ATLANTA – A Korean solar panel manufacturing company announced plans Wednesday to expand an existing operation in Dalton and build a new plant in Cartersville.
The commitment of more than $2.5 billion by Hanwha Qcells, the largest-ever single investment in solar manufacturing in the United States, will create 2,500 jobs.
The project is a direct result of new solar tax credits contained in the Inflation Reduction Act a then-Democratic controlled Congress passed last summer, President Joe Biden said in a prepared statement.
“Hanwha’s Qcells investment will create thousands of good-paying jobs in Georgia, many of which won’t require a four-year degree,” Biden said. “It will bring back our supply chains so we aren’t reliant on other countries, lower the cost of clean energy, and help us combat the climate crisis. And, it will ensure that we manufacture cutting-edge solar technology here at home.”
Hanwha Qcells opened the Dalton plant in 2019, the largest solar manufacturing facility in the Western Hemisphere, generating 750 jobs. An expansion already in progress will create another 470. The new facilities in Dalton and Cartersville are expected to bring Qcells’ total Georgia workforce to more than 4,000 by the end of next year.
“I am honored to announce the growth of Qcells in Georgia for a second time in less than a year,” Gov. Brian Kemp said. “With a focus on innovation and technology, Georgia continues to set itself apart as the No.-1 state for business.”
While the federal solar tax credits ultimately were included in the broader Inflation Reduction Act, the original legislation calling for those tax credits was sponsored by U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff.
“My goal remains to make Georgia the world leader in advanced energy production,” said Ossoff, D-Ga. “That’s why I wrote and passed major legislation to bring more solar manufacturing jobs to our state … with thousands of solar jobs and billions of dollars on the way to Georgia.”
Qcells CEO Justin Lee also credited Georgia’s other senator, Democrat Raphael Warnock, for actively supporting the solar tax credits.
The Qcells expansion is just the latest clean-energy project Georgia has landed. Last year, Hyundai broke ground on a $5.5 billion electric vehicle manufacturing plant near Savannah – the largest economic development project in the state’s history – and announced a joint venture with SK On to build a $5 billion EV battery plant in the Cartersville area.
Solvay Specialty Polymers is investing nearly $1 billion in an EV-battery parts plant in Augusta, supported by a $178 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy.
FREYR, a Norwegian battery company, has announced plans to build a $2.6 billion plant in Coweta County.
In all, solar panel, EV, and battery manufacturing companies have committed to investing nearly $25 billion in Georgia since Biden took office.
“We are in the decisive decade,” said Ali Zaidi, the White House’s national climate advisor. “In this decade, we need to dramatically reduce our [carbon] emissions.”
The Qcells expansion will bring the company’s total solar panel production capacity in Georgia to 8.4 gigawatts next year.
The Qcells project will put the U.S. on track to quadruple domestic solar manufacturing capacity by the end of next year, Zaidi said. That will mean generating up to 33.5 gigawatts of solar power, enough to allow 5 million homes to switch to solar, he said.
“This is what we need to be doing to meet the moment on climate,” he said.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – A state Senate study committee is recommending some new requirements for local development authorities in Georgia and members of their governing boards.
But the panel stopped short of suggesting major reforms some lawmakers and advocates for local governments had sought.
In a 24-page report, the study committee recommended the General Assembly consider legislation imposing additional training requirements for development authority board members and directors and limiting hold-over board members to serving no more than six months beyond their expired terms.
The panel also suggested the Georgia Economic Development Association establish “best practices” to guide development authorities.
“The vast majority of concerns that have been addressed by this committee could be addressed by best practices,” Sen. Max Burns, R-Sylvania, the study committee’s chairman, said last month.
About 1,300 local government authorities have sprung up across Georgia since 1995, when the legislature passed a law authorizing cities and counties to form authorities. Of those, 575 are development authorities or downtown development authorities.
Development authorities typically play an important role in attracting job-creating economic development by offering tax breaks that lure business prospects and floating bonds to help finance projects.
But generous tax incentives packages that take tax revenue away from local governments and school districts have prompted calls for the General Assembly to tighten controls over local development authorities.
In 2018, lawmakers passed a bill requiring authorities to register with the state annually and undergo financial audits.
