ATLANTA – Georgia’s hotel industry will receive by far the largest chunk of more than $415 million in federal pandemic relief grants announced by Gov. Brian Kemp Monday.
The Georgia Hotel & Lodging Association (GHLA) will get $150 million to help offset the losses hotels across the state have sustained during the pandemic.
The GHLA is among 33 Georgia recipients of federal assistance through the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) President Joe Biden signed into law in March of last year.
The recipients were approved by one of three committees Kemp formed last summer to determine how to distribute Georgia’s $4.8 billion share of ARPA aid among state and local governments, businesses and nonprofits applying for the money.
The Negative Impact Economic Committee included Pat Wilson, commissioner of the state Department of Economic Development; State Economist Jeffrey Dorfman; Georgia House Appropriations Committee Chairman Terry England, R-Auburn; and state Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Blake Tillery, R-Vidalia.
“I’m proud of our state’s resilience,” Kemp said Monday. “We have worked hard and identified ways to further deliver assistance to hardworking Georgians, support businesses and speed up the recovery of impacted industries and rebuild crucial public services.”
While business and vacation travel is starting to bounce back, COVID-19 hit the hotel industry harder than most.
“This program will provide Georgia’s hospitality industry with the support it needs to create and sustain jobs for people throughout the state, helping the industry return to its pre-pandemic level of success,” GHLA Executive Director Jim Sprouse said Monday.
Other recipients of grants announced Monday include the Atlanta Community Food Bank, which will receive about $29.6 million, and Buckhead Christian Ministries, which will get $12.7 million to expand an emergency assistance program.
The Georgia Department of Economic Development will receive about $11.5 million to help performing arts venues around the state recover from the impacts of the pandemic.
“The arts and culture sector contributes $23.8 billion to Georgia’s economy, and getting it fully back on track after pandemic-caused economic harm is a priority,” said Tina Lilly, executive director of the Georgia Coucncil for the Arts. “Governor Kemp allowed our arts and entertainment venues to safely return to work earlier than many other states, and the funding he announced today will provide further assistance in restoring this sector.”
The GHLA will allocate its grant funding through a formula that will be tested through a pilot program. A deadline for applications will be determined in the coming weeks and apply to Georgia hotels that were in operation before the pandemic.
“We will make this a fair, data-driven application process that will get critical funds into the right hands efficiently,” Sprouse said. “We have the right partners in place to ensure this program succeeds.”
The state awarded more than $422 million in federal ARPA grants for water and sewer project across Georgia earlier this year as well as more than $400 million for broadband projects.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp signed a package of public safety bills Monday, one day after he and Republican primary challenger former U.S. Sen. David Perdue clashed over the crime issue during a televised debate.
“Public safety is the No.-1 responsibility of the government,” Kemp said during a signing ceremony in the Buckhead section of Atlanta, an area he called an “epicenter” of growing crime.
“The rise in crime we’ve been facing in many communities across Georgia due to soft-on-crime policies and officials is unacceptable to me, it’s unacceptable to our law enforcement and it’s certainly unacceptable to the people that we serve,” he said.
Among the bills Kemp signed was legislation giving Georgia’s attorney general the authority to prosecute gang activity along with local prosecutors.
“Gangs do not confine their activities to one jurisdiction,” he said. “When they traffic drugs, illegal weapons and people, they don’t stop at county lines.”
The governor also signed bills allowing suspected child molesters to be charged separately for each image of child pornography or incident of child molestation and allowing separate charges for each illegal firearm seized from a suspect.
Another part of the package Kemp signed Monday increases penalties for fleeing or eluding law enforcement. And he signed a workforce development measure providing tuition reimbursement to former service members who enroll in training to become a law enforcement officer.
The governor also touted investments in law enforcement in the fiscal 2023 budget the General Assembly adopted this month, including a $5,000 pay raise for state law enforcement personnel, the addition of a new state trooper class and the addition of law enforcement and criminal justice to the high-demand degree programs that quality for tuition breaks.
“We will use every resource at our disposal to rid our communities of crime and keep Georgia families safe,” Kemp said.
During Sunday night’s debate, Perdue blamed Kemp for the rising crime rate in Georgia by not hiring enough state troopers. Perdue said North Carolina has twice as many troopers as Georgia, although the states are roughly equal in population.
“If we don’t get crime and education fixed, we are not going to have economic development,” Perdue said.
Kemp responded by citing the successes of the multi-agency Crime Suppression Unit he formed in April of last year, including the arrests of 745 suspects on outstanding warrants – 26 on murder charges.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
Gov. Brian Kemp (left) is being challenged by former U.S. Sen. David Perdue
ATLANTA – Gov. Brian Kemp defended his record of the last four years Sunday night against withering attacks from former U.S. Sen. David Perdue in the first televised debate of this year’s Republican gubernatorial campaign.
