ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp signed what he called an “historic” $36.1 billion state budget Tuesday containing healthy raises for state employees and public school teachers.
The fiscal 2025 budget, which takes effect July 1, represents an increase of $3.7 billion over the fiscal 2024 budget the General Assembly adopted last spring, including record spending on education and mental health and significant increases for public safety.
“This budget is the biggest demonstration of our priorities,” Kemp said during a ceremony inside the Georgia Capitol. “Because we refuse to spend beyond our means, we’re able to invest in these core areas while cutting taxes at the same time.”
The budget provides 4% cost-of-living raises for most state and university system employees, with an additional $3,000 for workers in state agencies suffering high turnover rates, including law enforcement officers and welfare workers. Teachers will get a pay raise of $2,500, bringing the total to $9,500 since Kemp took office in 2019.
Addressing both education and public safety, the spending plan earmarks $108 million in grants to upgrade security on public school campuses. Every public school in Georgia will get a grant of $45,000.
“We want to and we will keep our children safe,” said Georgia House Speaker Jon Burns, R-Newington.
Also in the public safety arena, the budget provides $10.7 million for a technology upgrade inside state prisons to head off a flood of cellphones and other contraband being smuggled in to inmates. Another $4.8 million will go to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to launch a gang task force in Columbus.
The budget kicks in additional funding for a number of programs already underway, including $20 million for a state reinsurance plan begun last year that aims to hold down health coverage premiums and $6 million for the Rural Workforce Housing initiative, also launched in 2023.
“Every Georgian should be able to live in the same community where they work,” Kemp said.
On the mental health front, the budget puts $16.5 million toward a network of behavioral health crisis centers across the state.
Despite the record spending, Kemp and the General Assembly also are continuing to reduce taxes, which they can afford to do thanks to a $16 billion budget surplus. The legislature signed off this year on the governor’s proposal to accelerate a state income tax cut lawmakers adopted last year.
Altogether, the governor and General Assembly have returned more than $5 billion to Georgia taxpayers, Kemp said.
ATLANTA – A Georgia man and his two adult sons have been arrested on charges related to the breach of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
William Gallagher, 55, of Ellijay was charged Monday with civil disorder, a felony, and misdemeanor offenses of knowingly entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds without lawful authority, disorderly conduct, and demonstrating in the Capitol.
The FBI also arrested Gallagher’s two adult sons – James Gallagher, 22, and Thomas Gallagher, 25 – on misdemeanor charges related to the attack on the Capitol.
According to court documents, closed-circuit television footage of the Capitol shows William Gallagher entering the Rotunda shortly after its doors had been breached. He then made his way to Statuary Hall and back to the Rotunda before placing calls to his two sons.
William Gallagher then participated with other rioters in pushing the Rotunda doors to open them from the inside.
Court documents say he placed his gloved hands on a Capitol Police officer and forcibly pulled the officer off the doors. He then put his hands on the officer again and, with the help of another rioter, pushed the officer out of the entryway. As a result, the Rotunda doors were breached, allowing rioters to stream into the building.
At this point, Gallagher’s two sons entered the building via the Rotunda doors and met up with their father in the Rotunda. The three men then made their way toward the Senate Chamber.
Law enforcement officers began clearing the area of rioters a short time later, and the three men exited the Capitol building via the Rotunda doors.
The case is being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia and the Justice Department’s National Security Division’s Counterterrorism Section. Assistance was provided by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia.
The case is being investigated by the FBI’s Atlanta and Washington field offices, with help from the U.S. Capitol Police and the Metropolitan Police Department.
ATLANTA – A group of African-American faith leaders vowed Monday to support Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis as she deals with death threats and political pushback, both stemming from her prosecution of former President Donald Trump.
Gathered on the steps of historic Big Bethel AME Church in the Sweet Auburn neighborhood renowned for its connection to the civil rights movement, the group endorsed Willis’ bid for a second term as Fulton’s top prosecutor. Willis is being challenged in the May 21 Democratic primary by former Fulton County prosecutor Christian Wise Smith.
