ATLANTA – A state senator and state representative-elect have joined forces to form the General Assembly’s first Hispanic caucus.
Sen. Jason Anavitarte, R-Dallas, who was elected Senate majority caucus chairman last week, and Rep.-elect Rey Martinez, R-Loganville, announced the creation of the Georgia Hispanic Caucus Thursday.
The caucus is open to legislators from both parties and both legislative chambers, with a goal of delivering strong representation to Georgia’s more than 1 million Hispanic residents.
Hispanics make up more than 10% of the state’s population. They are the third largest and second-fastest growing ethnic group in Georgia.
“Over the last decade, Georgia has seen immense growth within the Hispanic community,” Anavitarte said. “In the General Assembly … Georgians elected a record number of Hispanic officials to serve them in the state House and Senate this November.
“With the creation of our state’s first-ever Hispanic Caucus, my Republican colleagues and I aim not only to deliver strong representation to one of our state’s most important communities – but to send a clear message that Hispanic values will be at the front and center of conversations under the Gold Dome for years to come.”
“Hispanics are not single-issue voters who care solely about immigration,” Martinez added. “We are parents, business-owners, and hardworking Georgians who ultimately want the same freedoms and opportunities that have enabled generations of Americans to achieve prosperity and success. These are the values – and the individuals – that the Hispanic Caucus will work tirelessly to defend.”
Anavitarte was elected to the General Assembly two years ago. He represents the 31st Senate District, which includes all of Polk County and most of Paulding County.
Martinez was elected this month to an open seat in the 111th House District with more than 65% of the vote. The district includes portions of Gwinnett and Walton counties.
The presence of Hispanic lawmakers in the General Assembly goes back two decades. Rep. Pedro “Pete” Marin, D-Duluth, was elected in 2002. Other Hispanic legislators to serve under the Gold Dome include former Sen. Sam Zamarripa, D-Atlanta, and former Rep. David Casas, R-Lilburn.
The Georgia Hispanic Caucus will formally convene when the 2023 session of the General Assembly begins in January.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – While development authorities are an essential economic development tool in Georgia, they need more controls to prevent abuses, witnesses told a state Senate study committee Thursday.
Local government and school district officials have complained that development authorities are too prone to lavish property tax abatements on developers that take away the revenue they need to provide services. The study committee has been meeting during the summer and fall to come up with recommended legislation for the full Senate to consider this winter.
Some of the problems are structural, DeKalb County Commissioner Jeff Rader testified Thursday. He said members of development authority boards tend to remain on them after their terms have expired because no one has been appointed to replace them.
In DeKalb County, tax abatements tend to vary according to the size of a project rather than maintaining uniformity, Rader said.
“There’s really no qualitative analysis that goes into these things,” he said.
Worse still, there’s no substantive way to determine whether a developer seeking tax abatements would build a project without them, Rader said.
“Money that goes to unnecessary tax abatements hurts school districts and other governments,” he said.
Julian Bene, a former member of the board at Invest Atlanta, the city’s economic development arm, cited several instances in recent years where a developer has asked for tax abatements and been turned down, yet went ahead and built their project anyway. He mentioned the expansion of Ponce City Market in Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward as an example.
Bene said some development authorities approve tax abatements simply to gain the fees they earn from the transaction as a revenue source.
“We have a public trust problem with development authorities,” he said. “If the boards of these authorities aren’t making decisions in the public interest, you’ve got a problem.”
Both witnesses said tax abatements tend to be most beneficial when offered for job-generating industrial projects where there’s competition from other communities. Apartments and retail projects don’t tend to need tax breaks because the developers are motivated to build them because of market demand.
Sen. Max Burns, R-Sylvania, the study committee’s chairman, said one topic the panel should consider in its recommendations is addressing the charging of fees by development authorities to generate revenue.
Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver, D-Decatur, who is on the committee despite being a member of the House, suggested eliminating per-diem payments to members of development authority boards.
The committee is planning one more meeting Nov. 30 to begin shaping its report to the full Senate. The panel expects to release the report next month.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – The Georgia Lottery Corp. Thursday reported its most profitable first quarter ever.
The lottery program transferred $389.9 million in profits to education covering July, August, and September, the first three months of fiscal 2023. That surpasses last year’s first quarter transfer by $25.1 million.
“As we celebrate another record quarter for the Georgia Lottery, we’re especially mindful of the direct impact these funds will have on our students and their families,” Gov. Brian Kemp said. “Our state’s HOPE Scholarship and Pre-K programs serve an essential role in educating the next generation, and this record-breaking quarter will ultimately benefit those students the most.”
Since its inception in 1993, the lottery has returned more than $25.7 billion to the state for education. More than 2 million students have received HOPE scholarships, and more than 1.7 million 4-year-olds have attended the statewide, voluntary prekindergarten program.