Last year, the legislature passed a measure capping per-diem payments to directors of development authorities in counties with populations of 550,000 or more. The bill also gave the state ethics commission jurisdiction over complaints aimed at authority directors.
However, a second bill sponsored by Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver, D-Decatur, that would have given cities, counties, and school districts the right to participate in bond validation hearings failed to gain support.
During a half dozen meetings last summer and fall, Republicans on the Senate study committee showed little appetite for letting local governments and school districts in on bond validation hearings or other significant reforms to development authorities that have been scoring major successes in creating jobs.
“I just don’t want to throw out the baby with the bath water,” then-Sen. Jeff Mullis, R-Chickamauga, who left office at the end of December, said during the panel’s final meeting last month. “Georgia is the No.-1 place to do business. I don’t want anything we do to keep us from being No. 1.”
The study committee also recommended the General Assembly authorize local legislative delegations or joint county delegations to pass local laws aimed at preventing multiple development authorities from operating in the same jurisdictions.
Witnesses who testified before the committee said overlapping authorities tend to compete for business, driving up the cost of the tax incentives they offer.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney.
ATLANTA – The Fulton County special grand jury investigating whether former President Donald Trump should be criminally prosecuted for allegedly interfering in Georgia’s 2020 election results has now delivered its final report.
But it’s not yet clear what the report says and whether it will be made public. Though the special grand jury recommended that the report be published, Fulton County Judge Robert McBurney still has to decide whether Georgia law requires a special grand jury’s report to be published.
Arguments about publishing the report are scheduled for Jan. 24, McBurney wrote in a Monday order.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis spearheaded the effort to get the special grand jury appointed. For the past nine months, grand jurors have been investigating whether Trump or others unlawfully interfered in Georgia’s 2020 election results.
“The court thanks the grand jurors for their dedication, professionalism, and significant commitment of time and attention to this important matter. It was no small sacrifice to serve,” McBurney wrote.
Willis will use the special grand jury’s findings to help decide whether to empanel a standard grand jury to consider bringing charges against Trump and/or his associates for their alleged wrongdoing surrounding the 2020 elections.
Trump pressured Georgia Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 votes for Trump during a lengthy phone call in January 2021. Democratic President Joe Biden carried Georgia’s 16 electoral votes by a margin of 11,779.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – The Georgia House of Representatives set an example of efficiency Monday its congressional counterpart could only dream of emulating.
Lawmakers elected House Majority Leader Jon Burns, R-Newington, to move up to speaker of the House in just a single ballot and by acclamation.
Burns succeeds the late Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, who died in November at age 68 following an extended illness.
“This is a very bittersweet moment,” Burns told his House colleagues following Monday’s vote. “The passing of Speaker David Ralston has left a hole in the heart of this House.”
House members also reelected Rep. Jan Jones, R-Milton, to continue as speaker pro tempore, the second-in-command position she was first elected to in 2010. Jones took the reins temporarily as speaker after Ralston’s death, becoming the first female House speaker in Georgia history.
Burns was elected to the House in 2004. His Republican colleagues elected him majority leader in 2015.
It took the Georgia House less than an hour to get its leadership team in place, in sharp contrast with the U.S. House of Representatives, where the new Republican majority took four days and 15 ballots last week to choose U.S. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., as House speaker.
On Monday, both Burns and Jones thanked their colleagues for their support and vowed to work with lawmakers from both parties to move the state forward.
“This House will continue to lead,” Burns said. “It will continue to be independent. … It will continue to champion the policies that make Georgia the best place to live, work, and raise a family.”
On the Senate side Monday, Sen. John Kennedy, R-Macon, was unanimously elected Senate president pro tempore, that chamber’s second-highest leadership position. Newly elected Republican Lt. Gov. Burt Jones did not preside over the Senate as he will during the remainder of the session because he won’t be sworn into office until Thursday.
“My office will be here to serve this entire chamber … whether Republican or Democrat,” Kennedy told his fellow senators. “We may not agree on all issues … but you will be treated respectfully.”
Lawmakers in both legislative chambers also voted unanimously Monday to set the schedule for the entire 40-day session. The House and Senate will take off Tuesday to allow members to return from Monday night’s college football championship game in Los Angeles featuring the Georgia Bulldogs.