“We make this endorsement today because of her record, her principles, and her commitment to service,” said Georgia AME Bishop Reginald Jackson. “Fani Willis is a person of tremendous courage and integrity.”
Willis drew national and international attention last August when the grand jury she empaneled indicted Trump and 18 co-defendants on racketeering charges accusing them of taking part in a criminal conspiracy to overturn the results of Georgia’s 2020 presidential election.
With that fame came death threats from Trump supporters, including an announcement just last Friday that Marc Shultz, 66, of Chula Vista, Calif., was indicted late last month for allegedly posting two separate YouTube videos threatening that Willis “will be killed like a dog.”
On Monday, Willis said she will not let such threats dissuade her from doing the job she was elected to do.
“I don’t care how many times they threaten me,” she said. “If we brought an indictment, we plan on prosecuting it.”
Willis also pushed back at criticism leveled by Smith and Republicans in the state Senate that focusing so much of her office’s attention on prosecuting Trump and his allies has diverted away resources her agency should be using to go after violent criminals in Atlanta.
She said the DA’s office was swamped with a backlog of cases going back seven years when she took office.
“We’ve been able to get rid of that massive backlog,” she said.
Willis said homicides have decreased more than 21% on her watch.
“Atlanta had a gang problem,” she said. “We’ve been able to bring crime down.”
Willis said she could do more to reduce overcrowding at the Fulton County Jail if the county commission would provide her and Sheriff Patrick Labat with more funding.
“We’re doing the best job we can with the resources we have been given,” she said.
The Republican-controlled state Senate’s Special Committee on Investigations has invited Willis to testify about her use of public funds to pursue the Trump case. Committee Chairman Bill Cowsert, R-Athens, said last Friday the committee would issue a subpoena to Willis if she doesn’t come voluntarily.
“I don’t think they have the authority to subpoena me,” Willis said Monday. “I will not appear for anything that is unlawful.”
ATLANTA – A South Georgia-based manufacturer dedicated an expansion Friday with the capacity to produce millions of packets a day of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) to prevent and treat acute malnutrition.
The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) announced a $200 million initiative to maximize the procurement and distribution of RUTF produced by MANA Nutrition in Fitzgerald. USIA Administrator Samantha Power was on hand for the ceremony.
“This U.S. government investment in RUTF … can save millions of the most vulnerable children in our global village – and it will enable MANA to draw upon the strength of our village in Georgia, which proudly supplies the workforce and key ingredients required to produce RUTF,” said Mark Moore, MANA’s founder and CEO.
Severe malnutrition claims the lives of one in five children under the age of five. But the disease is treatable with RUTF, a shelf-stable product made from peanuts, milk powder, oil, sugar, and a blend of nutrients. It costs less than $1 a day to treat a child with RUTF, and it’s highly effective, with a recovery rate of 90%.
MANA Nutrition, a nonprofit, currently produces three million packets of RUTF each day. The expansion is the culmination of two years of planning, engineering, and construction.
The packets it produces will be distributed through UNICEF and the UN World Food Program to people in Sudan, Burkina Faso, Haiti, and other areas where hunger is rampant. The new initiative will build on USAID’s ongoing nutrition support efforts in places like Gaza and Ethiopia.
Others attending Friday’s ceremony included U.S. Rep. Austin Scott, R-Tifton; Amy Towers, MANA’s board chair; and British philanthropist Sir Chris Hohn, who announced he’s making a $50 million investment in the company’s operation.
ATLANTA – Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was free to hire special prosecutors to pursue the election interference case against former President Donald Trump and pay them whatever she thought was necessary, two high-ranking county officials testified Friday.
“That’s solely the prerogative of the district attorney,” Fulton County Commission Chairman Robb Pitts told members of a state Senate committee formed to investigate allegations of misconduct and misuse of public funds lodged against Willis in her handling of the Trump prosecution. “We don’t get into that sort of detail.”
The Senate Special Committee on Investigations was formed in January after one of Trump’s co-defendants filed a motion accusing Willis of being involved in a romantic relationship with Nathan Wade, a special prosecutor she hired to pursue the investigation. Willis and Wade acknowledged the relationship but argued it did not constitute grounds for her to be dismissed from handling the case.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee ruled last month that Willis could remain but only if Wade resigned. He did so a few hours later and was replaced as head of the investigation by Pete Skandalakis, executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia.
