SPANISH FORT, Ala.—Parents of Rockwell and Spanish Fort Elementary School  students at a community meeting Tuesday aired concerns over a proposed school redistricting that will shift about 190 students from Rockwell Elementary to Spanish Fort Elementary.

The Baldwin County Board of Education held its second community-input meeting at Spanish Fort High School, where parents asked questions, assistant superintendent JaNay Dawson answered them and for the school board listened.

Many of the about 60 parents at the meeting said they have a strong bond with Rockwell Elementary and would prefer for their children to stay there.

“It’s going to be sad telling my kids that they’re not going to go to school with their best friends anymore,” Trudy Jenkins, a mother of two Rockwell students, said. “But we’ll try to be optimistic about the whole thing.”

Other parents are still concerned why the TimberCreek neighborhood can’t be rezoned since there are about 172 Rockwell students living there. About 187 Rockwell students live in homes located from Stagecoach Road to the west, which is the area planned to be rezoned.

A number of parents also said they purchased their homes to be in Rockwell’s school zone—a risky bet, according to Dawson.

“It’s unrealistic for anyone to think school zones won’t change,” she said. “Zones will continually change.”

The reason behind the rezoning is that Rockwell is overcrowded and Spanish Fort Elementary has empty classrooms.

Rockwell currently enrolls  about 807 students; Spanish Fort Elementary has about 552 students.

Rockwell was built to hold about 550 students and Spanish Fort Elementary was built with a capacity for 800 students, according to Dawson.

“They’re using every nook and cranny, including closets for office space,” school board spokesman Terry Wilhite has said of Rockwell.

Spanish Fort Elementary has 10  to 15 empty classrooms, Dawson said.

Because of the ailing national economy, Dawson said it will probably be three to five years before there is another large school development in Baldwin County.

“The market may come back but we don’t anticipate that for several years,” Dawson said. “We have to be diligent with our money.”

Dawson said Rockwell Elementary is so overcrowded that the entire school can’t fit in the gym for an assembly, the cafeteria is too small for the amount of students and the number of restrooms at the school is inadequate for more than 800 students.

The school has 13 portable classrooms, which the school board rents—and they don’t come cheaply.

Portables can cost between $450 and $600 a month to rent and provide utilities for. With 13 portables, the school board must pay between $5,850 and $7,800 per month just for Rockwell.

If rezoning is approved, six to eight portables will be removed from Rockwell, Dawson said.

Tuesday’s meeting was step six of the eight-step school districting policy procedures. The seventh step is when a final plan will be given to the board to vote up or down. The board is expected to vote at its Jan. 29 meeting.

For the final step, students will start to attend their newly zoned school in August 2009.

“I do feel better after tonight knowing there are other parents with the same concerns as me,” Liz Kane, mother of one Rockwell student said. “I hope the board will take our concerns to heart before they vote.

“Every parent in here wants the same thing and I hope they can see that.”

A community meeting was held Aug. 28 to get feedback from residents about the proposed rezoning.

Parents were split into about five groups of 12 where they were asked to list any alternative options besides rezoning them.

The No. 1 response from the meeting was for the board to use Interstate 10 as a geography line of demarcation. The second option given was to move Plantation Hills and Bay Branch Estates and Villas students to Daphne schools.

Third, parents said to eliminate zone variances to Rockwell and to provide a yearly check if necessary. The fourth option was to grandfather in fourth-graders at Rockwell.

Dawson did say Rockwell fourth-graders will be grandfathered in.

Fifth, parents recommended to keep the feeder pattern together. And the last concern was to consider future development.

After the list was reviewed at Tuesday’s meeting, Dawson said Rockwell’s school zone has the highest concentration for land development in the Spanish Fort area.

 The board has monitored growth patterns for Spanish Fort using its geographic information systems technology, which monitors and analyzes growth patterns and helps predict what residential housing will be like in Spanish Fort for the coming years, a news release said.

The data estimates that over the next five to 10 years more than 2,000 new residential housing units will be sold in Rockwell’s school zone, based on the current real estate market, the release said.

About 300 apartments have been constructed on U.S. Highway 31 behind the Eastern Shore Centre and next to Rockwell Elementary.

Spanish Fort Elementary did have sixth-graders at its school until Spanish Fort Middle School opened in August.

Rockwell has become overcrowded since multiple neighborhoods and apartments are being developed in its school zone.

Tuesday’s meeting was step six of the eight-step districting procedure.

The seventh step: A final plan will be given to the board, which is expected to vote at its next meeting, Jan. 29, 6:30 p.m. at the  Tharp Building, 2600 N. Hand Ave., Bay Minette.