The Republican-controlled state Senate passed legislation Thursday that would mostly do away with the granting of no-cash bail to criminal suspects in Georgia.
Senate Bill 63, which passed 31-23 largely along party lines, would prohibit judges from ordering no-cash bail unless the accused has been charged with a crime that does not carry a jail or prison sentence. No-cash bail would apply to a long list of violent and non-violent crimes, from murder and rape to possession of marijuana.
The legislation is aimed at a rise in crime across Georgia that cities and counties aren’t doing enough to combat,” said Sen. Randy Robertson, R-Cataula, the bill’s chief sponsor and a former law enforcement officer.
“The individuals going out and committing these crimes are not new criminals,” Robertson said. “The vast majority are recidivists, individuals the system has been kind to. “
But Democrats argued the bill would be counterproductive. Sen. Josh McLaurin, D-Sandy Springs, cited studies showing that the longer a criminal suspect sits in jail, the more likely that person is to become a repeat offender.
“This bill is mean spirited,” said Sen. Nabilah Islam, D-Lawrenceville. “It unfairly targets Georgia’s poor … and makes Georgia less safe by making it more likely people will end up back in the criminal justice system.”
McLaurin praised former Gov. Nathan Deal, a Republican, for his efforts to enact criminal justice reform in Georgia through initiatives including accountability courts aimed at keeping people out of jail.
“If you’re in jail, you can’t go to your job, take care of your family, get treatment for a medical condition,” McLaurin said. “Gov. Nathan Deal understood that. We are moving in the opposite direction Gov. Nathan Deal took us.”
But Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, chairman of the Senate Public Safety Committee, said Democrats’ arguments against the bill were more concerned about criminals than their victims.
“We should be mortified that people are afraid to leave their homes,” he said. “We have a responsibility to protect the people of this state.”
Senators approved an amendment to the bill brought by Sen. Ed Setzler, R-Acworth. Under the change he proposed, a person charged with a crime who fails to appear in court would be denied cash bail on their “second or subsequent offense” rather than after the first.
The bill now moves to the Georgia House of Representatives.
Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta CEO Donna Hyland was joined by Mercer School of Medicine Dean Dr. Jean Sumner, former state governor Nathan Deal, and current state leaders in announcing a new partnership aimed at bolstering rural pediatric rural care. (Photo courtesy Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta)
ATLANTA – Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta has created a $200 million fund and formed a partnership with Mercer University School of Medicine to bolster rural healthcare for the youngest Georgians.
The new partnership will fund 10 full scholarships for medical students who study at Mercer and agree to practice pediatric medicine in rural Georgia for four years after completing their training.
The new fund will also support a number of pilot projects to improve pediatric care outside of metro Atlanta. One is aimed at ensuring that eight rural emergency rooms are “kid ready.”
The hospitals that will participate are: Clinch Memorial Hospital, Coffee Regional Medical Center, Crisp Regional Hospital, Dodge County Hospital, Mountain Lakes Medical Center in Rabun County, Taylor Regional Hospital in Pulaski County, Upson Regional Medical Center and Washington County Regional Medical Center.
The new project will also help five rural pediatricians with peer support and additional training: Dr. Grace Davis in Worth County, Dr. Leah Helton in Laurens County, Dr. Brittany Lord in Dodge County, Dr. Jennifer Stroud in Coffee County and Dr. Jennifer Tarbutton in Washington County.
The new partnership will work to develop a “comprehensive approach” to mental health services, including virtual mental health services and suicide prevention programs, in Washington and Jefferson counties.
Children’s will also increase funding for the Atlanta-area Ronald McDonald House charities. These charities provide support – including housing – for families that must travel to Atlanta to get care for their children.
Children’s serves pediatric patients from every Georgia county, with the system providing care to more than 32,000 patients from rural counties last year, CEO Donna Hyland said.
“The purpose of this effort is to expand access to quality care in rural communities and provide rural children with the right care at the right time in the right place,” said Dr. Jean Sumner, dean of the Mercer University School of Medicine, which is the home of the Georgia Rural Health Innovation Center.
“We hope that rural pediatricians will be empowered to serve patients … and families will be able to stay closer to home, when possible, for convenient care and follow-up.”
Sumner and Hyland were joined by Gov. Brian Kemp, Lt.-Gov. Burt Jones, state House speaker Jon Burns and former governor Nathan Deal during a Wednesday press conference announcing the partnership at the state Capitol.
State lawmakers and others have, in the past, criticized non-profit hospital systems for allegedly inadequate spending on charity care. Such criticism resulted in the passage of a 2019 GOP-sponsored bill requiring nonprofit hospitals to post financial data on their webpages.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp’s $32.5 billion mid-year budget is a step closer to final passage.
The Georgia Senate passed its version of the spending plan Thursday by an overwhelming 54-1 margin.
The mid-year budget, which covers state spending through June 30, is highlighted by $1 billion in property tax relief Kemp promised on the campaign trail last year. It also includes $1.1 billion to backfill the revenue the state lost last year and at the beginning of this year from the governor’s temporary suspension of Georgia’s sales tax on gasoline and other motor fuels.
The mid-year budget increases spending about 6.8% over the fiscal 2023 budget the General Assembly adopted last spring, about even with the rate of inflation since then.
