. We work with some ex military guys. We have a great group out of Centennial Abel Shepard. Jimmy Graham is ex Navy SEAL. He comes over and very, very good organization. These guys are amazing. I love working with them. Just good humans. But yeah, they take their training different because it's a military background. He has a different mindset than law enforcement. And then law enforcement has their mindset on how they handle things. From a civilian standpoint, we have to handle it totally different both those, right? We have to definitely watch our P's and Q's or the laws of things like that. Officers got a little more leeway, right? To defend and things. And they get a little different rules that they can play by. Ours are so strict that we really need to know where we're at and what we're doing or you're going to be the one in trouble. Very defensive.  So we like to see that. We like to train from all three because we get good things from them. But we always have to differentiate. Hey, that belongs on the military side. We're not teaching that. Absolutely. I don't need to know how to launch a grenade. Yes, yes. So for us, it makes us better instructors when we can train with all these different organizations. And we're very blessed that our team, our executive team, lets us do some of these additional trainings. We bring in groups like gun sight and some outside instructors that we can learn from and also teach the civilians. So it's open up to all the civilians. We'll open it up. We just had an instructor here, Tatiana Whitlock, out of Maine. Amazing instructor. Just overall, just incredible. She was here for two days, did a couple classes. People, both classes were sold out. It was amazing. Not only does it help us as instructors, we learn things and how to instruct better and do some things. It was great for our community because everybody just got this fantastic training that you didn't have to go travel to different locations to get all this training. We'll actually bring them here for you. Awesome. So we're looking forward to some of our groups next year. We're already working on some instructors for next year. Very cool. So who are you trying to reach with your organization? Obviously the public, right? I guess it's, I wouldn't necessarily say it had to be second amendment people, right? Because the thing that I like about the shooting sports, it's a huge wide swath. So you could be interested in things from a marksmanship and purely fun, right? Just out there plinking around with the 22 if you'd like to, where we can get more defensive. Bowling pin. And fun stuff, right? Bowling pin. There's a lot of different things. You know what bowling pin? Bowling pin, right. So we put up some kind of a wooden shelf unit and we put several bowling pins, like real bowling pins.  So you'll have one person shooting at one set of bowling pins, five of them usually, and another one. And we say go and whoever gets the bowling pins on the ground first wins. So it's a time thing. It's a skill thing. And it's just a lot of fun. Just for fun. Yeah.  We've, yeah, we started with in house. Hey, this, this sounds fun.  We need to open it up to the community. And holy cow, we're getting 2025 people coming on this event. And we took it further. We work with two other local ranges where after four months of keeping points for everybody, we'll talk our best eight shooters against each of their eight best shooters from each team. And we get together at one of the ranges. We kind of have like a little final competition thing and we'll get pizza and sodas and we'll shoot and everybody gets to meet new people. We get to meet new people from other ranges. We get to see how other people do things and stuff. So it really is that community that comes together because yeah, we connect, right? Anytime you got the baseball community or whatever, it may be there's, this is another one of those where it's not, it's not defensive. It's not tactical. It's, hey, we're just having fun and everybody likes to get together and talk and have a slice of pizza, shoot some bowling pins and have some bragging rights, right? So it's been fun. It's really grown. It's continuing to grow. Every month we'll get a couple more people joining. So it's been a lot of fun. Oh, that's great. I like that a lot. I like the knowing of how to, you know, of connecting people and with things that they're interested in. That's, and that's a hard one to nail down, to target down. What makes the work of the public option different than other similar organizations? I think it's our training. It's our level of training is, I think, unmatched between any other range and it's because of the range that we have. It is an open warehouse. We can get as creative as we want. We actually have a Sims house, which is shooting simulation rounds, which are basically like a paintball. It has like a little soap, soap pillow at the end of it. They hurt. Don't get shot by one. They do hurt. So we gear up and we'll do some really live-firing training that way. We have another part of the range is a big building. It has an open floor plan at the top and it looks like two apartments