Some opponents of the millage taxes coming up for a renewal vote on March 1 have claimed they are voting no on “new taxes,” but research into the county’s archives and vote tallies show these particular taxes came into existence before the Great Depression.

The mills currently up for renewal were first voted on as early as 1916, according to county commission minutes found by Baldwin County Schools CFO John Wilson.

“Based on the minutes from the county archive on Jan. 17, 1957, we know for certain that the one mill and three mill renewals have been approved by the voters, levied and collected since before 1941,” Wilson said. “The constitutional provisions were first ratified by the Alabama legislators in 1916 for the three mills with the one mill predating that date. The records show that these are not new taxes and have been the foundation of funding for the Baldwin County School System for close to a century.”

Those taxes came up for renewal in the Nov. 5, 1940 general election. The Baldwin Times from Nov. 14 proclaimed in a front page headline that Franklin Roosevelt was elected by a four to one margin in the county and that both school taxes had been kept.

Seventy-eight percent of Baldwin County’s voters (2,239 people) wanted to keep the three mill tax, while 79 percent of the ballots cast decided to keep the one mill tax.

Only the Rabon precinct had the “no” vote prevail in both cases in that election, with 24 of Rabon’s 43 total voters coming out against the proposals.

The Times’ writers commented on the “nearly overwhelming support for continuing to fund the county’s schools.”

That election continued those tax renewals for another 30 years, requiring a special election on May 12, 1987.

Records obtained from the Baldwin County Probate Court showed that 58 percent of the county’s voters wanted to keep the three mills, while 59 percent chose to renew the special one mill tax.

Glancing at the vote tallies, strong support from the municipalities, especially along the Eastern Shore precincts, carried the renewals, while the unincorporated parts of the county generally returned more “no” votes.

With the sunset for these taxes looming in 2017, the Baldwin County Board of Education attempted to tie the renewal of these taxes to a request for eight new mills of taxes in March 2015, but both renewals failed as the one mill failed to receive the necessary required percentage of “yes” votes to pass and the three mill tax received 51 percent of the vote against its renewal.

Alabama law allows for another vote on the taxes, so while the March 1 vote will be a new referendum, school and county officials have said these taxes are anything but new.

“There are some out there who are trying to couch these renewals as a new tax, and this just isn’t the case,” Superintendent Eddie Tyler said.

Tyler said he’s concerned about the anger he has seen from some of those opposed to the renewals.

“It concerns many of us that there are so many people who seem to be angry toward education in this system,” Tyler said. “You can be angry with administrators, superintendents and board members, but your anger is going to be felt by the children of this county, and the children have no voice in this.”

School officials said continuing these taxes will continue a legacy of school support that began generations ago and will allow the system to continue functioning without having to make cuts to staff or programs they feel benefit Baldwin County’s children.

However, the county will have to wait until March to see whether that legacy will move forward.