FAIRHOPE – The proposed three-mill property tax for Fairhope schools would mean more money and opportunities for local children and educators but getting the votes to pass the measure will be a challenge, officials told parents and teachers.
City officials and supporters have proposed that a special tax district be created in the Fairhope area and a public vote held to determine if the tax would be passed for that area. The district would have the same boundaries as the attendance zones for Fairhope schools.
The Baldwin County Board of Education voted April 25 to approve the request. The proposal now goes to the Baldwin County Commission.
Fairhope City Councilman Robert Brown and Ken Cole, chairman of the city’s Education Advisory Committee, met with parents and teachers at Fairhope Intermediate School as part of a series of discussions on the tax.
Brown said the tax would cost property owners $30 a year for each $100,000 in value to their home. A house worth $200,000 would have a tax of $60, or about $5 a month. That money would bring in about $2 million for the five schools in the Fairhope feeder pattern, averaging out to about $350,000 a year for each school.
Supporters have asked that the referendum be set in September.
Brown said that voters in both the city and unincorporated areas in the Fairhope attendance zones, from Point Clear to Fish River to Daphne, would decide the issue in the referendum.
Everyone in the feeder pattern gets to vote on it,” he told the audience. “You get to decide what happens to Fairhope schools.”
Brown said that while Fairhope residents have voted for education funding efforts in the past, residents cannot take that support for granted and need to make an effort to encourage people to get out and cast ballots for the measure.
During the meeting, most audience members expressed support for the tax, but said some of other residents had stated that they opposed the idea of a new tax and the Baldwin County Board of Education could raise money from revenue already available.
Cole said the only way to get more money for Fairhope schools is for Fairhope residents to raise it.
“It’s not a county problem,” he said. “It’s our problem.”
In earlier meetings, some Board of Education members had expressed concerns about the fact that the tax would be in effect for 30 years, the maximum time allowed under the tax amendment.
Cole said 30 years will mean a stable source of revenue for local schools.
“Think of three decades of kids going through the school system and the impact that it’s going to have on all those lives,” he said. “This is powerful stuff.”
Brown said some residents have also asked if the additional money would mean that the county board could transfer funds that had gone to Fairhope to other schools. He said the contract with the board under the proposal will not allow any county funding to be cut for Fairhope.
Cole said the funds will be used for academic improvements and not for construction or athletics. The city now provides about $350,000 a year for all five schools. Since that money is discretionary funding, however, it cannot be used to hire teachers. The tax money could be used for more staffing.
Fairhope Elementary School Principal Julie Pierce said more staffing, such as intervention teachers, would be a major benefit for her school.
Pierce said she now spends a lot of time trying to raise money for her school. Fundraising efforts bring in about $100,000 a year.
“It we could get $350,000 and my energies could be spent on education, that would be huge,” she said.