underneath when you go look from the top side down. So we can watch people. How would you maneuver if somebody broke in your front door? How would you escape? How would you get your kids and put that plan together? So we can kind of watch that and work that where other ranges you don't have that aspect at all. It's kind of, again, most ranges you're going to go to a booth, put your target down at the end and shoot it. You're not, that's not training. This is actually training. Working a room. How do I get to the door? How do I grab a child? Using those fine motor must rights and creating the memory instead of just trying to. So we have a lot of facilities. Abel Shepherd, that was one of the things he loved about our range. So we've teamed up with him. He comes down and really kicks up our training because obviously with his background, he's helped us a lot with different scenarios and stuff and how to handle different things. And again, we have many leads to a spot officers all over. So coming up with scenarios and the training is easy for us. And I think that's one of the things that separates us from everybody else is our training and the piece that, again, we're going to reiterate all through this. It's their planning prior to the incident happening. People don't realize with some of the refuse to be a victim courses and things that we do of, you know, having certain rooms.  But we never trained for an intruder, right? What do you do if there's an intruder, right? You know, and how do you go through that? And so we have courses that'll take you through of, you know, I do want to be able to get to my kids's or I have an elderly parent living with me or something. How do I get to that room and then defend myself from that room? And what do I need in that room? Cell phones and different things that people don't realize. You know, one of the secrets we always give out is any old cell phone can still dial 911. So if it's charged, it's not on a service. It could be, you know, the old flip phone from years ago, as long as you can charge it, you can keep it powered up in a closet. And when you defend yourself from that safe room, have it in there because you're going to forget your phone, right? You're not going to look for your phone. You've got my whatever I'm going to use to defend myself. I'm going to get down that hole, get to my kids's room, and I'm going to fight for my kids's room. Those are the kind of things that we all put in place and we teach you how to defend yourself before something happens and getting that mindset. So I think that's one of the things we really are very good at. We met up about two years ago at a class and just well, I got involved in a lot of women's shooting rights. Right. So that's kind of how I ended up getting in that way. You know, and it was the same thing. I was looking for more information, more opportunities to practice, you know, and then you just want more of a challenge. So I want a more of a challenge. And I've gone to several different camps and things like that, different classes and got involved with a group here that they had there. The life shoot portion was at the range. You know, so I kind of knew you from that. And then through that, yeah, I was interested in becoming a volunteer. So I was a volunteer for a while. And then it was lucky enough that they were looking to increase the number of paid part-time range safety officers that we have. So I was able to get on there. And now we were like, yeah, yeah, we're both instructors. Well, what about this? Can we do this? And yes, but actually, yeah, we have our, we're certified through the NRA to be pistol rifle concealed carry instructors. And then we just last weekend got certified through USCCA, which is the United States Concealed Carry Association to be their concealed carry and home defense fundamental instructor. So, you know, we've got a lot of content, you know, when we're looking at that and thinking, oh gosh, we can really, we can really do a lot of classes. So yeah, and again, it's not all shooting classes, right? It's, you know, what do you do before that stuff? We really want to get you out of having to defend myself. You know, I've got daughters and they were sincere little, I've been teaching them. And when you're off to college, they were very aware. It's nice to see them now when they can recognize something in Walmart go, I see this or, you know, that one's looking a little bit like this way. So there's just different things that we need to be aware of instead of just looking at my phone going through the day and then wondering what happened when somebody grabs you. So that's where we really focus is everything is before. I mean, the shooting is fun, all that kind of stuff. And it's very intense and a lot of, and it needs to be there. If that's what you're looking for, that that's really what you're looking for. Then then we give you that and we give it to you in multiple ways that are going to benefit. But we really focus on that upfront part. We really want to get people away from having to do anything with that, you know, you know, simple little things that we can teach and how to keep yourself