Commission votes 3-2 to waive fees at new pool for military training

Posted on April 2, 2025 by Jenn Rowell

City Commissioners voted 3-2 during their April 1 meeting to waive fees for military training at the city’s new indoor aquatic facility.

The waiver is subject to annual written training schedules being submitted by the Montana Air National Guard and Malmstrom Air Force Base.

The Sheels Aim High Big Sky Aquatics and Recreation Center opened last summer and was funded with $10 million from a U.S. Defense Department grant and a $10 million match from the city.

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The city partnered with Malmstrom in 2020 to apply for the U.S. Defense Department grant of $10 million, but in city documents, discussions and stories by The Electric dating to 2020, the city consistently said the military would pay user fees, as would community users.

Earlier this year, Malmstrom’s commander requested that their training fees be waived when using the facility, according to City Manager Greg Doyon.

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During the April 1 meeting, Doyon said, “this has been an interesting journey.”

He said the military provided training calendars and that the Malmstrom commander verbally asked him to waive the fees for military training at the facility.

Doyon said he initially sent a letter stating the city would not waive fees, but Malmstrom officials “were politely persistent.”

In a Feb. 28 memo to commissioners, Doyon wrote there was no formal promise to waive fees and retired Malmstrom commander Jennifer Reeves said the “issue likely ended up in the ‘assumption pile’ with military leadership believing the facility would be accessible without cost.”

Doyon said during the April 1 meeting that he could see how formal discussion of training fees was missed with multiple parties involved in the development of the facility and DOD grant process, the quick timeline, appeal of the design contract award and leadership changeover at both military installations.

In March 2024, the commission approved the fee structure for the new aquatic facility.

During a December 2023 commission work session, Commissioner Rick Tryon asked city staff if military members and their families would pay the same rates as city residents.

In response, Park and Recreation Director Steve Herrig said that there’s always some justifications for a military discount, but, “I don’t know that we’ve fully answered yet.”

During that work session, Herrig told commissioners that military will pay fees to use the facility for training.

During a February 2021 neighborhood council meeting about the design of the building and location within Lions Park, then deputy Park and Rec director Patty Reardon said that they were developing fees with a goal of making it an affordable community facility and that fees would be assessed to military users.

In October 2020, when city commissioner approved a resolution to issue bonds to finance construction of the facility, the staff report stated that the city would be required to manage, operate and maintain the facility without additional financial support from the Air Force, aside from standard user fees or partnership agreements.

While giving a regular update to commissioners at the beginning of the meeting, 120th Airlift Wing Col. Dave Smith said that he wasn’t commander when the grant application was submitted or the DOD grant awarded to the city.

Smith said he had not read the grant but when he became commander, he was told they’d have access for training events, an assumption that he said was probably incorrect.

The wing rented the facility in August and needed the whole pool to train with the large parachutes crews use on C-130s, but was charged $440 for two lanes so it wasn’t economical and they went back to their former site at the Great Falls High School pool for a lower cost, he said.

Smith said it was “fiscally irresponsible” for the wing to use the city aquatic center for training.

Smith left the meeting before commissioners discussed the pool fees toward the end of the meeting.

Doyon said that he wasn’t aware of Smith’s problems with the city pool and staff told The Electric that they were pulling records of the wing’s rental to determine the details of that arrangement.

Doyon said when the city designed the pool, they did so specifically to accommodate the military’s parachute training and had added that in construction costs.

He said he understood the commission’s desire to maintain good relationships with the military but didn’t think they should waive the fees.

“This is a commission decision and I will support whichever way you go,” Doyon said.

The Malmstrom commander did not speak about the fees during the public comment portion of the item.

Commissioner Rick Tryon said he was “pretty conflicted on this.”

“I distinctly recall it being understood that military would pay to use this facility,” he said, to help cover operational costs.

The facility isn’t paying for itself right now, he said, and “I’ve heard some pretty scary figures” of the deficit it’s operating at that he’s not sure if sustainable.

City staff said in their agenda report that the facility is operating at a $10,000 deficit monthly.

The facility opened last summer and the city is faced with “a couple of perplexing issues,” Tryon said, including subsidizing the facility with the general fund, taking resources from public safety.

He said he appreciates Malmstrom and was concerned about Smith’s issues for the 120th.

Tryon said that he’s heard it said that it’s not that much money for the city to waive the fees for military training and give up that revenue, but if it’s not that much for the city, then it’s not that much for the Pentagon or the Air Force.

