DAPHNE, Ala. — Elected state officials, Baldwin County commissioners and Baldwin County Board of Education members met Tuesday at Daphne High School’s Trojan Hall for a SEEDS summit. They participated in a panel discussion and devised possible solutions to overcome the school board’s $75 million deficit; this figure excludes an expected 1 percent proration, adding $7.5 million to the shortfall.

The majority of panel members agreed that the county is too dependent upon sales and use tax revenues to fund the school system. Simply put, not enough people are shopping.

Baldwin County Superintendent Faron Hollinger suggested the county reform its funding policy to become more reliant on ad valorem tax revenues.

“The problem is more than the amount,” Hollinger said, referring to the school board’s task of overcoming its shortfall. “It’s the stability,” or lack thereof.

“We’ve got the wrong funding methods,” Baldwin County Commissioner Ed Bishop said, adding that he’d like to see a rainy-day fund created that could be drawn from during economic emergencies.

The school system also has too few human resources, Hollinger said.

“We don’t have enough cafeteria workers,” he said, referring to the most recent wave of cuts that terminated the jobs of many cafeteria, landscaping and library personnel.

“We don’t have enough people to keep our schools clean,” he said. “But we’re trying hard to maintain the integrity of the classroom. We’ll do everything we can to protect your child’s classroom.

“But if we don’t cut teachers, what can you cut? Or what can you close?”

School board President Tracy Roberts said that the main obstacle the board faces is that 79 percent of its budget is fixed costs comprising tenured and non-probationary employee salaries at 72 percent and debt services at 7 percent.

Roberts said revenue changes such as increased costs, state mandated raises and decreased revenues have contributed to the funding crisis.

Roberts added that she expects the school board to approve another reduction in force in the near future.

Audience members during the summit were asked to form small groups and submit questions for the panel to answer.

Asked if across-the-board pay reductions was a viable option, Hollinger said, “that would be very difficult. We are looking for flexibility. We’d be willing to survey employees if they’d be willing to make that sacrifice.”

Regarding an audience members’ suggestion of applying a temporary 1-cent sales tax, Roberts said, “the board has taken no formal action to take a 1-cent sales tax to the commissioners.”

She added that a joint meeting is set for Oct. 30 to update county commissioners and possibly address a sales tax increase.

“Everything is on the table,” Bishop said. “We continue to look at every option possible.”

Like Hollinger, Bishop favors reforming the funding policy to be more dependent on ad valorem revenues.

“We’re interested in seeing any and all things that the school board is willing to do,” Baldwin County Commissioner Wayne Gruenloh said. “We all have things we can do to get our house in order a bit. I’d like to feel like the public has more confidence and trust in the board.”

Gruenloh said a temporary sales tax increase is not a viable solution.

“People have been drawn to Baldwin County because of our school system,” Gruenloh said. “What I don’t want to see happen is the opposite.”

Asked what he’s learned while dealing with the education budget crisis, Gruenloh said he recognized early on the need for the school board to have a good working relationship with county commission.

“While we’re two separate elected bodies, we’re still attached at the hip,” he said.