ATLANTA – Area Development magazine has selected Georgia as the No.-1 state for business for the 10th year in a row, Gov. Brian Kemp announced Tuesday.
Georgia placed in the top 10 for all 14 categories included in the magazine’s annual rankings and earned the No.-1 spot in seven of those categories.
Georgia has generated 343,650 new jobs since first receiving the award a decade ago, and that includes only economic development projects in which the state played a role.
Most of those jobs came to communities in rural Georgia, Kemp said during a ceremony at the Governor’s Mansion attended by state agency heads, legislators, and former Gov. Nathan Deal, who was in office at the time Georgia first won the designation as the best state for business in 2013.
“People shouldn’t have to move away from home to find good economic opportunities,” Kemp said.
The 2023 Top States for Doing Business Survey is the 14th in Area Development magazine’s annual series.
ATLANTA – Georgia high school athletes will be able to make money off of their name, image, and likeness (NIL) following a unanimous vote by the Georgia High School Association (GHSA) board.
Monday’s vote will put high school athletes on a par with their older brothers and sisters playing college sports. The General Assembly passed legislation two years ago letting student-athletes at Georgia colleges, universities and technical colleges receive compensation for use of their name, image and likeness.
The new high school rule comes with a number of restrictions in order for students wishing to take advantage of the opportunities provided by an NIL to maintain their amateur status.
Students may not wear school logos, school names, school uniforms, or any items depicting school mascots or any trademarked GHSA logo or acronym in association with NIL advertising.
No GHSA member school facility may be used. Student athletes may not promote products that conflict with a member school’s local school district policies, including tobacco, alcohol, or controlled substances.
Compensation paid through NILs must not be contingent on specific athletic performance or achievement, or as an incentive to enroll or remain enrolled at a specific school.
Students entering into an NIL agreement, or a student’s parents or guardians, must notify the school’s principal or athletic director within seven calendar days.
Students and their families should seek professional guidance as to how NIL activities could affect collegiate financial aid and/or tax implications.
Some high-profile Georgia college athletes have built substantial NILs since lawmakers legalized the agreements in 2021. Georgia Bulldogs tight end Brock Bowers, for example, has NIL deals that include Associated Credit Union, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and Elliott International, an Atlanta-based executive staffing company.
ATLANTA – An inmate at Smith State Prison in Glennville has been charged with killing a correctional officer who was escorting him from the dining hall.
Correctional Officer Robert Clark, 42, was assaulted from behind with a homemade weapon Sunday as he was escorting inmates Layton Lester and Marko Willingham, according to a news release from the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC).
Willingham, who stepped in to help Officer Clark, also was assaulted. Both were transported to local hospitals, where Clark died of his wounds and Willingham remains with non-life threatening injuries.
“The entire GDC team is mourning the loss of one of our own, and we collectively express our deepest condolences to Officer Clark’s family and friends,” state Commissioner of Corrections Tyrone Oliver said Sunday. “We will support them as they navigate this tragedy over the coming days, weeks and months.”
“Today, we join the public safety community in mourning the loss of Corrections Officer Robert Clark,” Gov. Brian Kemp added. “Please join us in praying for his family, loved ones, and the Georgia Department of Corrections at this time.”
Clark was new to the corrections agency, having just joined the department at Smith State Prison in April.
Lester will be charged in the assault and resulting death of Officer Clark, as well as the assault of inmate Willingham.
Lester is serving a life sentence for a murder conviction stemming from a 2007 killing and armed robbery in Tift County, the Associated Press reported.
ATLANTA – A nonprofit headed by a former aide to Republican Gov. Brian Kemp is launching a six-figure ad campaign supporting tort reform legislation.
Kemp said in August that reforming the state’s civil justice system would be a priority for next year’s General Assembly session.
The last major change in Georgia’s tort laws came back in 2005, when the legislature’s newly elected Republican majorities in the state House and Senate passed a bill capping awards of non-economic damages in lawsuits at $350,000.