safe and how to set things up that just make it better for you. And next thing you know, you're going to go, Hey, I don't know whatever if that would have mouth much or anything, but at least I wasn't there. Right. Exactly. What are your greatest needs? Communication out to the community. Right. So the awareness that we are there. There's information on the website that's through the city. You know, it's very limited. Yes, we've got some information on the calendar there. But sometimes things change. So, you know, sometimes it's difficult to get that, you know, to keep everything synchronized. But yeah, you know, we've got a nice membership. If the weekends work for you, that's it's it's reasonably priced, you know, and again, then you've got the access to a lot of different kind of training. And we will say you don't necessarily need to be a member of the range in order to take advantage of the training that we have, or even, you know, the bowling pins and different things like that. So come complete a waiver, we have your information in case anything happens.  So Now you're talking about, um, yeah, do you have any upcoming events or volunteer opportunities? Volunteer opportunities. Well, really in order for somebody to be a volunteer for a range safety officer volunteer, you're going to need to go through the city's process. Right. So they'll do a background check on you, and then you'll get a badge and this sort of thing. So so you're vetted through the city. But we do need volunteers. We would like to have some more volunteers. One of the things you will get trained as a volunteer. So you will take a full day class. That's how to be a certified NRA certified range safety officer. But one of I think our biggest selling points is when we have the concealed carry class, that's a full day class. And there's at least two hours of live fire there. When we're running that and next one is in two weeks, we have another class, we have 14 attendees. So we will have more than one or two range safety officers will call everybody on say, Hey, all hands on deck. And we will generally have one person in each of the lanes. So we'll break that class in half, half shooting at each time. But anybody that's there will have a range safety officer right at their elbow. And those are the volunteers. Yes. Yeah. So some will be our paid part time RSOs and some will be the volunteers. Volunteers get trained just like our regular say range safety officers. So I look at that. And I think that's reflected in a lot of the evaluations that we get. People feel very safe with us. And that makes me feel good. It makes me feel like it's yeah, it's right. It's not safety two or three, safety number one, safety third, fun, yeah, fun, maybe, you know, two or three or so. So yeah, no events coming up though, not specific for that. But we run, but you're 12. Yeah, almost. I mean, between he and I, we're running like 12 events every month. You know, whether it's a ladies level one, a ladies level one and a half, a ladies level two class, firearm one, firearm two, carbine two. Actually next month, we are restarting a ladies level one class. So if there was a lady who had a little bit of experience or had taken a CCW already, you know, had had that class, but she's looking now what do I do now? Well, you can come in and join us. And it is a program, right? Because it's not just a onesie twosie. So we will come you will meet with us every month and we will spend two and a half to three hours with you. There'll be a portion of the class that's in the classroom. Nice, calm, right? No noise. We'll be in there, present the topics, remind you of what you learned before.  Yep. Let's go pull your bag out of the car. Let's go into the range. And then we're ready on the range to go and then to actually hands on do what you just learned in that class. Right. And especially for females being that I am one, I know that we can draw from many places depending on just what we want to wear. So do you guys focus on that? Yeah, and that's another thing. So again, even when we have these women's classes, it's not always all the time on the range. So we'll have the time and within the next couple months, we'll have a section and it'll be like after we shoot that we'll go reconvene in the classroom and say, Okay, well, let's talk about all these different ways that that a woman can carry concealed, you know, because a lot of times they just don't realize all the options that are available. So if we can, you know, guide them to a particular brand or style or something like that that we think is more reasonable, yeah, then we'll do that. That's awesome. And the pros and cons of that. Absolutely.  