BY SARAH STEPHENS
ELMORE AUTAUGA NEWS
Top Photo: Residents of Rodgers View Neighborhood went before a committee to testify they want to be annexed into the City of Millbrook.
Tuesday morning a public hearing was held in Montgomery at the Alabama State House regarding Millbrook’s proposed annexation of Rodgers View Neighborhood off Airport Road.
Residents of Rodgers View, State Rep. Reed Ingram, and city officials from Millbrook and Coosada were allowed to testify to the State House Local Legislative Committee either in favor or against the annexation of the 12 properties.
This particular neighborhood has some properties which fall in the Coosada Police Jurisdiction, while others are under Millbrook. Residents said they want to all be officially part of the City of Millbrook. However, Coosada officials spoke against it, citing a disagreement of the law and an interpretation with the jurisdictional maps. They also said they are currently in a lawsuit regarding the legitimacy of the jurisdictional map, saying the one they have differs from one being used by E911.
There was not a quorum of members, so an official vote was not taken at that time. However, after the meeting when a quorum was met, the committee 9-0 to approve the House Bill sponsored by Rep. Reed Ingram to allow the Alabama House to vote on the issue.
Rep. Ingram was the first to speak to the Local House Legislative Committee.
“This is a real simple bill,” Ingram said. “You can annex by legislation, and it is all contiguous. I have petitions from everybody that wants to come in. I think the heartburn here is that most of these people were in a Police Jurisdiction of another municipality. And the PJ, they never asked to come into the PJ. (Either Coosada or Millbrook.) Somebody closer to the municipality annexes and it puts you into the zoning of another municipality. And it also puts you into their police jurisdiction without asking. We have worked on a lot of the PJ bills several years ago to minimize some of the impact from one of the few states that still have a police jurisdiction.”
Reed said that everyone has signed and wants to come in and be a part of Millbrook. Everything is in legal order, and this is a procedure that happens a lot, Reed said.
Chris Wright is the Homeowners Association President for Rodgers View neighborhood and addressed the committee.
“In March of 2023 is when we were notified of Coosada failing to follow Senate Bill 107 which basically allowed them to collect and fund their PJ. In May of 2023 Coosada held a town meeting and informed the residents of their revenue laws and their plans for funding for the future.”
Related article for background https://elmoreautauganews.com/2023/05/02/residents-pack-coosada-fire-station-for-meeting-on-police-fire-jurisdiction/
At that point, the neighbors made the decision it was in the best interest of their neighborhood to annex into Millbrook rather than Coosada.
In June of last year, the residents approached the Town of Coosada City Council and made a request to be allowed to annex into Millbrook. Two weeks later they attended another meeting to follow up and Wright said Coosada Mayor Jim Houston then declined their request. This is disputed by Coosada Mayor Houston. More on that below.
“We then followed up as a group and approached the City of Millbrook,” Wright said. “After a series of meetings (with Millbrook) we decided that a legislative action would be the quickest and the cleanest, and not tying up the next two years.”
Wright was then told he was running out of his allotted time. However, he shared his entire presentation with the EAN.
In January of 2024 Wright said that residents in Rodgers View received a letter from the town of Coosada outlining three options to continue emergency services. They could annex into the town of Coosada, or pay a contract rate of $350 a year (no description of what this rate coves, or Pay per call and be charged in excess of $10,000, where failure to later pay could result in being turned over to collections and the Town of Coosada placing a lien on their property.
Wright said, “We find ourselves in a unique position where some of our neighbors already touch the city limits of Millbrook and a third of our neighborhood is already serviced by Millbrook for Emergency Services. I personally believe the annexation into Millbrook is the best option for my families’ safety and security.”
Wright said that point was driven home to residents just last week.
“One of our neighbors had the need to call for police services from Coosada due to a man hiding in the woods outside his home at 8 p.m. At the time of the call, Coosada had only one officer on duty and that officer was at the Elmore County Judicial Complex in Wetumpka, 14 miles away. It took nearly 30 minutes from the time the call was placed until an officer arrived and at which time the person was not able to be located by the Coosada Police Department.”