The General Assembly will hold a joint session on Thursday for the inauguration of Gov. Brian Kemp to a second four-year term.
After meeting this Friday, the legislature will not meet again on Fridays throughout the session to give lawmakers more time with their families.
Crossover Day, the deadline for bills to clear at least one legislative chamber, will take place on March 6. “Sine Die,” the final day of the session, will take place on March 29.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – The 2023 session of the General Assembly beginning Monday is expected to get off to a slow start.
With the Georgia Bulldogs vying for their second straight college football championship on Monday night and Thursday’s inauguration of Gov. Brian Kemp for a second term, there won’t be a rush to get down to legislative business on the session’s front end.
Since it’s not an election year, lawmakers also won’t be in a hurry on the back end to finish up under the Gold Dome and hit the campaign trail.
But once the ceremonies have been dispensed with, new legislative leaders have been elected, and committee assignments are in place, the General Assembly will take up an agenda likely to include mental health, public safety, tax policy, education funding, electric vehicles, and the perennial debate over legalizing gambling.
A highlight of last year’s legislative session was a lengthy overhaul of the state’s mental health-care delivery system championed by the late House Speaker David Ralston. The goal this year is to build on the success of that measure.
Legislators are more likely to introduce smaller, individual bills this year to address problems with mental health services in the state, said Roland Behm, chairman of the board of the Georgia Chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
The Georgia Behavioral Health Reform and Innovation Commission issued a report recently recommending the state set up a loan forgiveness and repayment program for mental and behavioral care professionals. To qualify, providers would need to accept Medicaid patients and practice for five years in areas where there is a shortage of mental health-care services.
The commission also recommended increasing funding for inpatient psychiatric beds and other behavioral services and streamlining licensing requirements for mental health professionals.
The legislature likely will consider a bill letting patients more easily access and obtain insurance coverage for the mental health-care services they need, Behm said.
It’s also likely lawmakers will consider increasing the number of home- and community-based slots serving people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, as a state Senate study committee recommended last month.
Public safety agenda
Kemp, too, is looking to build on his first-term success in the public safety arena. At the height of campaign season last October, the governor unveiled a second-term platform that calls for increasing penalties for gang members who recruit minors.
Taking aim at criminal justice system reforms that include the granting of no-cash bail, Kemp also wants to require judges to consider a defendant’s criminal history when issuing “own-recognizance” bonds.
“Although we’ve made significant progress putting dangerous criminals behind bars and making our communities safer, we still have work left to do,” he said.
Along with public safety, Kemp also built his successful reelection campaign around cutting taxes. He backed two bills last year that provided a $1.1 billion tax refund, which quickly appeared in checks to Georgia taxpayers, and a longer-term measure that will reduce state income tax rates starting next year.
This year, the governor is calling for another $2 billion in tax relief, a $1 billion income tax rebate and a $1 billion property tax rebate.
Sitting atop a $6.6 billion budget surplus, the state can easily afford the additional tax cuts.
But with economic forecasters predicting a recession later this year, soaring tax revenues aren’t likely to last, said Kyle Wingfield, president and CEO of the Georgia Public Policy Foundation.
“Everybody expects revenues will come back to Earth at some point,” he said.
Wingfield said one-time tax rebates are attractive at a time inflation is running high. But he sees accelerating the reduction of income tax rates to the current tax year as a better approach.
“If you take the same amount of money and cut rates for the future, you’re giving people an incentive to work harder, save more and invest more,” he said.
The General Assembly also is expected to consider overhauling the state’s education funding formula to provide additional support for children living in poverty, higher student transportation costs, and the need to fund school support staff. The Quality Basic Education (QBE) formula was adopted back in the mid-1980s.
“We’ve spoken with leaders in both political parties, and [changing the funding formula] seems to be an area of interest,” said Matt Smith, director of policy and research for the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education, a nonprofit affiliated with the Georgia Chamber of Commerce.
A proposal to decrease the student-to-school counselor ratio also has the support of both Kemp and the state Department of Education.
EV charging stations
With Rivian and Hyundai beginning construction on huge electric vehicle manufacturing plants in Georgia – the two largest economic development projects in the state’s history – Georgia policy makers are anxious to accommodate the industry by rolling out a network of EV charging stations.
