by Dave Williams | Nov 18, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – The state is laying the groundwork for a private-school vouchers program by launching a website with details on the initiative.
The new site, mygeorgiapromise.org, includes information on the Georgia Promise Scholarship, which the Republican-controlled General Assembly created this year to provide eligible K-12 students in lower-performing schools up to $6,500 in annual funding for private school tuition, tutoring services, and other qualified expenses.
“Mygeorgiapromise.org will make it easy for families, schools, and providers to learn about eligibility and the application process as we work toward the program launch in July 2025,” said Mitch Seabaugh, the program’s senior vice president.
The Georgia Education Savings Authority has partnered with Odyssey, an experienced technology provider, to create a user-centric financial services platform for families to use the vouchers.
The program is open to students who reside in a public school attendance zone that is in the lower 25% of all public schools in the state for at least one academic year or are a rising kindergarten student. Parents must have been Georgia residents for at least a year, with exceptions for active-duty military personnel.
Private-school vouchers have been a hot issue in the General Assembly for years. Legislative Republicans tried unsuccessfully over many sessions to pass a vouchers bill until this year, when the House and Senate approved the measure largely along party lines.
In an effort to get the bill through the legislature, Republicans made concessions that set spending limits on the program.
The legislation prohibits spending more than 1% of Georgia’s Quality Basic Education (QBE) fund on vouchers, a cap that is currently set at $140 million a year.
But Democrats argued the bill will divert money from public schools while not truly serving the needs of students from low-income families. Among other things, opponents said $6,500 is not nearly enough to pay the tuition at most private schools.
by Dave Williams | Nov 18, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Georgia’s medical cannabis program has hit an important milestone.
Enrollment in the registry of patients eligible to receive the drug hit 25,000 during the weekend. That growth means the Georgia Access to Medical Cannabis Commission, the state agency that operates the program, is authorized to open additional dispensaries.
As a result, the six production companies licensed by the commission to grow marijuana and produce medical cannabis products from the leafy crop now are operating 13 dispensaries across Georgia.
“Patient access continues to be our mission and purpose,” commission Chairman Sid Johnson said. “Expanding Georgia’s medical cannabis program, especially providing service to patients, is why the commission exists.”
The General Assembly first legalized possession of low-THC cannabis oil to treat a wide range of diseases back in 2015 but failed to provide patients a legal way to obtain the drug. Adult patients and parents of ailing children were forced for years to travel out of state to get cannabis oil or buy it illegally in Georgia.
It wasn’t until 2019 that the legislature passed a bill setting up a licensing process for production companies to grow marijuana indoors under close supervision, convert the leafy crop to cannabis oil, and sell the product to patients with a doctor’s prescription who signed up for the state registry.
Under the legislation, the number of dispensaries will increase by an additional dispensing license for each of the six production companies with every increase in the registry of 10,000 patients.
“We anticipate things are going to pick up in pace quickly from here,” said Andrew Turnage, the commission’s executive director.
Part of the growth in patients enrolling in the medical cannabis registry stems from a recent series of listening sessions the commission conducted at Valdosta State University, Georgia Southern University, Kennesaw State University, and Middle Georgia State University. The tour will wrap up this week at Lanier Technical College in Gainesville.
“We have heard from patients, caregivers, health professionals, veterans, researchers, and students with an interest in or need for medical cannabis,” Johnson said. “Their willingness to share their personal stories and feedback for improvement is invaluable to the betterment of the program.”
by Dave Williams | Nov 15, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Boating enthusiasts and representatives of the recreational boating industry are asking Georgia lawmakers to separate the right to float along the state’s rivers and streams from hunting and fishing.
That was a major theme of the final meeting Nov. 13 of a legislative study committee that has been grappling with how to guarantee Georgians access to the state’s navigable rivers and streams without violating private property rights.
“The right of passage is independent of laws relating to navigability,” Joe Cook, paddle coordinator for Georgia Rivers, a member of the Freedom to Float Coalition, told members of the study committee. “Common law guarantees the right to float.”
The right to float down Georgia waterways has been caught up in a debate over fishing rights that began early last year when a property owner on the Yellow Jacket Shoals portion of the Flint River banned fishing there and sued the state to enforce it.
The General Assembly responded with legislation codifying public fishing rights into state law. But that didn’t clear up confusion over which rivers and streams across the state are navigable and, thus, open to fishing and paddling, and which are off limits.
The House Study Committee on Navigable Streams has held several hearings this summer and fall to try to come to grips with that issue.
Front and center in the debate has been legislation House Majority Whip James Burchett, R-Waycross, introduced this year naming 64 rivers and creeks “presumed to be navigable.”
Burchett’s “list” bill has run into strong opposition. Representatives of the Freedom to Float Coalition argue the bill, if adopted, would ensure the public’s right to boat, fish, and hunt on just 5% of the state’s 70,000 miles of waterways.
“List bills do not work when it comes to capturing the breadth of recreational boating in Georgia,” said Suzanne Welander, author of “Canoeing and Kayaking in Georgia.” “List bills barely scratch the surface of where people are boating today without conflict.”
Burchett has suggested that boaters wishing to float down streams that are not on the list of navigable waterways seek permission from landowners along the banks of those streams.
But Janina Edwards, a kayaking instructor in DeKalb County, dismissed seeking out every property owner along a stream as unrealistic and even potentially dangerous.
