A proposed annexation plan to add as many as 25,806 residents and making Mobile the second-largest city in Alabama will dilute city personnel and police officers assigned to the current boundaries of the city, some residents fear.

But Councilman William Carroll says those fears are unfounded for public safety. Police patrol three miles outside of the city limits within Mobile’s police jurisdiction, covering approximately 70,000 residents.

Related:

Those concerns were expressed during the Mobile City Council meeting Tuesday as annexation talks heat up following the release earlier this month of a report advocating for adding tens of thousands of new residents west of Mobile.

Advocates for annexation also spoke out during the council meeting, combatting criticism from anti-annexation groups over issues that include a dilution of Black voters if a mostly white area of Mobile is brought into the city limits.

“West Mobile citizens don’t have an SPLC or ACLU or other political organizations,” said Freddy Wheeler, secretary of the West Mobile Annexation Committee. “All we have is people in our communities. Let us vote.”

Community meetings

The annexation talks will continue during individual community meetings scheduled over the next two weeks. The first will be held tonight at 6 p.m. at the James Seals Park Community Center, hosted by Carroll.

The others include:

• 6 p.m. April 27 at the Connie Hudson Mobile Regional Community Center, 3201 Hillcrest Road.
• 6 p.m. April 27 at Craighead Elementary School, 1000 S. Ann St.
• 6 p.m. on May 1 at the Mobile Museum of Art, 4850 Museum Drive

Under consideration is whether council members should vote in support of allowing a special election that will then determine whether residents living within the unincorporated areas of Mobile should be annexed into the city.

The city is pitching four different annexation proposals and is looking to grow the city from anywhere between 16,738 residents – equivalent to the size of Muscle Shoals – to 25,806 residents – which is slightly larger than adding the entire city of Fairhope.

The end result is to boost Mobile’s population well above 200,000 residents, and having the city leap over Birmingham and Montgomery to become the second-largest in Alabama trailing only fast-growing Huntsville.

Dilution of services

Some Mobile residents fret the addition of tens of thousands of new residents will dilute a police department that is already suffering from personnel shortages. According to Chief Paul Prine last month, the agency is down 70 police officers from its typical budget of 488. Last year, 83 officers left the department, while 61 of them – or 73% of those who left – resigned.

“We have weekly complaints or (hear) excuses from the council regarding the problems of hiring adequate staff to service the needs of the city and to provide public safety to the city,” said resident Betty Shinn. “Taking care of current problems appears to be overwhelming. Why would addressing annexation without (addressing personnel), help?”

Darlene Martin, also a Mobile resident, said the issues of hiring adequate number of employees should be addressed first before more residents are added to the city’s population.

“How many more city staff above what we currently have area needed?” she asked.

Carroll said that Mobile police are already covering the areas that could be annexed into the city limits largely due to the existing police jurisdiction.

“The annexation will be a quarter of that, if we even do (annexation),” Carroll said. “The personnel is already out there. We are already operating out there and servicing 70,000 people, which is more (people) than any map or study area we’ve seen.”

Carroll argued that Mobile is spending around $26 million to police the extraterritorial jurisdiction without receiving revenues from residents within the area because their properties are not within the city’s boundaries.

“Adding garbage and trash (services) would be small compared to what we are (already) doing,” Carroll said.

Carroll’s comments come after he defended the annexation process after it received criticism last week from the Mobile County Democratic Party’s executive committee over concerns that it will dilute the city’s Black representation on the council.

Annexation proponents, including Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson, have said that adding a large swath of properties west of Mobile will generate revenues and boost up grant opportunities for the city. Proponent say the city stands to gain $7.1 million to $8.4 million immediately in extra sales tax revenues from the annexed territories, depending on which territories are brought into the city.

“What we do now has a heavy weight on the economic prosperity in the city in the next 20 to 30 years,” Carroll said last week.

Voting-age demographics

A previous annexation plan, which called for adding around 13,000 new residents within a similar area west of Mobile, crumbled in 2019, and was voted down by the City Council by a 4-3 vote along racial lines.

Similar concerns about demographic makeup of future Mobile electorates exist with the current proposals. Each of the annexation plans maintain Mobile as a majority Black city, but voting-age populations would be close an even Black-and-white split.

If the city’s largest annexation plan is adopted, Mobile’s voting age population would be a razor-thin 46.8% Black and 46.7% white makeup.

Wheeler said annexation opponents are “sewing seeds of distrust” between the city’s Black residents and west Mobile.

“We support Stand Up Mobile in efforts to register Black voters,” Wheeler said, referring to a low turnout among Black voters during recent municipal elections. “We are vigorously opposed to pitting African Americans against West Mobilians to do it.”

Some Black Mobilians say they want the city to grow further to the west.

“I truly believe in the vision of Mobile and that vision is growing and annexing the western corridor,” said Monica Lane, a resident of Mobile for the past 44 years. “Mobile, to me, is a melting pot of Americans of different dreams, goals and relationships. We should want to be all-inclusive and have no separates us. I believe expansion is absolutely necessary for our city’s continued growth.”