Up next was Coosada Mayor Jim Houston.
“There are two laws here in a basic municipality annexation. One is you don’t cross the jurisdiction of another municipality or corporate limits. And the other is in the same act that eliminated our revenues in the police jurisdiction. It also froze the jurisdiction. So, this annexation, probably 80 percent of the property is in this subdivision is in the PJ of the Town of Coosada.”
Houston said that at one point, the entire neighborhood was in the Coosada PJ. He said the neighborhood is named after one of Coosada’s town council members’ grandfather.
“We feel like this came about with the 2021 297 act. We lost the revenue. But we still enforce the jurisdiction, we are still getting calls from Rodger’s View Court. We still answer those calls.”
However, to respond to calls in the PJ, the town of Coosada has sent out a fee notice to all residents, which is based on three levels. If service is requested, and the home or business owner has not paid the yearly fee, substantial charges up to and perhaps above $10,000 could be levied. (See graphics below for those fees and more information.)
Houston said that Coosada officials believe it is wrong to cross the jurisdiction lines and Coosada opposes the annexation into Millbrook.
Houston also said he was not aware that the residents of Rodgers View wanted to annex into Millbrook until he read a legal notice in the newspaper. That is disputed by HOA President Chris Wright in his timeline of events. (Graphic below.)
Residents we talked to said they feel that since Coosada lost the right to take in an overall fee in the jurisdiction, after failing to file proper paperwork with the state, they have taken the fees to a new level to ensure response. Once Coosada lost the ability to receive that automatic funding, they came up with the contract for service which for residents of Rodgers View neighborhood would increase to $350 per year.
Representative Reed addressed the committee again saying annexations are not unusual. On this particular issue, he said that everything being proposed is legal and has been signed off on by other officials.
“Every local House member has signed off on this. We do this every year. This is the first public hearing I have ever seen on this. These people control their own destiny. They want to come into Millbrook, and it is unanimous. This is what they want to do and it is their property. There is no ill will to Coosada, but they just want to make sure they are taken care of. As services diminish, they know they are in a municipality that they are taken care of.”
Several other Millbrook officials and neighborhood residents also spoke in favor of the annexation, with officials stressing it has been researched and in good legal order.
Coosada Police Chief Leon Smith Jr. had arrived late to the meeting but was granted permission to speak. He disputed the map that had been presented marking the different police jurisdictions.
“In reference to that area I know they mention that they got four houses there. There are only two houses there (in Millbrook PJ.) I am not sure exactly what map y’all are looking at. However, we are also in current litigation with these maps when it comes down to the fire district. When we learned the bill was passed and we learned that the jurisdiction line was freezing, there were also some changes made with Elmore County 911 in reference to the mapping of the jurisdiction. When we learned that, we also learned that some of our property in our fire district maps was given to Elmore, some given to Millbrook. So, we are not sure what map you are looking at. There are several different maps out there. Right now, we have a lawsuit in reference to these maps when it comes to the fire jurisdiction.”
Chief Smith said this has caused a lot of problems when it comes to who is responding to calls.
Rep. Reed countered Smith’s comments with “This just enforces what we are trying to do here. The residents (who want the annexation) know they are going to be protected. It assures everybody that they can call one person or one municipality and that is Millbrook. The litigation is not between these people, the residents. These people are here to get something done to save their family.”
In reference to comments that this annexation would go against the jurisdictional lines, Reed said that is not accurate.
“Anybody can annex inside of PJ,” Reed said. The effort with this annexation is to reduce the amount of time it would take to annex each property individually, which could take years. By doing it in one move with all residents agreeing, it saves time and assures the residents who will be responsible for their police, fire or medical calls. “This is something that we do a lot of. Pike Road did one…a shotgun annexation. It was about 180 residents that did it at one time. This is not a shotgun. Everything is contiguous. Every single resident signed to come in. It is their destiny.”
Once Millbrook annexes the property, they will not be able to increase their police jurisdiction, but they could annex more properties that are contiguous.
This will now be put into the hands of the legislature. There are still four working days in this session, and officials said it will likely be resolved one way or the other in this session.