The lottery program has undergone significant changes over the years. The HOPE Scholarships initiative initially set family income limits to qualify but soon switched to a merit-based program as lottery ticket sales greatly exceeded early expectations.
By 2011, demand for scholarships was outstripping HOPE revenues, prompting then-Gov. Nathan Deal and the General Assembly to reduce benefits to the point that only students with grade-point-averages of 3.5 or better in high school could receive full college tuition coverage.
The percentage of tuition costs HOPE is covering for other students receiving scholarships has gradually risen in recent years as the program recovered its financial footing.
However, legislative Democrats have been pushing for Georgia to offer some need-based scholarships as well, using funds that could be generated if the state decides to legalize sports betting and/or casino gambling.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Georgia’s unemployment rate rose slightly last month but remained below the national jobless rate, the state Department of Labor reported Thursday.
Unemployment in Georgia stood at 2.9% in October, up from a record-low of 2.8% set during the previous month but below the national rate of 3.7%.
“Although Georgia’s unemployment rate went up slightly from September, the rate of job creation still far exceeds those in the workforce looking for employment,” state Commissioner of Labor Mark Butler said. “We must continue to encourage jobseekers to join the workforce and take advantage of the incredible job opportunities we are seeing.”
Despite the uptick in unemployment, job numbers reached another all-time high last month, increasing by 3,700 from September to more than 4.8 million.
The largest job gains occurred in the arts, entertainment, and recreation sector, where jobs increased by 1,600. The finance and insurance sector was next with 1,500 jobs gained. The number of local government jobs rose by 1,400.
“We are starting to see some churn in the employment numbers with some isolated layoff events offsetting some of the all-time highs we have experienced,” Butler said. “However, we are still setting records in multiple sectors highlighting the current favorable hiring environment for Georgians.”
The number of employed residents fell by 9,527 last month to nearly 5.2 million. The number of unemployed was up 3,954 to 152,124, the first over-the-month increase since the early days of the pandemic in April 2020.
Initial jobless claims were down in October by 651 compared to September, or 3%, to 20,919. Over the year, initial claims fell by 6,391, or 23%.
There are more than 165,000 jobs listed online at EmployGeorgia.com. Industries with more than 10,000 job postings include health care with 30,000 postings, followed by retail trade with 16,000, and accommodation and food services with 14,000.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Georgia House Speaker David Ralston died Wednesday at the age of 68, just two days after the House Republican Caucus nominated a new speaker to succeed him in January.
Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, had been suffering from an extended illness. His wife, Sheree, his children, and other members of his family were with him when he passed away, his office announced. Arrangements will be announced in the future.
Ralston announced early last week that he would not seek election by his House colleagues to another term as speaker, citing his health. Voters in the 7th House District in Northwest Georgia reelected him Nov. 8 without opposition.
At the time of his death, Ralston was the longest currently serving state house speaker in the nation.
As provided by the Georgia Constitution, House Speaker Pro Tempore Jan Jones, R-Milton, will serve as speaker for the remainder of the current term, which ends in January.
On Monday, House Republicans nominated Majority Leader Jon Burns, R-Newington, to succeed Ralston as speaker. The full House will vote on the nomination on the first day of the 2023 General Assembly session Jan. 9.
Political leaders who served with Ralston remembered him Wednesday as an effective leader who played a key role in the major legislation the General Assembly adopted during his tenure.
“Speaker Ralston was a pioneer in the growth of Georgia’s Republican leadership and leaves an indelible mark on this state,” Gov. Brian Kemp said. “His last session as speaker will long be remembered for his landmark mental health reform bill, helping Georgians fight through inflation, and passing a historic income tax cut that puts more money in the pockets of taxpayers for years to come.
“We are also especially proud of our previous bipartisan efforts on reforming the citizens’ arrest law and adding an anti-hate crime statute to the Georgia code, which would not have happened without the speaker’s steadfast leadership. These historic accomplishments were only a handful of the numerous hallmarks of David Ralston’s decades-long service to Georgia.”
“Speaker Ralston was a steady, reliable guiding force under the Gold Dome in good times and tough times,” added state Sen. Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega, who was elected majority leader by Senate Republicans last week. “He cherished the idea of his beloved House being a body that truly represented all of Georgia’s people, and he respected each of the elected members that comprised it, regardless of partisan differences. It takes a genuinely good heart and decent person to lead that way.”
Democrats, too, reflected on Ralston’s passing.
“Georgia Democrats join the entire state in mourning Speaker David Ralston,” said U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, D-Atlanta, chairman of the Georgia Democratic Party. “Speaker Ralston was a statesman who led with fairness and honesty, looked for common ground, and always put his commitment to Georgia first. … Speaker Ralston will be missed dearly – by those who agreed with him, and by those who often didn’t.”
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