At Friday’s hearing, Fulton County Chief Financial Officer Sharon Whitmore testified that the county commission reviews and votes on the district attorney’s annual general fund budget request. Willis received $36.6 million from the general fund for the current fiscal year, she said.
An additional bucket of funds has come the federal government in the form of pandemic relief, Whitmore said.
Willis did not seek prior approval from the commission before using those funds to hire Wade and two other special prosecutors to take on the election interference case.
“The board of commissioners has no oversight over the district attorney,” Whitmore said.
After hearing that testimony, Sen. Bill Cowsert, the committee’s chairman, cited a state law that requires district attorneys seeking to hire independent contractors to receive prior approval from their county commission.
“This sounds to me like the Wild West, very little control for Fulton County,” said Cowsert, R-Athens.
But Fulton County Attorney Soo Joo said the state law applies only to assistant district attorneys, and it’s unclear either in case law or court rulings whether it should also pertain to special prosecutors.
Cowsert said one of the Senate committee’s purposes is to determine whether there’s a need to pass new laws or amend existing laws to restore public confidence in the criminal justice system. He said requiring district attorneys to submit for prior approval requests to hire special prosecutors is an issue lawmakers may address.
ATLANTA – The debate over a tax break the data center industry has enjoyed in Georgia for the last six years has moved from the General Assembly to the governor’s office.
The legislature passed a bill during this year’s session suspending for two years a state sales tax exemption on purchases of data center equipment aimed at attracting more data centers to Georgia.
The measure also would create a 14-member state commission to study how the tax break has been affecting the state’s existing electric grid and energy supply and make recommendations by June 30, 2026, on how those impacts should be addressed.
While environmental advocates are urging Gov. Brian Kemp to sign the bill, representatives of the data center industry are asking him to veto it. Kemp has until Tuesday, May 7, to sign or veto legislation the General Assembly passed this year.
Republican legislative leaders got behind House Bill 1192, arguing for the need to slow the rush of data centers lured to Georgia by the tax break. Since the sales tax exemption was approved in 2018, such high-profile companies as Microsoft, Meta, and Google have set up data-center operations in the Peach State.
The bill’s supporters said the industry’s rapid growth is putting a strain on the state’s capacity to supply enough electricity for the power-hungry data centers. That point was driven home when executives with Georgia Power said the industry accounted for 80% of the additional electrical generating capacity the utility was seeking from the state Public Service Commission.
With that concern in mind, nine environmental organizations – including Environment Georgia, the Southern Environmental Law Center, and the state chapter of the Sierra Club – sent a letter late last month urging Kemp to sign the bill. The letter raised concerns about how unchecked growth of data centers could affect residential electric bills.
“Georgia Power customers already have seen steady increases in their bills in recent years,” the letter stated. “There is no guarantee that data centers will shoulder expanded electricity demand alone.”
The letter went on to warn that the higher demand for electricity data centers pose would result in greater reliance on fossil fuels, hurting air quality and increasing carbon emissions.
Besides the stress data centers put on electricity, they also require a great deal of water to cool servers and other computing equipment, the environmental groups wrote.
“By signing HB1192, you will move forward reasonable steps that will help Georgia understand and plan for the large environmental and financial impacts data centers bring to our state,” the letter suggested to the governor.
But advocates for the industry say ending the tax break for the next two years would send the wrong message to an industry that relies on certainty and predictability.
Josh Levi, president of the Virginia-based Data Center Coalition, cited a recent PricewaterhouseCoopers report that Georgia’s data center industry provided 22,760 jobs in 2021.
“The abrupt suspension of the High-Tech Data Center Equipment Tax Incentive Program in HB1192 would create tremendous uncertainty around many data center projects planned and actively under development across the state,” Levi said.
“Additionally, there is risk of data center customers migrating to the more than 25 other states that maintain tax policies similar to the program HB1192 would suspend.”
The bill’s supporters counter that the suspension of the sales tax exemption would only apply to new data center projects, not those already in the pipeline.
