by Ty Tagami | Apr 1, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Legislation that would regulate an alternative method for disposal of the dead is on its way to Gov. Brian Kemp.
The Georgia House of Representatives on Monday adopted Senate Bill 241 by a vote of 157-4. The Senate had already approved the bill in a near unanimous vote in early March.
SB 241 was brought to the legislature by Sen. Rick Williams, R-Milledgeville, who is in the funeral home business.
“It’s just human composting,” he explained in a hearing about the measure several weeks ago, a hearing that was ripe with quips about the “Breaking Bad” bill and a 1950s song called “Dry Bones.”
But Williams said his measure was important for community safety and for the dignity of the deceased. He referenced a recent case in Colorado where remains were not properly disposed of, creating a health hazard.
Williams said properly composted corpses produced safe and hygienic soil that could be returned to families to use as they choose, including in the garden.
by Ty Tagami | Mar 31, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The Georgia legislature threw its support behind legislation that would make it easier for defendants in death penalty cases to avoid execution by proving that they have an intellectual disability.
The House of Represenatives approved House Bill 123 by a vote of 150-3, minutes after the Senate passed it 53-1. The bill, which now goes to Gov. Brian Kemp for his signature, would reduce the burden of proof for intellectual disability to a “preponderance” of the evidence rather than the current standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt.” It would also establish a pre-trial hearing process where the determination could be made rather than requiring it to be made during the guilt phase of a trial.
A convicted defendant could still be sentenced to life in prison. But the Senate amended the bill by adding “without possibility of parole.”
The House had approved the measure by a unanimous vote in early March but had to vote again Monday after the Senate made changes.
by Ty Tagami | Mar 31, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The Georgia legislature on Monday passed a sweeping school safety bill that seeks to identify students who intend to do harm and bolster mental health services for them.
House Bill 268 drew broad bipartisan support in both chambers of the General Assembly Monday, passing the Senate 45-9 and then the House of Representatives 154-12. The House had already approved the bill by a similar margin in early March but had to ratify Senate changes.
The measure has been a priority for House Speaker Jon Burns, R-Newington. The 57-page bill is a reaction to the mass shooting at Apalachee High School in Barrow County last September, which led to four deaths and murder charges against a student and his father, who was accused of giving his son access to a gun. Nine others were wounded.
“We have to make sure that this never happens again in the state of Georgia,” said Sen. Bill Cowsert, R-Athens, whose district includes Barrow County.
HB 268 seeks to prevent violence before it happens. It would require that schools maintain records on students with troubling behavior, from regularly skipping school to disciplinary infractions and police encounters (police would have to inform the schools when they apprehend their students).
Schools would have five business days to share those records when a student transfers to a different school, as happened at Apalachee High. They would also have to maintain an around-the-clock anonymous tip line.
The legislation also calls for more mental health services. Each school system would get up to three state-funded student advocates, one for every 18,000 students. And it would require annual training for teachers and students about recognizing mental health warning signs.
The Senate deleted some provisions that were in the original bill passed by the House.
A mandate for schools to establish threat assessment teams was cut. So was a database that would have served as a repository of information about students who seemed suspicious. One state official said it might contain records on 1% of Georgia’s 1.7 million public school students.
Parents and their advocates feared such data would be inaccurate, prejudicial and stigmatizing — and follow students into adulthood, with potentially harmful consequences.
Cowsert agreed and deleted that provision during the review process in a committee he leads.
“They say and do stupid, irresponsible things,” Cowsert said of teenagers. “Why should we have this shadow database on misconduct of students that didn’t rise to the level of criminal conduct?”
But misconduct that does rise to the criminal level would be treated sternly under HB 268 through a provision added by the Senate. Children ages 13-17 who commit a terroristic act on campus could be tried in adult courts, with potential prison time and convictions that would go on their records for life.
A terroristic act would involve using a weapon, fire, hazardous substance or simulated hazardous substance to terrorize or cause an evacuation.
The legislation also would allow prosecutors to prosecute teens as adults for aggravated assault with a firearm, on or off campus.
That concerned Sen. RaShaun Kemp, D-Atlanta, who noted students in gangs could see their lives “drastically changed” by that new provision.
HB 268 now goes to Gov. Brian Kemp for his signature.
by Ty Tagami | Mar 28, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Joe Salome built up his intoxicating hemp products business from one small store to six, and he got licensed by the state last year after new rules gave the industry a path into the sunlight.
Then, in a surprise move, some Republicans in the Georgia Senate tried to slam the brakes in early March, with legislation that sought to pare back the potency allowed in gummies and other consumables — and that also sought a total ban on beverages containing tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the intoxicating component from hemp.
It wasn’t altogether unexpected by Salome, who said he always gets apprehensive when lawmakers return to the Capitol.
