Kennon: I want school district pact written in blood

Posted 7/26/16

ORANGE BEACH, AL – Now all that’s needed is a little understanding.

As in a Memorandum of Understanding. And the understanding needs to come in a hurry. As in before Aug. 1.

But from the …

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Kennon: I want school district pact written in blood

Posted

ORANGE BEACH, AL – Now all that’s needed is a little understanding.

As in a Memorandum of Understanding. And the understanding needs to come in a hurry. As in before Aug. 1.

But from the sounds of the discussion in the Orange Beach Council Chambers on Tuesday night an understanding might be hard to come by at all, much less before Aug. 1.

Mayor Tony Kennon’s understanding of the memorandum was that it wasn’t fair to Orange Beach and he had several issues to address in it.

“Until those are clearly defined in an MOU, essentially written in blood, I have no intentions of moving forward on anything,” Kennon said. “I think we’re being taken advantage of.”

First off Kennon limited the Education Advisory Task Force’s presentation at the meeting to just 10 minutes when the group thought it had 30 minutes or more. They learned of the limitation at 3:30 p.m. the day of the 5 p.m. meeting, a spokesman for the group said.

Their task was to detail the contents of a memorandum of understand with the Baldwin County Board of Education over a Special Tax District vote with the hopes of earning a resolution of support from the Orange Beach Council. The school board must call for the election to be conducted.

The goal is get a referendum on the Nov. 8 ballot to see if voters would agree to an extra 3 mills of property taxes to fund upgrades to school facilities on Pleasure Island.

The county board OK’d special tax districts for the seven high school feeder patterns in the county on June 16. By state law all funds raised in the district must be used in the district and the district would continue to receive the same level of county and state funding as well.

Kennon followed the abbreviated version of the group’s presentation with a detailed list of items in the proposed MOU that must change if he is to support it. Councilman Jeff Boyd and Councilwoman Annette Mitchell expressed similar concerns.

Councilman Jeff Silvers said he had no problems with the current memorandum.

“I feel fine with it,” Silvers said. “The items the mayor wants changed, I can live with. But I’ve been working on this for two months and have asked him for his input but have been given none.”

Councilman Jerry Johnson and Councilwoman Joni Blalock were mostly positive about voting for the resolution, saying the county doesn’t have to money for the island schools’ needs.

The schedule to get the questions raised and the county to call for the referendum is tight.

“The reason this timeline is so accelerated is that in order to be on the ballot, which is a federal election, Judge (Tim) Russell needs to get the ballot 90 days in advance to the folks in Washington to vet that,” Task Force Spokesman Kevin Corcoran said. “We’re on a very quick timetable but we think it’s accomplishable.”

The effort is being led by Corcoran of Gulf Shores, Jim Caldwell of Orange Beach and Doug Warren of Ono Island. The feeder pattern runs from Ono Island west to Fort Morgan and the northern boundary is roughly County Road 8.

After Tuesday night’s meeting the timetable just got tighter and an understanding in jeopardy.

Kennon’s two main objections had to do with the makeup of the board of trustees and the involvement of the Baldwin County Board of Education, which will retain the responsibility of educating island students.

“We want whatever legal lingo is needed so they don’t continue to control our destiny and do as poor a job in the future as they have in the past,” Kennon said of the county board.

The Special District board of trustees, under the current memorandum, would contain three members from Gulf Shores, three members from Orange Beach, two representatives from the unincorporated areas of Fort Morgan and Ono Island and a Baldwin County School Board representative, most likely Angie Swiger.

“I have no intention of supporting anything where we have one third of the vote when we’re giving up greater than 50 percent of the money,” Kennon said. “I made that clear some time back.”

According to numbers presented by Corcoran Orange Beach would contribute 47 percent via the 3 mill increase, Gulf Shores 33 percent and the unincorporated areas 19 percent.

Kennon called for an eight-member board with four representatives from each city and none from the school board. He said he would agree to a school board representative in an advisory, nonvoting role.

Corcoran said all things were negotiable in the memorandum of understanding and said he wanted to sit down with representatives from Gulf Shores, Orange Beach and the school board to try and work out any problems.

“We’re willing to sit down and talk about with you and the mayor of Gulf Shores and the school board to work these things out,” Corcoran said.

Corcoran also said it was unlikely the county board would ask for the 3 mill tax referendum to be placed on the ballot if not supported by resolutions from both cities.

Gulf Shores’ mayor and council have indicated favorable positions on asking for the referendum.

“I think this is an extraordinary opportunity and a responsibility that we have,” Gulf Shores Mayor Robert Craft said.

Gulf Shores High School is far and away the wealthiest of the districts. Three mill of property tax in the Gulf Shores feeder pattern equals just more than $6 million a year compared to the next highest, Fairhope, at about $1.8 million.