ATLANTA – A public-private partnership created to lead efforts to make Georgia the technology capital of the East Coast is getting involved in the farming business.
The Partnership for Inclusive Innovation announced the awarding of a $250,000 grant Monday to a program run by The Conservation Fund that supports next-generation farmers.
The Working Farms Fund program is the first in the nation to offer end-to-end support for new farmers, including a path to farm ownership and access to established farm markets.
“This support will allow The Conservation Fund to scale this critical program to help Georgia build a resilient local food system by ensuring that diverse, entrepreneurial farmers have access to farmland and new markets to grow their farm businesses,” said Stacy Funderburke, The Conservation Fund’s Georgia and Alabama associate state director.
The program will initially work in the 29-county metro-Atlanta region, permanently protecting at-risk farmland through conservation easements and lease-to-own options. It also aims to strengthen connections between farmers, markets and consumers while increasing the supply of locally grown nutritious food.
“The Georgia Working Farms Fund represents an innovative and transformative approach to how we think about the agricultural industry and food security,” said Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, a member of the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation’s board.
The grant will provide enough funding to continue the Farms Fund’s operations in Georgia for two years.
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp Friday extended through May 22 an executive order he issued last Monday to address the gasoline shortage that began with the shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline.
The 5,500-mile pipeline that provides nearly half of the gasoline on the East Coast was shut down a week ago following a ransomware attack perpetrated by hackers operating out of Russia.
Colonial restarted the pipeline on Wednesday. But by then, panicked motorists had depleted gasoline supplies across the Southeast, with many stations running out of fuel.
“While Colonial Pipeline is now operational, the company has informed the public that it will be a few days until full service is available statewide,” Kemp said Friday in a prepared statement. “This executive order will ensure fuel supply chains have every resource needed to deliver gas quickly and safely, and that Georgians aren’t hit with state gas taxes at the pump during this shortage.
“I continue to ask Georgians to only purchase the fuel they need for essential travel through the upcoming weekend.”
The executive order suspended the collection of the state sales tax on gasoline and prohibited price gouging by gas stations. It also lifted the usual weight restrictions on fuel delivery trucks and limits on hours commercial truck drivers can operate.
To free up additional fuel supplies, the federal government approved Georgia’s request to permit the sale of a blend of gasoline normally sold only during the winter.
While President Joe Biden said U.S. national security officials don’t believe the Russian government was involved in the ransomware attack, he said he has urged the Russians to more aggressively pursue cyber criminals.
ATLANTA – Camden County is pulling out all the stops to win approval of plans to build a commercial spaceport supporters say would represent a huge economic boost for southeastern Georgia.
The county spent nearly $825,000 between July 2020 and March of this year on a team of lobbyists, including a former chief of staff to Gov. Brian Kemp, to convince the state to endorse Spaceport Camden, according to documents filed by the county.
The spending came with a project seven years in the making approaching a final decision. While the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is due to decide by the end of next month whether to license the spaceport, it will be leaning heavily on the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) for recommendations.
“The timing would lead you to believe they needed help from the governor’s office to get pressure on the DNR,” said Dick Parker, one of a group of property owners on nearby Little Cumberland Island who oppose the project.
Supporters are counting on Spaceport Camden to create up to 2,000 jobs and help convince the next generation of aerospace engineers, many of whom graduate from Georgia Tech, to stay in Georgia. The project has the backing of Gov. Brian Kemp and the state’s congressional delegation.
Camden County Administrator Steve Howard, who also serves as project leader for the spaceport, said up to a dozen companies have shown “high-level interest” in launching commercial satellites from Spaceport Camden.
“It’s a once-in-a-generation opportunity for Georgia to play a very important role in the next space race,” Howard said.
The FAA originally was expected to decide whether to issue a launch license for the spaceport in late 2016. But the project was delayed when the county made a significant change in design that called for launching only small rockets from the site rather than medium-to-large rockets.
The project’s opponents say the FAA hasn’t done an adequate analysis of the impacts of the design change.
