BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Superintendent Lyman Woodfin knows the clock is ticking.
The Autauga County school system he leads — and that he grew up in — is at a crossroads.
Deteriorating facilities and rising competition from private and charter schools are driving away some families and making it harder to attract new ones.
And the district’s finances don’t match its needs.
It’s a challenge playing out in many rural counties — but one made more urgent here, as Alabama lawmakers expand school choice options that allow public funding of homeschool and private school options.
Woodfin has gone down a lot of paths, proposing options like raising property tax or changing the governance of the school system, but none have proved viable.
Now, he is proposing a new kind of partnership: Asking local governments to help fund long-overdue school repairs and construction.
“I’m asking for a funding agreement where we pay a portion and the entities pay a portion, and we try to renovate some of our facilities that are in dire need,” he told Alabama Daily News.
He has presented the idea to the Prattville City Council, the Autauga County Commission and the Town of Pine Level, hoping to build support for a joint bond issue or other arrangement to finance construction and renovations.
Some Prattville City Council members thanked Woodfin for continuing to bring ideas to the table, while acknowledging the difficult choices ahead.
“Most everybody in this room, in our community, knows the dire situation that we’re in or heading toward,” councilman Robert Strichik said during a meeting earlier this month. “I just have to believe most of these people sitting in this audience tonight agree that we need to work together as a city, as a county, to help you guys to be as successful as you possibly can. Because if you’re successful, we’re all more successful.”
The board of education hasn’t given formal approval to the proposal, but Woodfin – who became superintendent in 2023 after 17 years working and teaching in the district – says the work can’t wait.
New schools, rising costs
A centerpiece of his plan is a new high school for Prattville – not only to replace the aging campus, but to better serve the area’s military families and attract new students.
“The idea that we have is if we could build a new high school and you could tailor it to what your military families are asking for,” Woodfin told the Prattville City Council last week.
“What they are asking for is: Do you have an International Baccalaureate program? Do you have a way of preparing my kid for the military? We do.”
The district already offers a strong ROTC program, but Woodfin envisions an entire wing dedicated to military preparation.
“We can build this new high school and tailor the curriculum with the International Baccalaureate program and everything that Maxwell Air Force Base and Gunter (Air Force Base) families are asking for,” he told ADN.
The price tag: about $150 million. Two additional schools needed in the Marbury area – where residential growth is booming – would cost another $130 million to $160 million.
Limited resources
For now, the district can’t issue new bonds until 2029, when some of the district’s current debt is paid off. And while the state helps with bond issuance, it does not directly fund new construction.
Autauga County voters currently pay only the minimum 10 mills of property tax allowed by law – all of which must be used as the district’s share of the state’s Foundation Program, which funds basic educational operations including staffing and materials.
“The cost of facility repairs, when you’re funded the way we are, is just not possible,” Woodfin said.
Past efforts
In 2024, Woodfin and the board proposed a 7-mill property tax increase to fund building and curricular needs. It would have generated $7 million annually.
Voters rejected it, two to one.
He explored other options – forming a hybrid county-city system, or breaking Prattville off into its own city school district – but consultants said neither plan was financially viable.
Now he’s focused on building local partnerships – because the cost of doing nothing is growing fast.
Losing families
Without updated facilities, more families are choosing to leave, particularly in Prattville, he said. And the current school configuration with five separate campuses before ninth grade is also a factor. Many parents want a single elementary school campus through sixth grade, something Woodfin hopes is in the district’s future.
“The benefit of living in the district and being here all my life is I know everybody,” Woodfin said. “So they’re telling me straight up, look this is why we’re leaving. Sometimes it’s athletics, sometimes it’s whatever, but a lot of it is, on the travel side, I’ve got four kids and it doesn’t make a lot of sense for me to go to four different schools when I’m trying to get to work in Montgomery. I hear that a lot.”
Daniel Pratt Elementary – a first through sixth grade school – also feeds into Prattville High, and parents like that model better.
He also hears blunt assessments from parents: “It’s, ‘Man, the junior high is in bad shape.’ The high school – this is parents telling me – ‘For it to be the flagship school, it’s not in great shape.’”
Enrollment trends
The district’s enrollment peaked at a little over 10,000 students in 2008, gradually declined to 9,000 by 2018 and has leveled off since then at around 8,700.
Declining enrollment has already hit the Autaugaville community hard. Autaugaville School, a K-12 school in the southwestern part of the county, closed in May due to dwindling enrollment. Enrollment projections for the 2025-26 school year were around 180 students – barely 10 students in each grade. With its closure, there are no county public schools remaining in that part of the county.
An uneven playing field
Meanwhile, Alabama lawmakers continue to expand school choice. The newest change – $7,000 state-funded education savings accounts – will allow more families to opt for private schools.
“I’m not opposed to competition,” Woodfin said. “I’m opposed to the rules being different and everybody claiming they’re not.”
He and Elmore County Superintendent Richard Dennis recently co-authored an op-ed questioning why public schools face stricter rules than charter and private options.
For example, public charter schools are given flexibility in the curriculum that they teach, as long as they teach the state’s standards.
“If that’s such a good thing, why not give it to us?” he asked.
Public schools face extensive state mandates – from daily instructional time to curricular materials to teacher certification – that do not apply to private schools.
“Why does the Legislature feel like they need to be dad to us and cool dad to everybody else?” he asked.
And new state laws – such as restrictions on student cell phone use in public classrooms – will likely drive more parents to seek private options.
“You’re gonna have a lot of parents that say ‘My kid is going to have a cell phone.’ Guess where they’re sending them? To private school.”
“I can’t afford to wait”
The sense of urgency is growing.
“Autauga County schools have been strong for many, many years because Autauga family people grew up in Autauga, went to teach in Autauga and have stayed in Autauga,” Woodfin said. “Our homegrown teachers and support staff are the backbone of this system.
“My people are frustrated with some of their facilities. My people are frustrated with the perception that the government is supporting private schools and charter schools more than they are them.
“So when they walk out the door – this whole thing’s coming down.”