The Adams County Sheriff’s Office will break ground soon on a new training facility after years of delays blamed on the

economic downturn.

Capt. Michael McIntosh, Adams County Sheriff’s Academy’s director, said the first phase of constructing the Flatrock Training Center is scheduled to begin the first week of August.

This phase, first scheduled to begin in 2009, will include a state-of-the-art emergency vehicle operations center and a 10,000-square-foot “open-air, no-blue-sky” firearms facility.

The facility will have a series of overhead baffles to limit “blue sky” — what a shooter sees above the range backstop — to reduce the possibility of bullets leaving the shooting range.

McIntosh said he doesn’t foresee further delays after the Adams County commissioners approved the first phase on Jan. 13.

The estimated cost of construction of the first phase is not to exceed $2.1 million, according to contract documents with Denver-based Roth Sheppard Architects.

Ben Dahlman, Adams County budget manager, said the county has spent $4.53 million so far on the Flatrock Training Center.

He said most of the costs came from the county’s $4 million purchase of the land at 120th Avenue and Gun Club Road in 2007.

Municipalities with existing agreements to use the facility, including Brighton, Boulder, Commerce City, Westminster, Broomfield, Boulder County and Northglenn, will use a “pay-as-you-go” plan.

McIntosh said participating municipalities will pay an annual fee for the designated amount of time they reserve at the facility.

“As time and space permit, we will open the facility to other jurisdictions both statewide and nationwide,” McIntosh said

in an email.

Abel Montoya, Adams County Planning and Development director, said the county is proposing to transfer control of the current 29-acre Adams County Firearms Training facility off Riverdale Road from the Sheriff’s Office to the county to be decommissioned and cleaned in accordance with Environmental Protection Agency standards, and then designated as open space.

He said the transfer will not begin until the new facility is completed but will happen no later than Dec. 31, 2014.

This proposal will be considered by the Adams County Planning Commission at 1:30 p.m.

Thursday, July 12.