Orange Beach, Ala. – (OBA) – The whirlwind rush to split away from the Baldwin County school system and form a city system in Orange Beach continued on Wednesday, March 30, at a townhall meeting at the Performing Arts Center.

Mayor Tony Kennon announced the school board had already been appointed and introduced them at the townhall meeting. Kennon also announced that Orange Beach wants to take control as early as the 2022-23 school year a mere three months after voting to separate. It was also announced that the city would fund schools with 3 percent raise in the lodging tax.

The new board members are former Baldwin County School Board member Robert Stuart – he resigned his post when Orange Beach voted to separate – Randy McKinney, Shannon Robinson, Tracie Stark and Nelson Bauer. They will be formally appointed at the April 5 council meeting.

Questions arose after a quick meeting and vote March 15 by the council to form the system as to why there was no citizens vote on whether the city could make this move.

“Last time,” Kennon said of a failed 2014 vote to fund schools, “It was the Hatfields and the McCoys. We as a group didn’t want to put the city through that again.”

Councilmember Annette Mitchell said it seems like the council rushed to the decision but said the members have been studying the possibility of a city system since she became a councilmember.

“When the opportunity arose, we knew it was the right time,” Mitchell said. “This is the right time for Orange Beach City Schools.”

The reason a vote was necessary in 2014 – the measure was defeated two to one – because it would have been funded by raising the local property taxes above the 5-mill level. City councils have to put to a vote any property tax above the 5-mill level. State law does not require a vote by the citizens to form a city system city.

Raising the lodging tax 3 percent will match the rate Gulf Shores is raising it to in a two-year phase-in program. Gulf Shores will raise it 1 percent on Oct. 1 and then 2 percent on Oct. 1, 2023, for a total of 16 percent.

Lawyer Nash Campbell, who was hired by Gulf Shores during its split from Baldwin County, has been hired to guide Orange Beach through the process. He said most of the “minutia” that holds up splits – he’s worked on four of them – has already been worked out with the county.