by Dave Williams | Mar 6, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The Georgia House of Representatives passed two tax relief bills Thursday, one unanimously and another that proved controversial.
House Bill 112, which cleared the chamber 175-0, would provide $1 billion in one-time income tax rebates to Georgia taxpayers.
Single filers would get a rebate of $250, while heads of households would receive $375 and married couples filing jointly would get $500.
House Bill 111, on the other hand, drew substantial opposition from Democrats before passing 110-60. The legislation calls for reducing Georgia’s income tax rate from 5.39% to 5.19% retroactive to the beginning of the current tax year.
Rep. Saira Draper, D-Atlanta, said she supported a similar tax cut the General Assembly passed last year because it was tied to certain financial benchmarks that would only allow it to take effect if the state’s finances were strong.
“I was good with that approach because it was thoughtful and conservative,” she said.
Draper said she opposed HB111 because Gov. Brian Kemp and legislative Republicans are going ahead with additional tax cuts even though the state’s revenue estimate for this year is lower than last year.
Other House Democrats complained the tax cut would benefit primarily the wealthy while the state is failing to adequately essential services including health care and education adequately.
But House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Shaw Blackmon, R-Bonaire, said reducing taxes would help all Georgia taxpayers. Under the bill, a family of four wouldn’t pay any taxes on its first $32,000 of income, he said.
“This measure allows Georgians to keep more of their money – not the government’s – and reduces the tax burden for every family that pays taxes,” Blackmon said.
Both bills now head to the state Senate.
by Dave Williams | Mar 6, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp signed a record $40.5 billion mid-year budget Thursday that prioritizes hurricane relief and invests heavily in school safety and Georgia’s prison system while providing relief to the state’s taxpayers.
The spending plan, which the General Assembly passed earlier this week, includes $867 million in response and recovery efforts following Hurricane Helene, which devastated large swaths of South Georgia and the eastern half of the state last September.
Another $434 million will go toward a pay raise for state prison guards and additional correctional officers for a prison system that came under fire in a federal audit released last fall for failing to protect inmates from violence. The prisons also will receive funding to repair deteriorating infrastructure inside the lockups and give guards more tasers and drone detection equipment to combat the smuggling of cellphones and other contraband.
The mid-year budget, which covers state spending through June 30, also includes an additional $50 million in school-safety grants to all public schools.
The state is putting $501 million into improving water infrastructure in Coastal Georgia to serve the huge electric-vehicles plant under construction west of Savannah and the residents who will work there, as well as $266 million for water and sewer projects across the state.
Another $500 million will go toward highway improvements aimed at accelerating the movement of freight throughout Georgia, while $28 million will be used for workforce housing in rural areas and $20 million will boost economic development in rural communities.
“All of this investment is designed to benefit our local communities,” Kemp said during a bill-signing ceremony at the state Capitol. “But it’s also going to keep Georgians working in all parts of our state during these uncertain economic times.”
The mid-year budget also takes advantage of a $16 billion state surplus to return $1 billion to taxpayers in the form of a one-time rebate. The Georgia House approved the rebate later Thursday as well as a separate bill reducing the state income tax rate.
“We’ll be able to keep more of Georgians’ money in their pockets,” the governor said. “They know how to spend it better than the government does.”
With work completed on the mid-year budget, the state House of Representatives is expected to take up Kemp’s $37.7 billion fiscal 2026 spending plan next week.
by Dave Williams | Mar 5, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Legislation asking Georgia voters whether to legalize online sports betting in Georgia cleared a committee in the state House of Representatives Wednesday.
Because it’s a constitutional amendment, House Resolution 450 would require a two-thirds majority to pass the full House if it reaches the floor. The House Higher Education Committee approved the measure Wednesday on a voice vote.
Under the proposed constitutional change, 15% of the first $150 million in annual proceeds from sports betting would go toward programs and services aimed at preventing Georgians from becoming addicted to betting and treating those who do fall victim to problem gambling. The rest would be used to administer sports betting and to support Georgia’s pre-kindergarten program.
Legalized gambling legislation has been introduced in the General Assembly repeatedly in recent years but failed to win passage. If sports betting makes it through the legislature this year, Georgia voters would decide the question on the November 2026 statewide ballot.
The committee also passed an enabling bill designed to spell out details of how sports betting would be operated in Georgia.
House Bill 686 calls for the Georgia Lottery Corp. to administer sports betting. It would award 16 licenses to applicants interested in operating sportsbooks, including some of the state’s professional sports teams that have expressed interest in obtaining a license.
House Minority Whip Sam Park, D-Lawrenceville, amended the bill Wednesday to increase the tax rate on proceeds from sports betting from 20% to 24%. Doing so would raise an additional $40 million a year for the pre-kindergarten program, he said.
After the committee passed Park’s amendment unanimously, the underlying enabling bill – sponsored by Rep. Marcus Wiedower, R-Watkinsville – was approved on a voice vote.
