Lehighton hasn’t closed the books on a new training tower for its fire department.

Councilman Ryan Saunders briefly revisited the matter with borough council on Monday.

Saunders said that while the training center isn’t feasible in the budget currently, they want to come up with a plan.

Councilwoman Autumn Abelovsky said she always thought it was a great idea to have it in the borough, adding that it would be a “great asset.”

In December, Saunders said that the police, fire and safety committee, along with the finance and administration committee, met with the borough’s fire chief and assistant fire chief.

Saunders said the purpose of that meeting was to go over the training tower in lieu of a request that was previously made by the fire department for help to construct a new three-story training tower.

He said at that time “It’s something we are going to actively continue looking at.”

In September, two members of the fire department, Steve Ebbert, committee chairperson, along with Assistant Fire Chief Mike Mriss, appealed to council for help to construct the structure.

They said while the department has been successful in recruiting new members, it lacks adequate training facilities for those young recruits.

The cost of the project was estimated to be $318,650, with the firefighters providing some of the labor.

In October, council rebuffed a new training tower for the fire department.

Councilwoman Lisa Perry said at that time the borough couldn’t afford it.

Councilman Joe Flickinger, who is also a volunteer firefighter, agreed at that time that the matter would prove too costly.

Saunders said at that time that while he understood, he was nonetheless disappointed, and added it would have been nice to find funding for it.

Ebbert previously said the tower would be erected on the old sewer plant site.

The fire department previously had use of a three-story, concrete training tower at Baer Memorial Park that was built in the 1960s.

That tower was razed in July 2014 after the structure was condemned because of rust on the interior metal staircase, cracks in the masonry and roof joists in poor condition.

Since then, the department’s volunteer firefighters have been training on the site of the former Lehighton sewage treatment plant off Route 443.

Ebbert said in September that the conception of a new training building was included in the fire department’s long-range strategic planning, with an initial goal for its completion by 2025.

Perry questioned why the fire department doesn’t use the new training facilities being erected by the county in Nesquehoning.

A $6 million fire training project is being erected near the Carbon County Correctional Facility and is expected to be completed by next fall.

Ebbert said firefighters receive 16 hours of training per month, and that it would be difficult to have them travel to Nesquehoning on a regular basis for such lengthy training, and hard on the fire apparatus taking it to that site so often.

Further, he said that whenever Lehighton would train in Nesquehoning, other fire departments would have to be placed on standby status to handle emergencies in the borough.

Additionally, Ebbert noted that many fire departments train on Monday nights, meaning that it would be impractical for so many departments doing drills at the same time in Nesquehoning.

Ebbert said in September that he endorses the Nesquehoning site.

However, he said the fire department wants to keep the younger members who have joined, and feels that having such a facility would be an incentive for them.