“Every year during this timeframe we hold our breath,” said Salome, owner of The Georgia Hemp Company. “My daughter’s 10, and now during this time of year it’s, ‘Hey dad, anything else bad happen to your business?’ “
Products from the hemp industry with the power to intoxicate started proliferating on store shelves after Congress passed legislation in 2018 that distinguished hemp from marijuana, making hemp derivatives legal.
The two plants are the same species, but hemp flowers contain less THC. Clever entrepreneurs were able to develop products from hemp with an intoxicating effect though.
Georgia began licensing hemp-related companies last year, but Senate Bill 254 sought to pump the brakes. It passed the Senate 42-14 in early March, with Republicans and Democrats voting on both sides.
The chief sponsor of the bill, Sen Bill Cowsert, R-Athens, said the dosages appearing on shelves were hazardous.
“We are putting loaded guns in people’s hands in the form of a can, or a gummy, and we need to protect them,” he said.
Cowsert opposed an amendment that sought to go even further, banning beverages containing THC, the intoxicating ingredient from hemp. But after the amendment passed, Cowsert voted for his amended bill.
The amendment was brought by Sen. Randy Robertson, R-Cataula, the chamber’s majority whip, who said, “We are on a bullet train when dealing with marijuana.”
Despite the Senate’s efforts, it appears the train will keep moving, for this year at least.
The Senate measure hit a wall in the House of Representatives, where Rep. Alan Powell, R-Hartwell, said he was reluctant to ban a substance “that God lets grow naturally.”
Powell chairs the House Regulated Industries Committee, where Cowsert’s bill was sent for review. After Cowsert testified for it at a hearing on Wednesday, people from the hemp industry got a chance to talk about the impact the legislation would have on them.
They spoke of the investments they’d made and of the employees they’d have to let go.
Diana Padron, owner of Hemp Haven ATL, talked about older customers who come to her shop looking for an alternative to pain medications or alcohol.
Meanwhile, a representative from a group called Georgians for Responsible Marijuana Policy, spoke of health risks from hemp products, from anxiety to dependency.
That hearing ended without resolution, but the next day Powell called another one, and he introduced his own amendment to SB 254.
Powell’s substituted language deleted all of the Senate’s proposed limits, including the ban on hemp beverages. It would leave the hemp industry in status quo, with one exception. Instead of punching the brakes, the Powell amendment taps the accelerator, by expanding hemp product sales to package stores, where they are currently prohibited.
The amended bill passed from his committee unanimously.
“We’re going to be studying this in depth this summer,” Powell said.
On Friday, Salome was relieved. “We live for another year,” he said.
by Ty Tagami | Mar 28, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – In a last-minute legislative maneuver, Georgia Senate Republicans have revived a measure that seeks to ban diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in the state’s schools and colleges.
These programs, known by the acronym DEI, were well-intentioned but have been abused, said Sen. Max Burns, R-Sylvania, the author of Senate Bill 120 to ban such programs.
His bill stalled in the House of Representatives, so Burns and fellow Senate Republicans stripped House legislation that had passed to the chamber and replaced it with Burns’ measure Thursday evening.
The Senate Education and Youth Committee then passed House Bill 127, which had been aimed at increasing the number of sick days that teachers can take.
Instead, HB 127 would now withhold state funding from public schools with DEI programs and withhold state funding or state-administered federal funding — including scholarships, loans and grants — from colleges with such programs.
Sen. Greg Dolezal, R-Cumming, said DEI has morphed into “neo-Marxist” ideology that has “infected” the University of Georgia and Georgia Tech. It “squelches” academic freedom, he said,
The legislation targets terms such as “allyship,” “cultural appropriation,” “gender ideology,” “heteronormativity,” “implicit bias,” “intersectionality” and “racial privilege.”
It also targets “antiracism,” a term popularized by the author Ibram X. Kendi in the book “How to be an Antiracist” first published in 2019.
Democrats on the committee pushed back, especially against the idea of punishing schools for teaching antiracism. “So you think we should have a position in support of racism?” asked Sen. RaShaun Kemp, D-Atlanta, who is Black.
Burns, who is white, responded that he believes everyone should have “equal opportunities.” But he accepted an amendment by Kemp to ban the proper noun “Antiracism” rather than the lower-cased “antiracism.”
The amended HB 127 passed the Senate’s education committee in a vote along partisan lines. This was the last meeting of the committee in this legislative session and thus a last opportunity to alter a bill in this manner, though there is still time to make major amendments in the Senate Rules Committee, where this bill is now headed, or on the Senate floor, where the Rules Committee might send it.
For a DEI ban to become law, HB 127 would have to pass the Senate, and then the House would have to agree to the amendments.
The original author of HB 127, Rep. Brent Cox, R-Dawsonville, did not welcome the gutting of his bill, so the House might not appreciate the Senate’s changes.