Both the constitutional amendment and enabling bill move to the House Rules Committee to schedule votes of the full House. The measures will be competing for attention Thursday on a busy Crossover Day, the deadline for bills to pass either the House or Senate to stay alive for the year.
by Dave Williams | Mar 5, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Legislation that would require installers of solar panels on property leased from a landowner to return the land to its natural state cleared a Georgia House committee Wednesday.
But a second bill pertaining to solar panels installed in communities governed by homeowners’ associations ran into pushback from members of the House Energy, Utilities & Telecommunications Committee.
Solar panels have been cropping up on farms across Georgia in recent years. House Bill 249 would require that solar panels be removed from properties upon the termination of the operator’s lease and that any holes in the ground left by solar panels be filled with the same type of soil found elsewhere on the property.
The measure also requires the removal of any overhead powerlines or roads constructed in conjunction with solar panels.
“When these solar facilities get to the end of their life and become obsolete, there (needs to be) somebody standing there with some money to put them back in the original state,” said Rep. Robert Dickey, R-Musella, chairman of the House Agriculture & Consumer Affairs Committee and the bill’s chief sponsor.
While Dickey’s bill won the committee’s support, a second measure to prohibit homeowners’ associations from preventing property owners from installing solar panels drew concerns from members of the panel.
Rep. Chuck Martin, R-Alpharetta, said the General Assembly shouldn’t interfere in private agreements between homeowners’ associations and property owners living in those communities.
“If you don’t like the agreement, don’t buy a home in a neighborhood that says you can’t have solar,” he said.
Rep. Trey Kelley, R-Cedartown, said he’s concerned that a property owner denied permission to install a solar panel could sue his or her homeowners’ association, resulting in litigation costs that could be spread to everyone in the neighborhood.
But Rep. Eric Bell, D-Jonesboro, chief sponsor of House Bill 389, said Georgians who invest their life savings in buying a home should have the right to install solar panels if they choose to do so.
Committee Chairman Don Parsons, R-Marietta, announced he would set the bill aside until next year to allow further work on it. Meanwhile, Dickey’s bill heads next to the House Rules Committee to schedule a floor vote.
by Dave Williams | Mar 5, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – U.S. Rep. Lucy McBath, D-Marietta, filed paperwork Wednesday creating an exploratory committee for a potential race for governor next year.
“Georgians deserve a governor who understands what’s at stake because they’ve lived it,” McBath wrote in a prepared statement.
“As a mom and breast cancer survivor, I’ve seen first hand how regular people are too often left out of the political process. I look forward to continuing this conversation with my neighbors and fellow Georgians.”
McBath was elected to Congress in 2018 and reelected in 2020, 2022 and again last year, despite repeated attempts by the General Assembly’s Republican majorities to redraw her congressional district in a way that would favor GOP candidates.
She entered politics after her teenage son, Jordan Davis, was shot and killed by a man objecting to the music he and his friends were playing in their car. She has been a leading advocate for gun safety legislation during her years in the House.
McBath is the only Democrat thus far to take steps toward running for governor in 2026. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp is term limited.
On the GOP side, Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr is the only candidate thus far to enter the race. Others – notably Lt. Gov. Burt Jones – are expected to follow.
by Dave Williams | Mar 4, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The Georgia House of Representatives passed two bills Tuesday aimed at reining in abuses in the use of speed-detection cameras in school zones.
One of the bills would ban the cameras altogether, while a second would put restrictions on the use of the cameras without prohibiting them.
House Bill 225, the legislation repealing the cameras, passed the House 129-37, seven years after the General Assembly first authorized their use.
“Operation of these cameras has not improved public safety but become a highly profitable revenue stream for private corporations and local governments,” said Rep. Dale Washburn, R-Macon, the bill’s chief sponsor.
Washburn also argued the use of speed-detection cameras in school zones is unfair because there’s no way for motorists to contest a ticket.
The second measure, House Bill 651, takes a less dramatic approach. It would limit the hours speed cameras could be operated to two hours in the morning before school starts and two hours in the afternoon after school lets out.
The cameras would have to be accompanied by flashing signs that would warn motorists when they’re driving too fast through a school zone.
Only half of the fines levied against violators could be retained by the local government, while the other half would have to go to local schools to be used for safety improvements.
“It ceases to be a revenue-driving device for local governments,” said Rep. Alan Powell, R-Hartwell, the bill’s chief sponsor.
Powell’s bill also would give motorists accused of speeding through school zones based on evidence from a camera the right to contest the ticket through the local courts.
It’s unusual for a legislative chamber to pass two bills on the same subject during the same session. Powell said that was done because the state Senate hasn’t been willing to address speed-detection cameras in the past.
“This House of Representatives is very serious about dealing with this problem,” he said. “We want to give them a second choice.”
The House passed Powell’s bill 164-8.
