SUMMERDALE, Ala. — Summerdale town leaders have voiced their support of a high school in Elberta.

During Tuesday’s Summerdale Town Council meeting, Elberta Town Council members Jim Hamby and Michael Hudson presented a condensed version of the program they hosted for the Baldwin County Board of Education two weeks ago in a town hall meeting.

In that presentation, Hamby recapped figures indicating that existing Summerdale and Elberta students in that would be grades nine through 12 in the 2018-19 school year is 658. He added that this number falls into the number that several studies found to be an ideal school size.

Hamby also pointed out flaws in the School Board’s last own study, which both underestimated Foley’s student population growth and overestimated the same for Gulf Shores. He explained that his own estimations consisted of existing current populations of both towns and schools.

Plus, Hamby surmised that even with job growth along Gulf Shores and Orange Beach, a large portion of those employees would choose to commute from Foley, Elberta or Summerdale, where property taxes are lower.

“None of your numbers, they weren’t disputed by any of them,” said Summerdale Mayor David Wilson, who attended the town hall meeting, of the School Board’s reaction to last month’s presentation.

Discussion with the Summerdale Council included the School Board’s options for dealing with overcrowding.

“(Assistant Superintendent) Russ Moore is taking an inventory of every room of every school in Baldwin County,” Hamby said, “to make sure every Square foot is being used.”

As for the possibility of building a high school, Hamby and Wilson recapped that the town-hall meeting attendees had favored an increase in property tax to fund it.

“But I can’t see your property taxes going up more than $100,” Hamby said.

Hamby also told the Summerdale Council that the 38 acres that Bobby Faust agreed to donate for a high school is located three miles north of the main red light in Elberta, south of Seibert Lane and west of County Road 83. He estimated that if the School Board decided to accept that land donation and construct a new school there, it would take four years to complete.

Wilson told Hamby that from what he observed, the presentation seemed to have gotten the School Board’s attention.

At the end of the discussion, Wilson told Hamby and Hudson to let them know anything he could do to help.

“We appreciate y’all taking on this burden of supporting a school,” he said.