A legislative study committee that grappled with the issue last summer and fall was unable to come up with a way to balance the interests of retailers that might want to build stations – including convenience stores – and utilities also wishing to enter that space.
The state Public Service Commission stepped in last month by approving a provision as part of a Georgia Power rate hike request that gives retailers a right of first refusal when the utility seeks to build a charging station in their area. After Georgia Power publishes a list of addresses of stations it plans to build, local retailers wishing to build nearby will have 18 months to object, said Angela Holland, president of the Georgia Association of Convenience Stores.
The provision also limits Georgia Power to building no more than 11 charging stations per year, which must be in rural areas, which are considered less likely to attract private investment.
“That addresses of a lot of our issues,” Holland said.
The study committee did recommend legislation requiring EV charging stations to charge motorists by the kilowatt-hour for the electricity they sell rather than according to the amount of time they spend charging their vehicles.
Supporters of legalized gambling are expected to renew their push for sports betting, casinos, pari-mutuel betting on horse racing, or some combination of the three, armed with a statewide poll.
The survey, released in October by the Georgia News Collaborative, a consortium of more than 100 news organizations including Capitol Beat, found 59.7% support for legalizing casinos in Georgia and 45.6% favoring the legalization of online sports betting, slightly ahead of the 42.6% opposing it.
Legalizing any of those forms of gambling in Georgia would require the General Assembly to pass one or more constitutional amendments, which then would go to voters.
“It’s clear that people will vote it in,” said Rick Lackey, an Atlanta-based real estate developer backing several proposed casino resorts scattered across the state.
Georgia Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah, a longtime proponent of legalized gambling, said he’s optimistic it could pass this year given the large number of new lawmakers taking office on Monday. Also, newly elected Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a former senator who introduced a sports betting bill in 2020, will be presiding over the Senate.
“Every term, there’s less opposition to it,” Stephens said.
While there’s been debate over the years over how the state should spend the tax revenue legalized gambling would generate, much of the focus has been on propping up the HOPE Scholarship program, which no longer covers the full cost of tuition for many eligible students.
“There’s nowhere else to get the kind of revenue we need long term,” Stephens said. “When you’re not fully funding HOPE … it’s time has come.”
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Georgia lawmakers expressed frustration Thursday that the state’s medical marijuana program has yet to yield a drop of cannabis oil nine months after Gov. Brian Kemp announced a plan to break a logjam of lawsuits.
The Georgia Commission for Access to Medical Cannabis voted in September to award the first two of six low-THC cannabis oil production licenses the General Assembly authorized in legislation the General Assembly passed in 2019.
But those licenses remain on hold until the commission adopts rules governing the state’s medical cannabis program, Chase Bradshaw, chief of operations for Botantical Sciences LLC, one of the two licensees, told members of a Georgia House study committee Thursday.
The other four licenses haven’t even been awarded because of lawsuits mounted by 16 companies that weren’t chosen when the commission tentatively awarded the six licenses in 2021.
State Rep. Alan Powell, R-Hartwell, a member of the study committee, blamed the legislature’s failure to pass a bill he introduced last year aimed at heading off the potential for lengthy litigation by the 16 losing bidders by increasing the number of licenses to be awarded from six to 22.
After the legislation died on the final day of last year’s legislative session, Kemp responded by directing $150,000 from the Governor’s Emergency Fund to expedite the hearing of legal protests filed by the losing bidders.
Powell, chairman of the House Regulated Industries Committee, said a legislative fix still is needed.
“You’re going to be hearing a lot more about this issue this session,” he said.
Meanwhile, the commission is moving forward with rules for the program.
Andrew Turnage, the commission’s executive director, said a public hearing on the proposed rules will be held Jan. 18. The commission’s board is scheduled to vote on the rules a week later, he said.
Rep. Dale Washburn, R-Macon, another member of the study committee, said he’s frustrated the state’s medical cannabis program still isn’t delivering almost four years after the General Assembly legalized the in-state growth and distribution of a product that remains illegal in Georgia.
“This medicine is needed,” he said. “People are suffering every day who need it and have to break the law.”
The 2023 session of the General Assembly kicks off next week.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