However, the state Supreme Court overturned the law in 2010. Since then, efforts to pass significant tort reform have failed to make it through the General Assembly.
“For too long, Georgia tort laws have encouraged frivolous lawsuits that hamstring job creators, drive up insurance costs for families already struggling to make ends meet, undermine fairness in the courtroom, and make it harder to start, grow, and operate a small business,” said Cody Hall, executive director of Hardworking Georgians Inc.
Hall said the nonprofit will go “all-in” to support Kemp’s push for tort reform during the 2024 legislative session starting in January. The Georgia Chamber of Commerce will be an ally in that fight.
Legislative Democrats and trial lawyers will be on the other side of the debate. Opponents of tort reform say changes to the civil justice system backed by Republicans would strip away the constitutional rights of victims of car crashes and medical malpractice to have their day in court.
ATLANTA – Thirty years ago, the newspaper industry was just beginning to feel the first ripples of what would become a massive wave of change brought on by the internet.
That same year – 1993 – Robin Rhodes was stepping up from a staff position at the Georgia Press Association (GPA) to take the organization’s helm as executive director. Thanks to her leadership, newspaper executives across the state made the transition to the digital world smoothly instead of fighting it.
“The internet has made a huge difference in the way newspapers are produced,” said Rhodes, who will retire as the GPA’s full-time leader this fall. “We’ve had to move the legal [notices] online. That was a huge accomplishment.
“The members realized that had to be done or they would lose that business. We were probably one of the first states to have 100% participation.”
Rhodes was a natural fit for the GPA when she joined the association in 1986. She had been working for a company that hosted trade shows, including the Atlanta Home Show, where she sold booths to real-estate vendors.
Rhodes got a phone call from then-GPA Executive Director Kathy Berry asking if she’d be interested in handling arrangements for the association’s annual convention.
“Going to the GPA involved pretty much the same thing,” Rhodes said.
When Berry left the association in 1993, Rhodes applied for and landed the job as her successor.
Along with adapting to the internet era, Rhodes said a major challenge of her tenure in office has been coping with large corporations buying up local newspapers.
“They’re from out of state. They don’t care about the community,” she said. “It’s not the same presence as local ownership.”
One of the executive director’s key roles is representing the newspaper industry’s interests with state government leaders. That involves wearing out a lot of shoe leather in the hallways of the Gold Dome during annual General Assembly sessions.
“Robin Rhodes has more connections than Georgia has pine trees,” said Alan NeSmith, regional publisher of The Northeast Georgian in Cornelia and past president of the GPA. “Her relationships with influential leaders and hardworking newspaper people across the state has been the bedrock of our beloved association.”
Rhodes said Atlanta-based Troutman Peppers Strategies and its principal, Ragen Marsh, have been highly effective representing the GPA at the state Capitol. She also gave a shout-out to the various executives at member newspapers.
“Their relationships with local legislators has been tremendous,” she said.
GPA’s strong working relationship with Georgia decision makers paid off this year when the General Assembly passed and Gov. Brian Kemp signed legislation allowing newspapers to raise their rates for legal notices. House Bill 254 cleared the legislature with just one “no” vote.
“[Newspapers] hadn’t had an increase in 27 years,” Rhodes said. “It was time.”
Kemp had parting words of praise for Rhodes in congratulating her on her retirement.
“For decades, her leadership has helped bring awareness of important developments to communities all across our state,” the governor said. “She has played an essential role in informing Georgians of what’s going on, both locally and statewide.”
Rhodes credited Capitol Beat News Service, which the GPA launched nearly four years ago, with contributing to that mission of informing Georgians about the latest happenings in state government.
“The small newspapers don’t have the opportunity to have somebody at the Capitol,” she said. “That was a void across our state. You ask any newspaper out there, and it has a lifeline to the Capitol.”
Rhodes isn’t stepping away from the GPA completely. She plans to spend the next two years in a part-time capacity,
“I’ll be giving up the day to day and working with Ragen and the [GPA] board, which is a great opportunity for me,” she said. “It keeps me involved.”