And I'm like, Well, this is why you should or should not. All right, because there's the theoretical process and then there's the actual what if you're sitting at the table at a restaurant that's going to be different from depending on where it's located, different things. So, you know, we look at the whole thing where some folks that are not deep into it will think, Hey, that's if I carry there, then I'm fine. Well, depends on what situation you're in. I mean, I want to move it. I might do different things, whatever. So we look at it the whole way through and she does a great job with the ladies class. Again, we usually start those very satisfied. We usually start those in January. We've got such a big request again with brand new shooters and, you know, taking off what you said, this is open to any lady, if you've never held a gun, nothing, no zero experience. They're actually the ones we want because they're easiest to teach. They really are. I don't have to break bad habits. But you have a promise to practice, right? Just come to the class. You've got to, you know, make a commitment, honestly. And that's what we say. So if somebody, you know, reached out and said, Hey, I'm interested in this, I'd say, Okay, well, here's the schedule. If you can make the schedule or as good as you can, you know, because we do operate under the thought process. Nobody's going to get left behind. So if for some reason you had to miss a September class, we will work with you because we can actually do, you know, individual private lessons on the range and we will, right?  And then that makes it safer for everybody because everybody's doing the same thing at the same level. Yes. So we'll all drag each other, you know, through the process, but everybody will, will, you'll get all the content. I love the idea of having it for females because, you know, having the husband or the boyfriend teach you can get, can get messy. My brother was the hunting, the hunting lead at Sportsman's Warehouse.  And he's like, you should really have anybody else. We've had gals come in that, yes, they never touched a gun. And we might say, you know, we have introductions in the beginning of the concealed carry class. Oh, well, you know, what's your experience level? What did you bring? Well, I don't know. I don't even know. Yeah, I don't even know what it is. I bought it last night. I bought it last night. I'm here today. Perfect. Exactly what we want. I like it. Bring them in. I can show you things. Strike from the get-go and you're good to go.  Let's just go it that way.  It's great. It's the guys that are pre-military. I'm shot when I was a kid with dad and so forth. They're the ones where I have to fix that. It's a lot more work. But once you show them by changing something and how it works, then they're like, oh, that does work. So much better. And as this light comes on and off they go, again, she does such a good job with the ladies. We took what they've been in there about a year and a half from our first group, two years. And we've gotten them where they shoot one-handed. They can put a tourniquet on. They can do certain things and move and shoot.  These are ladies that had never touched a gun. Yeah, they'll be the first to tell you. The very first one, first class was, here's how you hold it. Here's how to pull it one round in the magazine. Because they were putting it backwards and like, okay, this is going to be a long day. But you look at them a year and a half later and you're like, oh my Lord. And I think that is one of the things that I think that gets both of us is knowing that you're helping somebody want to defend themselves to the confidence they now display when they go through life, those types of things, that empowerment that they get from this. And it's amazing watching some of the ladies, you know, develop over this year or two year program has been incredible. So that's what we really get out of it is giving back to the community, whether it be the non-shooting portion, which is, again, the most important part, come to the refuse to be victim classes. There's no shooting or anything. And then if you do want to get to that part where I feel I want to defend myself in a different way, we can take you there as well. That's awesome. I love it. Full spectrum. Yeah. We have the tactical med class coming up. We don't have a schedule yet. We're working on the calendars because an outsourced source comes in and does that for us. It's a co-instructor of ours. He's not tied to the range, but he comes in and he'll teach tactical, what we call tactical med. Really, it's a med class that anybody should take. And I always say, please ladies come in and take that because us as men are horrible. We're always falling out of the tree with a chainsaw or something. So we need you guys know how to save us. But yeah, it's tourniquets. It's blood packing.  Sun crashed on the bike and there's a bone sticking out. It's anything that you can help. It's the good Samaritan rules. At least stop bleeding or get a heart going or whatever those things are. Is it a certification class? It's not a certified class. We're going to work on that on the future with a TCCC program that comes out. They're definitely more intense and more critical. But this is something that for one day of class for, and I can't even remember what we charged for that, you come out for a day and it's great training. Hands-on. Hands-on. We teach you all kinds of, we break out all kinds of med kits. Well, that's great too, that it's hands-on. Because that's how you really learn things. You can read all about it and watch videos, but man to actually physically do it, man that sticks with you. I could put a tourniquet on somebody else or do something, but then you're like, okay, how do I get this darn thing on myself one-handed, right? Well, that's going to be September with any of our level one classes, whether it's the co-ed class or the ladies only. September is, you know, tourniquets. So it's tourniquet. So how do you put a tourniquet? Let's just say, right, you would get shot in the arm. How do you get a tourniquet on that arm so you don't bleed out? And then how do you continue the gunfight and protect yourself with one hand? How do you deal with that?  