Hoeven presses for new Jamestown readiness center for Guard unit

A permanent home for the 817th Engineer Company could shape how Jamestown trains, builds, and keeps the unit ready for future deployments, and Sen. John Hoeven used a Senate Defense Appropriations Committee hearing to push that case again.

Hoeven said Jamestown still needs a new readiness center for the North Dakota National Guard unit, which has been operating out of a temporary joint-use facility. He cast the project as part of a broader federal obligation to give reserve and Guard branches the buildings they need to train properly and stay mission-ready.

The need is tied to a specific site in Stutsman County. A North Dakota legislative testimony document said the Jamestown readiness center would sit on 25.2 acres and called it the future building site for the Jamestown National Guard Readiness Center. That same testimony said the project is the Adjutant General’s number one Major Military Construction priority and is competing for placement in the Future Years Defense Program for fiscal year 2032.

State lawmakers already moved to clear a path for the project. HB 1520, passed in 2025, authorized transfer of the property to the Office of the Adjutant General so a new training and storage facility could be built in Jamestown. Legislative materials said the National Guard Bureau requires land documentation to be completed before the project can move farther ahead.

Hoeven’s office said he has secured $2.3 million through annual funding legislation to advance the Jamestown Readiness Center, and a North Dakota procurement notice showed the state was seeking architectural and engineering design services. Gen. Steven Nordhaus later said the project was in the design phase and that the Guard would keep working with Congress on construction funding.

For Jamestown, the stakes reach beyond military paperwork in Washington. A new readiness center would bring construction activity, create a permanent training and storage home, and give the 817th Engineer Company better conditions for drill and deployment preparation. It would also help keep the unit rooted in the community instead of leaving it to operate indefinitely from a temporary setup.

That matters because the 817th has already been called on hard. About 125 members deployed to the southern border in October 2023 for roughly a year and returned home in January 2025. Hoeven publicly honored the company after that deployment and cited its record of excellence, underscoring why local leaders want a facility that matches the pace and demands of the unit’s service.