“This idea could get me killed for trespassing or having to get permission from dozens of property owners,” she said. “If a person has a vessel and it will float on a Georgia waterway, we have a right to recreate on it.”
Opponents of limiting access to the state’s rivers and streams also are putting forth an economic argument. Boating and fishing generated $1.1 billion in economic activity in 2022, and 70 small businesses offering canoe, kayak, tube, raft and paddleboard rentals as well as hundreds of independent fishing guides depend on access to Georgia waterways.
“Let’s not curtail an entire river recreation sector,” Andrea White, community programs coordinator for Georgia Rivers, told the study committee. “It’s a major draw for our state.”
The study committee has until Dec. 1 to make recommendations for the full House to consider during the 2025 General Assembly session starting in January. While Burchett’s bill died with the end of the 2023-24 legislative term, it could resurface next year.
“It won’t be an easy debate,” Rep. Lynn Smith, R-Newnan, the study committee’s chairperson, said at the end of the Nov. 13 hearing. “But it’s one worth having.”
by Dave Williams | Nov 15, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plan to expand the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge – including land near the swamp being eyed by a mining company – received strong support this week.
Speakers at a public hearing on the proposal in Folkston were overwhelmingly in favor of the plan to add about 22,000 acres to the existing refuge.
This week’s hearing was the fourth in a row where public opposition to Alabama-based Twin Pines Minerals’ (TPM) plan for a titanium mine along Trail Ridge adjacent to the Okefenokee was strong, said Josh Marks, president of Georgians for the Okefenokee.
“Georgians overwhelmingly said they want the Okefenokee protected, and they do not want mining,” Marks wrote in an email to Capitol Beat. “Hopefully, Governor (Brian) Kemp will finally listen to his constituents, deny the TPM permits, and instead join the federal government in permanently protecting Trail Ridge and the swamp once and for all.”
Proposed state draft permits would allow Twin Pines Minerals to mine titanium oxide along Trail Ridge on the Okefenokee’s eastern rim. Scientific research has shown a mine would threaten the swamp’s water levels, increase wildfire risks, harm wildlife, and release toxic contaminants into nearby surface and groundwater.
Twin Pines officials say the project would not harm the largest blackwater swamp in North America.
In a news release last month, the Fish and Wildlife Service wrote the planned expansion of the refuge would “enable the service to work with willing landowners to explore voluntary conservation actions, including potential acquisition, that would further protect the refuge’s globally significant freshwater wetland system and wildlife habitat.”
There is precedence for adding to the wildlife refuge to head off proposed mining. That’s what happened in the 1990s when DuPont abandoned its plans to mine titanium near the swamp.
Public comment on the Fish and Wildlife Service expansion plan must be submitted by Nov. 18 via email to Okefenokee@fws.gov.
by Dave Williams | Nov 15, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – President-elect Donald Trump will nominate former U.S. Rep. Doug Collins of Gainesville to head the Department of Veterans Affairs, Trump announced on social media Thursday.
“Doug is a veteran himself, who currently serves our nation as a chaplain in the United States Air Force Reserve Command, and fought for our country in the Iraq war,” Trump posted on his Truth Social site. “We must take care of our brave men and women in uniform, and Doug will be a great advocate for our active duty servicemembers, veterans, and military families to ensure they have the support they need.”
After a stint in the General Assembly, Collins served four terms in Congress from 2013 until 2021 representing Georgia’s 9th Congressional District, which stretches from Gainesville and Athens northeast to the South Carolina border.
As ranking Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, he gained national attention as one of then-President Donald Trump’s most vocal supporters during Trump’s first impeachment inquiry in 2019.
Collins was Trump’s preferred pick for the U.S. Senate following the retirement of the late Sen. Johnny Isakson. But Gov. Brian Kemp instead appointed Kelly Loeffler to fill the vacancy.
Collins ran for Loeffler’s seat in 2020 but failed to make the January runoff. Democrat Raphael Warnock defeated Loeffler in the runoff to win election to the Senate.
Georgia politicians have a long track record of leadership on veterans’ issues. Isakson served as chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee.
Before that, the late Max Cleland served as administrator of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs during the administration of Jimmy Carter.
Trump’s nomination of Collins will be subject to confirmation by the Senate.
by Dave Williams | Nov 14, 2024 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Georgia House Democrats Thursday elected longtime Rep. Carolyn Hugley of Columbus to serve as House minority leader during the two-year term starting in January.
Hugley, who was elected to the House in 1992 and served as the Democratic whip from 2003 until 2018, will succeed Rep. James Beverly as minority leader. Beverly didn’t seek reelection this year to his Macon-based House seat.
House Democrats also voted Thursday to retain Rep. Sam Park, D-Lawrenceville, as minority whip.
Rep. Tanya Miller, D-Atlanta, was chosen to succeed Rep. Billy Mitchell, D-Stone Mountain, as chairman of the House Minority Caucus.
In other leadership elections, Democrats picked Rep. Spencer Frye, D-Athens, to serve as minority caucus vice chairman. Rep. Park Cannon, D-Atlanta, will return as minority caucus secretary.
Democrats gained two seats in the House in last week’s elections, but Republicans retained a comfortable majority with 100 of the chamber’s 180 seats.
The 2025 session of the General Assembly will convene at the state Capitol on Jan. 13.