If you got a car wrecked yourself, we all carry tourniquets and after this class like that, you're like, okay, I need one in my car. I need one at home. I need one in the RV. And you know, you got these things laying around like anything, right? Well, they won't go bad. But you got to learn how to put it on yourself because if I was in the accident and I got hurt and my arm was bleeding out, how do I put that? So it really doesn't tell you always back. We do a lot with the guns, but it really is more of, I like to look at is if something would happen camping, hunting, you know, our hunters are out there, you know, we were always out there and I'll ask my guys to go hunting. And there's maybe two of us that have med kits.  How are you going to save yourself? Those are the things that could call somebody. No, not out there.  So those are the things that we really put a lot of focuses on our T triple C classes. That's great. Hands on. I like the hands. Yeah, and that's fantastic. It's a great class. Something that's that's different also. So how can people connect and contact and find out more about the Longmont Police Range public option? You can actually go out to the Longmont city websites. If you put in a Longmont Fire Range or training center, that should get you down to the main page. And there you should list out phone numbers, contacts that you get a hold of us. Calendar on there. There's a calendar on there that you can see upcoming events and so forth. The hard part with the city is it takes us so long to get things through the channels to get things changed. If I got to cancel a class this Saturday, they're not going to know about it by the time. So we also double back off of my personal website. T three firearms training LLC. That way we can post it right now. Hey, I got two more openings for this Saturday or I got to cancel Saturday, whatever the information that we need to get out. We go Facebook and the place or the website off of mine. Just easier for us to do that way that way we can communicate better with our with our folks. We get a lot of emails from you know range support at longmont colorado.gov. So again, that's that's an easy way to get a hold of us. And I'll have everything as always in the QR code. It'll be there in the link tree. And then in the description, I'll have everything listed there is clickable things also. So yeah, clickable. A clickable link. Right. That's what it's called. Operational link or whatever. Yep. Live clickable. You don't have an Instagram then yet. Oh, we do. Yeah. But for our own, not necessarily representing the public, right? So we have our own because we wish going on. We each have our own training business. Awesome. Yeah, we all have our own business, but we work for this. Yeah, is there anything else you'd like to add to the conversation that you feel like we missed or you just feel passionate that you want to talk about? Well, we're more than just shooting. I think that's the most important thing is that we really want to make sure that people are protected. Protect yourself. When seconds count, you know, you'll hear this thing that says the police are coming, right? But you might need to to do something on your own and maybe and help them out. Yes. In the process. I think our training is top notch from, like I said, having fun with a firearm, having being safe, whatever it may be, we can teach you that all the non-engagement things. You were just hitting on that, you know, what if the cops are coming? How do you make yourself that I'm not the bad guy? They don't know what they don't know what's happening. They're coming around the corner and they just got to call it. Exactly. How can we help you have a gun? What is what's going to happen? Guess what's going to happen when you're driving a corner, right? So there's different things that we can help ourselves out. And that's kind of that whole spectrum that we go through. We try not to leave anything out in any of the training that we can help make it safer for everybody, not only a lot of enforcement for the person, everybody that's there. How do I make that better?  And next thing you know, two years later, you'd feel like, oh, I should be able to have this down in a year. Two years later, you're still going on. There's so much to learn. It is a process. It's a lifestyle. People don't get it. But my biggest thing and what I like is watching Lynn is our ladies program is huge. I can get enough of watching the ladies train, putting them through training and how they just soak everything up.  