“These rockets operate differently,” said Brian Gist, senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center. “They have a higher failure rate. They’re experimental.”
But John Simpson of the Atlanta office of Capitol Resources LLC, who handles public relations for Spaceport Camden, said the county has made a commitment not to launch experimental rockets.
Simpson cited a March letter from the FAA to the Georgia Department of Community Affairs asserting that the risk posed by the type of small rockets Spaceport Camden proposes to launch would be significantly smaller than the risk from launching medium-to-large rockets.
The FAA also indicated small-rocket launches from the spaceport would be on the same footprint covered by launches of larger rockets, only smaller.
Kevin Lang, another Little Cumberland Island property owner, said even that smaller footprint encroaches on environmentally fragile marshland.
“There’s a 7,300-foot radius around the launch pad that is considered a debris disposal area,” he said. “The purpose of that area is to catch all the debris from a launch failure on the pad or early in the launch.
“Over two-thirds of the area is coastal salt marsh owned by the DNR … property they have an obligation to protect.”
As part of its review of the spaceport plan, the DNR must determine whether allowing satellite launches over marshland is consistent with the marsh’s protected status.
“If they follow the law, they should withhold their concurrence,” Lang said.
Opponents say the FAA also has given short shrift to the impact satellite launches would have on the people and structures beneath the flight path. That would include residents of Little Cumberland Island, campers and other visitors to the Cumberland Island National Seashore and several historic structures.
“The FAA has said this is the closest-ever populated area they’ve sought to launch rockets across,” Gist said.
But Howard said the FAA has determined any risk from satellite launches at Spaceport Camden would be limited to the footprint of the launch site and not extend to Cumberland Island or Little Cumberland Island.
“The analysis we’ve seen shows you can do this safely,” he said.
With the time for a final decision approaching, Camden County has added to the team of lobbyists who have been working the project for years.
Former Kemp Chief of Staff Tim Fleming registered as a lobbyist for the county in February, according to a report filed with the Georgia Government Transparency & Campaign Finance Commission, five months after leaving the governor’s office. Joining the Spaceport Camden team at the same time was Chuck Harper, a former deputy chief of staff to Kemp.
Lobbying and public relations firms that have been on the spaceport team longer include Simpson’s Capitol Resources, Joe Tanner and Associates and Washington, D.C.-based Capitol Hill Communications.
Howard said it was important to bring in such a large team of lobbyists and consultants because of the nature of Spaceport Camden.
“You’re not building a road or a park. It’s a very complex subject,” he said. “You have to have subject matter experts.”
Workers advocates in Georgia are pushing for further expansion of paid family leave after state lawmakers passed legislation to give state employees up to three weeks of time off following the birth of a child.
Representatives from several Georgia nonprofits met Friday to call for a broader paid family and medical leave program that offers up to 12 weeks of leave for new parents, sick leave for surgery or serious medical treatment and extending eligibility to care for a family member beyond one’s child.
A more comprehensive paid-leave program would help boost morale for Georgia employees and curb instances of health complications or death stemming from pregnancy, local advocates said.
“This is an important first step in the right direction toward supporting working families in Georgia,” Allison Glass, a training coordinator with the national women’s advocacy group 9to5’s Georgia chapter, said of the recent legislation on three-weeks paid family leave for state employees, which Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law earlier this month.
“[But] three weeks is not enough time and the vast majority of Georgians are still without any paid family or medical need whatsoever. … We believe that Georgia can lead the way in making paid leave accessible to all working Georgians.”
The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Houston Gaines, R-Athens, gained wide support from state lawmakers and advocates who hailed the measure as a boost for local businesses and workers, particularly amid the economic struggles over the past year caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is estimated to benefit about 246,000 state workers and teachers and will apply to parents following the birth of a child of their own, an adopted child or a foster-care placement.
The new Georgia leave program could come in addition to a proposed federal paid-family leave program included in President Joe Biden’s legislative package on worker protections and child tax credits called the American Families Plan.