Perdue, who has former President Donald Trump’s endorsement, accused Kemp of failing to investigate allegations of voter fraud after what he called a “rigged and stolen” 2020 election in Georgia. He blamed the governor not only for President Joe Biden’s victory but for the loss of his Senate seat to Democrat Jon Ossoff.
“He sold us out,” Perdue declared in the debate, which aired on Atlanta’s WSB-TV.
“The only reason I’m not in the United States Senate is you caved in,” Perdue told Kemp.
After responding that he followed the law and the U.S. Constitution following the election, Kemp chastised Perdue for focusing so much attention on the last election cycle. Instead, the governor cited his accomplishments in going after criminals, creating jobs and reopening Georgia’s economy during the pandemic earlier than other states.
“That is a record that will beat [presumptive Democratic gubernatorial nominee] Stacey Abrams, not looking in the rear-view mirror,” Kemp said.
Both candidates supported legislation the Republican-controlled General Assembly passed this year allowing Georgians to carry concealed firearms without a permit and restricting how certain “divisive concepts” including racism can be taught in the schools.
But they clashed over the state’s strategy in luring electric vehicle startup Rivian to invest $5 billion in a truck manufacturing plant east of Atlanta that will create 7,500 jobs. Perdue criticized the use of generous tax incentives to convince the company to come to Georgia, suggesting a better approach to economic development would be to eliminate the state income tax.
“You’re taking hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in Georgia and giving them to a company owned by [billionaire and Democratic mega donor George] Soros,” Perdue said.
Kemp shot back that the Rivian deal was part of a successful effort he has waged to boost the economy of rural Georgia. The governor accused Perdue, on the other hand, of sending American jobs overseas during decades as a corporate CEO.
“We’re bringing in 7,500 great-paying jobs to rural parts of our state,” Kemp said. “He’s spent his whole business career outsourcing jobs to China.”
Perdue criticized the governor for not taking a position on a bill calling for a vote on whether the Buckhead area of Atlanta should break away and form its own city, legislation that ultimately fizzled. He tied the push for cityhood to rising crime in Atlanta.
“These people have no service up there,” Perdue said. “The only way they’re going to get there is to control their own government.”
Kemp said he decided to keep his “powder dry” on the issue.
“As much as you want me to be a dictator, I’m not,” the governor told Perdue. “That’s something that is going to have to go through the legislative process.”
The two also clashed on the issue of crime, with Perdue hammering away at statistics illustrating the increase in violent crime, particularly in Atlanta, since the pandemic began.
“What we have is a runaway crime situation the governor is burying his head about,” Perdue said.
Kemp responded by citing the number of arrests made by the multi-agency Crime Suppression Unit he formed in the spring of last year.
“We have taken stolen weapons off the street,” he said. “We’re going to continue to do that.”
Kemp and Perdue will meet twice more on the airwaves before the May 24 primary, later this week in Savannah and Sunday night on Georgia Public Television.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Former Atlanta Mayor and business leader Sam Massell died Sunday at the age of 94.
Massell, who led the city from 1970 through 1974, was Atlanta’s first and only Jewish mayor and the city’s last white mayor.
Later, he founded the Buckhead Coalition, a business group, and headed it for more than 30 years.
Massell was known as a champion of collaboration and inclusion, said Andre Dickens, Atlanta’s current mayor, who put Massell on his transition team after Dickens was elected late last year.
“He paved the way for better representation of women and minority participation in city government,” Dickens said. “Sam always said that we can get more done through a conference call than through confrontation.”
Massell also played a key role in bringing heavy rail transit to Atlanta.
“MARTA would not exist but for the dedication and persistence of Massell, who convinced the Georgia legislature – and later voters – to approve the local-option sales tax the continues to fund MARTA to this day,” MARTA officials wrote in a statement. “MARTA was fortunate to have such an ardent supporter, and we remain forever in his debt.”
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – The Georgia Department of Education is accepting applications for a new tax credit aimed at recruiting teachers for high-need subjects in underserved public schools.
The General Assembly passed legislation last year authorizing a state income-tax credit for teachers in 100 rural and/or low-performing schools. Qualifying teachers can receive a $3,000 credit each year for up to five consecutive school years if they teach certain subjects that students struggle to learn.
“Georgia teachers have an impressive record of recent academic success, as evidenced by our record graduation rate and K-12 scores,” said state Rep. Dave Belton, R-Buckhead, the bill’s chief sponsor.
“This program places a laser focus on our rural schools and those performing in the lowest 5%. More importantly, it works to restore the all-important profession of teaching.”
Teacher recruitment and retention are top priorities for the state Department of Education. With teachers in short supply, the agency also is supporting legislation this year that would allow schools to bring back retired teachers for high-need subjects.
“If we want our students to achieve, it is absolutely essential that we retain our hard-working educators,” state School Superintendent Richard Woods said.
“That means creating an environment where those educators can thrive, compensating them appropriately, and treating them as the competent professionals they are.”
This story available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
