Bibb County superintendent recommends rezoning, not immediate school closures, after consolidation study

District staff presented findings of a school consolidation exploration and recommended the Bibb County Board of Education pursue a district-wide rezoning and commission an organizational efficiency study rather than move immediately to close schools.

Dr. Lovett, presenting for Instructional Services, told the board the exploration considered enrollment trends, facility condition and costs, and included stakeholder engagement: seven school-based meetings, a district-wide town hall and a steering committee. The team modeled five scenarios — three that consolidate campuses and two that preserve existing buildings while adjusting boundaries or programs — and reviewed impacts on enrollment balance, building utilization, staffing and transportation.

The recommended near-term action is to begin district-wide rezoning to improve building utilization with less disruption than closures, Dr. Lovett said. Staff also recommended issuing a request for proposals in May 2025 for an organizational efficiency study, with a goal of a study report to the board in July or August 2025. The presenter said a planning year would be used before any implementation, with a notional implementation target of the 2026–27 school year if consolidation were pursued.

Why it matters: The study aims to address under-enrollment and aging facilities while weighing community identity, transportation and class-size concerns raised during engagement. The presentation framed rezoning as a less disruptive option that can improve staffing efficiency and equity across the district without immediately shuttering campuses.

Selected data from the presentation: the team modeled three consolidation scenarios and reported estimated non-instructional cost savings roughly in the same range across scenarios: Scenario A (Hartley consolidation into Ingram Pi and Southfield) total non-instructional savings about $1,000,000; Scenario B (Williams consolidation pattern) about $1,100,000; Scenario C (Porter consolidated into Heard and Skyview) about $1,051,300. Projected transportation adjustments ranged from two to three additional bus routes per scenario, with estimated additional annual costs of about $104,000 (two buses) to $156,000 (three buses) depending on the scenario. The presenter also cited available-seat counts used in modeling: Hartley (115 available seats in one scenario), Heard (179) and Skyview (227) as example figures tied to October 2024 enrollment snapshots.

Board members pressed staff on personnel impacts, asking whether projected savings primarily came from noninstructional operations or from reductions in funded positions. Dr. Lovett replied that savings include both categories: reductions in position counts (principals, assistant principals and other school-level roles) as well as operations (utilities, maintenance) and school nutrition. Board members asked what would happen to affected employees; Dr. Lovett said that human resources would outline processes for redeployment and that the administration would return with further details.

Other board questions covered the timespan used for enrollment trends (staff reviewed roughly five years of historical data and short-term projections) and whether external factors such as prospective charter schools or scholarship programs were modeled (the presenter said they were aware of such developments but did not include uncertain, unquantified impacts in the projections). Several members urged additional boundary-analysis detail and asked staff to provide more granular receiving-school capacity numbers where some consolidation slides omitted redlined available-seat counts for the campuses proposed for closure.

What the board directed or was asked to consider: staff recommended launching rezoning planning and issuing the RFP for an organizational efficiency study; board members asked staff to return with clarifying detail on personnel transition plans, explicit receiving-school capacity numbers for every scenario, and more detailed projections that incorporate likely local changes to school choice and scholarship programs.

Ending: The presentation closed with staff offering next steps: release the RFP for an organizational efficiency study, begin outlining a community-informed rezoning process and return with the requested clarifications. No formal board vote on consolidation was taken at the meeting; the presentation and recommendations will inform future agenda items and potential actions.