“It certainly looks to me like we cannot afford to be giving away the training facility,” Tryon said.

Commissioner Shannon Wilson said that having served in the military, she understands the need for training.

But also that when the military use a gym on base, it’s free because the federal government was operating it.

In the case of the city pool, the city has to budget to operate the facility, she said.

Wilson said as a commissioner she has a membership to the facility and pays to use it.

“It’s only right that the military does too,” Wilson said.

She said the military should get a steep discount on using the facility, but “we can’t just do it for nothing because we have to operate the facility.”

Commissioner Susan Wolff said that the community wouldn’t have the new indoor aquatic facility without the $10 million DOD grant.

She said it was the second topic the commission had discussed that night where explicit communication would have been helpful between the entities involved.

Mayor Cory Reeves said he knows the city is losing money on the facility, but that he would vote to waive the fees for military training usage.

Commissioner Joe McKenney said that without the DOD partnership, the new aquatic facility wouldn’t exist.

It helped the city, but “was to their advantage too,” he said of the military.

He said he would also vote to waive the fees since, “the cost is minimal, it’s the right thing to do.”

Tryon said that the email from the DOD grant administrator stating the city could charge fees to the military to help cover expenses, “to me that was the understanding from the very beginning.”

Tryon said his issue was that he hears “folks on this commission say” they’re going to ask the public for more money toward public safety, but had only taken back half of the mills through the library management agreement and were now subsidizing the pool.

“It’s going to come directly out of our general fund,” he said.

When the commission tries to ask the public again for a public safety levy, Tryon said they’ll say the city is giving money away.

He said not only will the public bring it up, “I will bring it up.”

In Doyon’s staff report, he wrote that the Montana Air National Guard had not requested a fee waiver.

The military’s training requests so far have been minimal, according to the city:

Malmstrom: one lap lane four hours of use, up to twice per quarter
Montana Air National Guard: six-hour training day once per quarter, including classroom and pool use

The estimated annual revenue for the city is $4,000 to $8,000 for both military installations, which according to Doyon’s staff report, “is modest,” but contributes to the facilities operating costs.

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The DOD grant was awarded in September 2020.

Doyon wrote in his staff report that in an email dated Sept. 21, 2020, Timothy Roberts, the DOD grant administrator, wrote that the facility wasn’t subject to any condition requiring free use for military personnel and wrote, “the expectation is you will charge minimal fees for use in order to cover operating expenses and that these fees will not generate a profit. This is a public facility and should operate similarly to other Great Falls public facilities.”

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Doyon wrote that Roberts’ guidance helped the city to plan to operate the facility primarily as a cost recovery model with fees while attempting to limit general fund subsidies since taxpayers are paying the debt on the facility. He wrote that the military is receiving discounts for training and recreational use of the facility.

In a memo to commissioners, Doyon wrote that military leaders were never told they would be able to use the facility for free, “they just assumed it.”

He wrote in his staff report that military leaders at Malmstrom “have expressed surprise at being charged for training access. This confusion appears rooted in assumptions made during the grant application process.”

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Doyon wrote that city staff contacted two other facilities funded through the same DOD grant program in Rapid City, S.D. near Ellsworth AFB and the facility near Fort Drum in New York.

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Both charge user fees, including to military members, and both are operated by third party nonprofits, not municipal governments, according to Doyon’s memo.

Doyon recommended maintaining some level of fee structure in the form of either discounted fees, a flat rate or a military-funded operational subsidy since there was no commitment made to waive fees, the city has reduced the military’s training costs by providing a local facility so they can avoid travel, the facility is “heavily subsidized by local taxpayers,” and fee equity across user groups is important to public facility management, according to his staff report.

Over the last few years, commissioners have discussed ways to cut costs or generate additional revenue to relieve pressure on the general fund in an effort to better support public safety needs.

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Earlier this spring, the Park and Recreation adjusted the aquatic center’s pool hours based on usage in an effort to cut costs.

For background on the new aquatic facility, see our previous coverage:

City Commission approves aquatic center change order

City’s new aquatic center opening rescheduled for July 9

Opening of city’s new aquatic center postponed

New city aquatic center opening set

New aquatic facility set to open late June; city amending its budget, holding frog slide naming contest

City approves aquatic center change order, Nat demo payment; discusses funding for new facility

City Commission to consider aquatic center change order during April 16 meeting

City approves new recreation fees, including fees for new aquatics facility

City proposes fee structure for new aquatics center; planning June opening