Mike Odom

Staff Writer

Once expected in April, a $25,000 study on the feasibility of separating Fairhope city schools from the Baldwin County system is now set for completion in August, Councilwoman Debbie Quinn stated this week.

"As our intentions for this study were always to be as detailed and comprehensive as possible, we have instructed Dr. (Ira) Harvey to do what it takes to find all the answers we need and not to put haste over the careful analysis that will direct the important decisions to come," Quinn wrote in a June 7 e-mail. "We now anticipate the feasibility study to be completed and ready for public discussion and review in early August."

A group of parents sent a letter to the City Council in September, requesting the funding of such a study, which resulted in $25,000 being set aside in the budget for that purpose. The parents stated it was the financial crisis facing the county school system that prompted the call for the study of an independent system in Fairhope.

With little discussion before its vote on Jan. 11, the council awarded a $25,000 contract to Harvey, a Birmingham-based consultant on educational finance, to conduct a study on splitting the Fairhope city schools from the county system.

Two months later, Baldwin County voters passed by a wide margin a countywide three-year, 1-percent sales tax to address the local school funding crisis.

Quinn stated the study should have taken about three months, but a number of unforeseen difficulties have delayed its completion, including the passage of the new sales tax and the impact of the oil spill on taxes that fund the schools.

In recent years, several Baldwin County cities have decided against breaking away from the county system, including Gulf Shores and Orange Beach. And in 2006, the Daphne City Council voted not to split from the county system, following a $16,500 study conducted by Harvey, who told the council it would take $1.5 million to form an independent system.

But in 2006, Saraland did separate from the Mobile County system, following a study by Harvey. In total, during the past school year, 65 cities had separate school systems in Alabama, according to information provided by Harvey.

Should Fairhope establish an independent system, it would use existing school buildings but would have to assume the debt for construction costs of several new schools built the past few years, Harvey stated.

After the contract for a feasibility study was awarded, a committee was established, at Harvey's request, to assist him in gathering data and information. The committee met once, in February, Quinn stated.

Kristie Street, a Fairhope parent ­who sought unsuccessfully to serve on the committee, has raised concerns at council and other public meetings whether some students now attending Fairhope schools, but who live outside the city limits, would be excluded from the new system.

"There was no question this study would be complicated with so many of our students living in the feeder pattern, yet outside the technical city limits," Quinn stated this week.

The feasibility study has also been delayed because some data continues to come in from the county school system and other agencies, she stated.

"Other unknowns must also be calculated, including the potential for the Gulf oil spill disaster to negatively impact our sales tax collection and the projections for the new one cent sales tax passed in March," she stated.

In her e-mail update this week, Quinn stated it was a "historic step the City of Fairhope has taken this spring with the feasibility study for a Fairhope City School System."

But not everyone agrees, including Mayor Tim Kant, who has questioned the need for the study.

"It's being debated why are we even doing a study, much less going to the next step," he said earlier this year.