Get a hold of us. That's a great time right now is perfect. Where are you guys located? I'll put the address on because it's funny because our race car shop is within walking distance. My husband works within walking distance. We drive past. Nobody knows where they are. You guys are hidden. Where is this jam at? My first trip, yeah, I was on the opposite side of the road on a dirt road. I said, this can't be right. This can't be right. It is hidden. It is tucked back right off of 119. The best way I can say it, there's the fire station there. Mountain View Fire on the corner. It's the only one on 119 right before you get to the river going east. We're right behind it. There's the big, huge tower. Oh, it's the tower. It's all about the tower. It's all about the tower right underneath that tower. Great facility. Like I said, we have classrooms, shootouts, big range, lots going on there.  It's really big for the canine stuff. And we do a lot of fundraising for the canine unit. We've gotten to know all the guys over there real well. They'll come out. Anytime we ask, hey, bring the dogs out, do a display. Oh, they're there. We just had the open house. We had dog display a couple of times during the day to let them go run around, show how they take people down and stuff like that. So we do a lot of stuff with the canine unit. We raised enough money last year. I think it was they were looking, they had a bunch of new dogs and they have to fundraise most of their stuff after the grants have been fulfilled. Divide the protective vests. Yes, yes. They would get a catalog of vests that can stop rounds and knives and things like that. And I think we purchased two or three of those through our group. That was great. I know we have the canine in one of my, when we were at the location. So I haven't been able to listen to it yet, but I know mom was there and they were really impressed with that and thought that was awesome too. And again, we work with a lot of folks. A lot of local companies, people don't realize Lama is kind of a hotbed for firearms distribution stuff. People are making all kinds of different parts and things like that. And there's these little companies that nobody knows about. And we've been digging them up, bringing them out, and they've come to our open house that day. So we had booths, we had all kinds of things going on, food vendors and stuff like that. It was a great day where we came and shop for free. My son was there. I was not there. We're missed. I'm so sad. But yeah, it sounded amazing. So that's, I can't wait till next, the next thing that you do. It's getting better. I'll be there next year. We do a lot of work with them, 4-H. We do a lot of work with 4-H kids. So we open up a range. Younger kiddos that, you know, can't, because we do have an age, you know, the lower age that you're able to shoot there. You gotta be 10. You gotta be 10 with an adult. But 4-H shooting sports for Boulder County shoots with us. And they have honored us too. We've gone to several of their awards dinners, you know, that are at the fairgrounds. And that's very satisfying too.  Yes. Very safe. It's a great program. Yes, exactly. So that'd be another resource. I would, you know, love to be able to give them a plug and point people their way. So 4-H, it's a good group who works over there. That's all I can think I can do. I can't even tell you how many classes we teach a year. It's phenomenal that we can get that much during the weekend. Trying to keep track every month, you know, and how many people go through. I think last year, just for the concealed carry class, we had 110 students. Wow. So that's pretty good. You know, that's a good 10 people a class. Right. And we limit that class. We had a ton of new members, you know, ton of new members last year. So membership is good. We utilize the rec track system also so you can reserve your lane at the range.  And that was sort of a remnant of COVID-19 closure, you know, where we were, we were close for a while. We opened back up. We had our, you know, cleaning routines that we went through in the range, but it is helpful when we know that you're coming. So that's good. So we don't have, you know, many people waiting at the door to come. Right. Well, thank you guys so much for coming in. And I know it's been trying to thank you and everything to get you guys here. But thanks for being my first two people for me. Thanks for having us. I think it was awesome. And I really appreciate you guys coming out and doing this. And I appreciate all that you guys do. And I'm really looking forward to what you guys do in the future and what I can do with you guys because come on out, because this is something that is near and dear to me and my family to, you know, that we don't have a fear of guns. We don't treat it as the enemy. It is a tool to help us and to protect our community and to serve our community. And the education piece behind that is critical for that. That's what needs to happen. And I think that that's what's lacking. And then, you know, when things happen, you know, just to not have that fear mentality that if something were to happen and I were there, what would I be able to do? How do I protect my kids? How do I protect myself? How do I protect other members of my community that maybe can't? And so for me, this is a very personal topic for me. And I just, I appreciate you guys. No, thank you. We're just trying to get the word out there. So if somebody's looking to get into that and that's your passion or something you want to even look into that we're there. If you have questions, get educated. Just get educated. Just a little bit. Yep. Yep. So you can have just the terminology would help. And we post a lot of stuff on Facebook that way.   