“This is very much in line with where we’ve seen spending on a national level go,” Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Blake Tillery, R-Vidalia, told his Senate colleges before Thursday’s vote.
The Senate version of the mid-year budget includes Kemp’s request to fully fund Georgia’s Quality Basic Education k-12 student formula (QBE), at $12.4 billion the largest single expenditure in the budget. After years of falling short of the mark, the state has been able to put up full funding of the QBE for the last several years.
The mid-year spending plan also includes $128.2 million to account for student enrollment growth in Georgia public schools since last year.
The Senate rejected a proposal in the version of the mid-year budget the Georgia House passed early this month that added $23 million to the governor’s funding request for school security grants, enough to raise the grants from $50,000 for every school in the state to $60,000. Instead, the Senate went back to the $50,000 grants favored by Kemp.
Senators reduced Kemp’s request for $105 million for a new electronic medical records system at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta to $50 million.
The Senate also added $50 million for transportation infrastructure needed to accommodate the Hyundai electric vehicle manufacturing plant being built in Bryan County.
House and Senate leaders now must work out their differences in the mid-year budget to get a final version to Kemp’s desk for his signature.
The state House of Representatives approved Gov. Brian Kemp’s proposal to provide income tax refunds to Georgians this year.
ATLANTA – The Georgia House of Representatives Thursday approved Gov. Brian Kemp’s proposal to provide Georgia taxpayers with state income tax refunds this year.
Single taxpayers or married taxpayers filing individually are set to receive $250. A head of household would receive a $375 refund, and married couples filing jointly would get $500. The $1 billion to cover the cost of the refund would come from Georgia’s record budget surplus.
“We’ve had a surplus in Georgia,” said Rep. Lauren McDonald, R-Cumming, the bill’s sponsor and the governor’s floor leader in the House. “It’s our responsibility to give the money back to the taxpayers that’s theirs.”
The only change this year is that people who are claimed as dependents can also get the $250 tax refund. This would allow young people such as high-school students who also work to reap the benefit, McDonald said.
Rep. El-Mahdi Holly, D-Stockbridge, voted in favor of the bill but suggested that the House should in the future approve a state tax credit similar to the federal earned income tax credit for low- and middle-income families.
The bill passed nearly unanimously, with a 170-2 vote. Reps. Al Williams, D-Midway, and Spencer Frye, D-Athens, were the sole no votes.
The bill now moves to the Senate for consideration.
The state House Thursday also approved a resolution retroactively approving Kemp’s executive orders from last year that temporarily suspended the state’s gasoline tax.
“The governor’s actions delivered much-needed temporary relief to Georgians at the pump, which saved taxpayers approximately $1.7 million,” said Rep. Matthew Gambill, R-Cartersville, the resolution’s main sponsor.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – A legislative committee approved a bill Wednesday aimed at putting in place a framework for selling electricity to drivers of electric vehicles in Georgia and taxing it.
The House Technology & Infrastructure Innovation Committee unanimously passed House Bill 406 and sent it to the House Rules Committee to schedule a vote of the full House.
The legislation stems from the work of a joint legislative study committee last year that explored how the state should prepare to accommodate an anticipated influx of electric vehicles in the coming years.
Georgia is receiving $135 million in federal funds to build a network of EV charging stations across the state. Most of the stations are likely to locate at restaurants and convenience stores, although utilities including Georgia Power also own and operate charging stations.
House Bill 406 would allow retailers to charge EV drivers for electricity by the kilowatt hour. Currently, charges are based on the length of time a vehicle is connected to the charging station.
The Georgia Department of Agriculture would be responsible for testing and inspecting EV chargers for safety and accuracy, as the agency currently does with gasoline pumps.
EV motorists would pay an excise tax on the electricity they buy. The Georgia Department of Revenue would set the tax rate at a level that would generate the same revenue the state gets from the tax on gasoline.
“The goal is to make sure as we move from carbon-based fuel to electric, we maintain our funding,” said Rep. Rick Jasperse, R-Jasper, the bill’s chief sponsor. “We have to make sure everybody pays their fair share.”
Jasperse said Georgia is out in front of other states on the concept of treating the electricity that powers EVs the same as gasoline for tax purposes.
“We are the leader,” he said. “We are on the absolute cutting edge of this.”
Representatives of Georgia utilities and convenience stores, who have worked with legislators for a couple of years on issues surrounding EV charging, spoke in favor of the bill Wednesday, particularly selling the power by the kilowatt hour.
“We feel this is a good opportunity to move the needle toward electric,” said Angela Holland, president of the Georgia Association of Convenience Stores.
But Holland and others expressed concerns over how to make sure utilities and convenience stores are charging the same rates for the electricity they sell to EVs and how to bring EV charging at multi-family residences and workplaces into the law. For now, Georgians who charge their EVs at home pay an annual fee of $216 to offset the loss of tax revenue to the state because they’re not using gasoline.
Katherine Russell, director of policy for the agriculture department, said her agency won’t be in a position to carry out the testing and inspections of EV chargers the bill calls for anytime soon.
“This is an emerging technology,” she said. “Some of the testing equipment isn’t commercially available. We’d like some time to get up to speed.”
The section of the bill dealing with the regulatory authority of the agriculture department wouldn’t take effect until the middle of 2025, but Jasperse said that might have to be moved back.
A similar bill on EVs is now before the Georgia Senate’s Regulated Industries Committee.
