Legislative Updates
Your GAPS dues at work!
Summary of 2008 session of Georgia General Assembly
Taxes
Despite the failure of the tax cut proposals, lawmakers did approve several tax breaks for corporate interests, including HB 1100, a tax credit for film companies; HB 272, a sales tax exemption for energy used in manufacturing; HB 670, an income tax credit for transporting wood residuals to a renewable biomass facility; HB 851, an income tax credit for the rehabilitation of historic homes and buildings; and HB 977, a tax credit for high-deductible health insurance policies.
Healthcare
Lawmakers passed SB 433, which significantly revises the state’s certificate of need (CON) laws that regulate the construction of hospitals and related medical facilities. SB 433 also creates a special loophole in the CON laws for Cancer Treatment Centers of America to open a cancer hospital here.
HB 1234 will impose tighter controls over the private firms that administer the state’s Medicaid and PeachCare program, particularly their handling of claims and payments to healthcare providers.
HB 535, which passed, will establish a mental health patient advocacy board and a patient advocate general to investigate fatalities patient abuse in state-funded facilities.
HB 1158 would have instituted a $10 license tag fee to generate about $74 million a year for funding improvements to the state’s trauma care network, but it got caught in the end-of-session bickering over tax cuts and did not pass.
HB 367 originally would have allowed pharmacists to bypass an insurance company’s formulary and fill a 10-day prescription while the prior approval process was taking place. It was used as a vehicle on the final day for legislation that would have effectively “extended the patent” for brand-name prescription drugs whose patents are going to expire. It passed the Senate but did not get a vote in the House.
Education
HB 881, which passed, will set up a state commission that can approve applications for a charter school that were rejected by local school boards and funnel public education funds to charter schools.
HB 1133 will provide an income tax credit for donations to private school scholarship organizations.
Lawmakers adopted HB 1209, a recommendation from Perdue’s “IE2 Commission” that will allow public school systems to bypass state regulations in return for meeting performance goals. Earlier media reports that this bill failed to pass were incorrect.
SB 458, Sen. Eric Johnson’s bill to provide private school vouchers to students in under-performing or unaccredited public schools, died on the final day when Rep. Earl Ehrhart (R-Powder Springs) had it sent back to the House Rules Committee.
The Senate killed Richardson’s proposal to steer more high school students into vocational career paths, HB 905, by tabling it in the final hours.
Judiciary and public safety
HB 89, an NRA-backed measure, will allow persons with concealed-weapon permits to carry firearms into restaurants, state parks, MARTA trains and workplace parking lots with the company's permission. The Georgia Chamber of Commerce, which opposed the parking lot provision last year, said the version that passed “explicitly reinforces the right of employers to determine whether or not to allow employees to bring guns onto the worksite or workplace parking accommodations (whether the employer owns the land on which the business operates or leases it).”
Lawmakers adopted a measure that will crack down on dogfighting and those who participate in it: HB 301.
HB 119 will authorize a 5 percent pay raise for appellate judges, Superior Court judges, and district attorneys.
Lawmakers did not pass SB 449, which would have prevented lawsuits from being filed against landowners who hold hunts on their properties where a guest is killed.
SB 145, a “life without parole” bill that was amended by Rep. Barry Fleming (R-Harlem) to allow the imposition of the death penalty even if there is not a unanimous recommendation from the trial jury, failed to pass on the session’s final day.
Water and the environment
SR 822, which was introduced to start interstate negotiations on moving the boundary line between Georgia and Tennessee so that the state could tap into the Tennessee River, passed both chambers but is probably a moot point – the Tennessee Legislature voted not to participate.
SB 342 establishes a process to impound more public reservoirs as a source of drinking water.
HB 1318, a bill backed by the outdoor advertising industry that would have made it harder for local governments to restrict or eliminate billboards, failed twice to pass in the House.
HB 1145, which would have allowed Sandy Springs to create its own water-sewer authority and could have undermined the fiscal stability of Atlanta’s efforts to rebuild its water-sewer system, did not make it out of the House.
Government
SB 82, which has already been signed into law, authorizes a referendum this year on the incorporation of the city of Dunwoody in DeKalb County.
SB 328, a bill requested by Perdue, will close off the current state pension system to future employees and require them to join a defined-contribution pension plan with less-generous retirement benefits.
Economic Development
Both chambers passed SR 996, a constitutional amendment that would authorize local governments to use education property tax proceeds to help pay for redevelopment projects. This use of school tax funds was recently struck down by a Georgia Supreme Court decision. The measure will be on the November ballot.
Technology
HB 130 will enable consumers to put a “freeze” on their personal and financial data compiled by credit reporting agencies to prevent identity thieves from accessing it.
SB 379 originally would have prohibited the use of automated "robo calls" by political campaigns, but by the time the bill finally passed, the robo call prohibition had been stripped out.
Immigration
Both chambers passed SB 350, which would make it a felony offense punishable by prison sentences as long as five years for driving without a license. The bill’s sponsor introduced the measure in response to a Cobb County traffic accident where a car driven by an undocumented immigrant killed a law enforcement officer. Gov. Sonny Perdue vetoed a similar bill when it passed last year.
HB 488 will allow foreign citizens temporarily residing in Georgia on an extended visa to keep their country’s driver's license issued when they obtain a Georgia license. They currently must surrender that license when obtaining a state driver's license.
HR 413 would have declared English as the official language of the state and made it illegal to administer driver’s license examinations or print government documents in any language other than English. It was blocked in the House when Democrats kept it from getting the required two-thirds majority for a constitutional amendment.
Transportation
SR 845 was a constitutional amendment authorizing regions to hold referendums on one-cent sales taxes to pay for transportation projects. The final version of the measure was adopted by the House, but fell three votes short of the required two-thirds majority in the Senate.
Alcohol Sales
SB 454, which would have legalized Sunday package sales of alcoholic beverages, got a favorable vote from a House committee but was never brought up for a floor vote in the House.
HB 1280, which authorizes regional economic assistance projects to sell alcoholic beverages, was amended by Sen. Renee Unterman (R-Buford) so that it supposedly will allow beer to be sold on Sundays at Gwinnett County’s minor league ballpark, but there is some uncertainty about the provision. When one of Unterman’s Gwinnett colleagues was asked to explain her amendment, he said, “I don’t understand what she’s doing here.”
HB 1061, if signed into law, will allow Georgians to order wine over the Internet or via telephone directly from wineries.
SB 385, if signed into law by Georgia’s teetotaling governor, will allow limousine drivers to sell alcohol to customers.
SB 55, which also goes to a non-drinking Baptist governor, would allow persons who buy wine at a restaurant to take home the unconsumed portion of the bottle.