We're always just throwing content out there to remind people. These are the things. Yeah, right. It's just next door. There's a lot of stuff there. We do a lot of, we do a lot of stuff on next door. We're trying to get word about that way. They're very to a receiving. So it's nice. Nice to work with them. Yeah. So yeah, thanks you guys. I appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you to my guests, my listeners and my supporters serving together. We can strengthen our community. Please like and subscribe. Do all those other things. You know, you got to do them because that's the easiest way that you can serve right now. All right. Now go connect with others and be a blessing.


Hello, and welcome to an update on ACTIE. EDUCAUSE is Advanced Core Technologies Initiative and some examples of its recent work. I'm Greg Jackson, Vice President at EDUCAUSE, and I oversee ACTIE. We launched ACTIE in the fall of 2010 to provide a venue for staff from member colleges and universities to gather around specific technology challenges for the future. The goal was to bring collective wisdom and experience to bear on these challenges, especially by learning from the work and thinking of pioneers. We hoped to smooth technological progress. ACTIE's charter members included over 60 member institutions from 29 states. There are currently five active working groups focusing on cyber infrastructure, communication and mobility, data management, web frameworks, and optimization. Rather than give you overviews of all five groups, let me share with you a bit about two recent projects. First, communications technologies, the focus of the ACTIE communication, collaboration, and mobility working group, which we call CCM for short. CCM did a survey last fall on integrated communications technology, looking at three main areas, voice platforms and services, integration with other platforms, and opinions and forecasts. A surprise emerged. Here is the surprise. Many colleges thought they were done thinking about traditional phones, but they may need to think again. Responding to questions about voice over IP, about a third of the survey respondents said that they weren't looking to move to VoIP for another two years. Another 16% didn't have it in their plans at all. That is extrapolating a bit. Half of all colleges and universities may remain dependent on traditional systems at least two years into the future. And that may prove to be a problem, because there's also widespread skepticism that key providers of traditional campus scale telephone systems will still be in the business very long. Beyond the traditional phone findings, CCM found that there were many impediments and considerable ambiguity around two other important issues, cloud-based communication services and the importance of location services within campus networks. Moving from campus to cloud services and from wired to wireless networking are clearly important trends, but the optimal path remains hard to discern. Second, let's talk about cyber infrastructure, a term often used to describe high-performance technology that is necessary for advanced research and educational applications. ACTI's Campus Cyber Infrastructure Group, CCI, works in this domain. CCI's White Paper, What's Next for Campus Cyber Infrastructure, responds to a recent series of NSF reports on national cyber infrastructure. The White Paper analyzes the role of campus cyber infrastructure in six major CI areas and recommends directions for effective leadership. For instance, when looking at the NSF report on data and visualization, the paper points out that national trends in data mining, machine learning, and visualization will in due course require campuses to provide infrastructure well beyond that currently available, since, and I quote, the campus data infrastructure will be a foundational component for big data analytics. The CCI White Paper makes clear that campus cyber infrastructure has an intricate and important relationship to national cyber infrastructure and provides extensive detail why this is so. It's a useful read for any school that is concerned with the future of research and instructional support on our campuses. Several other ACTI projects are moving forward and in some cases are nearing publication. We're always thinking about new projects too. To keep up on the latest and especially to get involved, visit the ACTI website, write or call. ACTI participants will meet at the EDUCAUS annual conference this fall and again in the spring at the 2013 ACTI annual meeting. Please join us.