Details of the federal leave program are still being hashed out by Congress, advocates noted Friday. Biden so far has called for passing a program that expands the definition of who could receive paid leave to workers caring for extended family members and close loved ones not related by blood.
Calling the Georgia legislation a good start, local advocates pressed for state lawmakers to expand the new leave program to cover all workers beyond state employees and teachers as well as adopt 12 weeks of time off, arguing the current three weeks gives too little time for new mothers to bond with their infants.
“When parents can dedicate their time to building bonds and increasing interactions post-partum, they are not only laying a strong foundation for their child but also creating the conditions for supporting the varying needs of new parenthood,” said Kyesha Lindberg, executive director of the nonprofit Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition of Georgia.
Advocates also stressed an expanded leave program would particularly benefit members of Georgia’s immigrant communities who work in chicken-processing plants, fueling the state’s massive poultry industry.
“Paid leave for immigrant workers is so crucial,” said Maria Del Rosario Palacios, executive director of the Gainesville-based volunteer group Georgia Familias Unidas. “You can honor the contribution of so many amazing immigrant workers that work 14-hour shifts every single day and do so with pride, by allowing them paid leave.”
ATLANTA – Georgia is joining a growing number of Republican-led states in cutting off federal unemployment benefits to incentivize out-of-work employees to return to their jobs.
Gov. Brian Kemp said in an interview with Fox News Thursday that the Georgia Department of Labor will stop issuing $300 weekly checks to jobless workers effective June 26.
The governor’s remarks came three days after a coalition of statewide business organizations spearheaded by the Georgia Chamber of Commerce released an op-ed complaining companies can’t find workers for a growing list of job openings because unemployed Georgians are receiving more in state and federal jobless benefits than they could earn by going back to work.
“It is hurting our productivity not only in Georgia but across the country,” Kemp said. “We’ve got to get more people into the workforce.”
Kemp and state Commissioner of Labor Mark Butler have been working on a plan to address the issue since a meeting on Monday.
“It is critical for us to support our economy and local businesses by providing solutions to the roadbloacks many Georgians have faced when returning to work,” Butler said Thursday in a prepared statement.
“Right now, the state has a historic number of jobs listed on Employ Georgia. We are seeing some of the highest pay scales with enhanced benefits and signing bonuses.”
But worker advocates panned Kemp’s move to end the higher benefit amount Thursday, saying it is untrue that the extra $300 each month has kept many jobless Georgians from seeking new employment.
Thousands of Georgians have already returned to work since the start of the pandemic last year, contrary to Kemp’s claim that too many workers are still sitting on the sidelines, said Ray Khalfani, a research associate for the nonprofit Georgia Budget and Policy Institute (GBPI).
Even so, Khalfani stressed many Georgians are still struggling to find new jobs or return to their old ones after the pandemic battered the job market and killed many service-focused businesses, particularly for low-income and predominantly Black communities in the state.
“Although some jobs are returning that doesn’t mean everybody who wants to return to work can,” Khalfani said at a news conference Thursday.
Among them is Elizabeth Knight, a Savannah resident who has received unemployment benefits since being furloughed from her job as an employment specialist in November 2020. Knight said she has struggled to find new work in her career field while also caring for her young son.
“This unemployment is giving me a little bit of time trying to find out what’s my direction,” Knight said Thursday.
Beyond ignoring difficulties for many people to find new work, GBPI’s Khalfani also warned Kemp’s decision to end the extra benefit could drive more Georgians into poverty and depress consumer spending that was partly bolstered by the increased federal benefit.
“When you pull that floor from people who need time to be able to get back to the workforce, that’s something that’s going to hurt a lot of Georgians, hundreds of thousands,” Khalfani said.
The $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package Biden signed into law last month extends the $300 weekly unemployment checks into September.
Responding to complaints that the checks are encouraging virus-wary Americans not to return to work, Biden said this week that anyone who refuses to take a suitable job will lose their unemployment benefits.
At least a dozen states with Republican governors have moved to cut off the federal benefits, including South Carolina, Alabama and Tennessee.
