Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for December 15, 2017

Georgia and American History

On December 16, 1773, the Sons of Liberty, led by Patriot Sam Adams, boarded three British ships in Boston harbor and threw tea worth $700,000 to $1 million in today’s money into the water in what came to be known as the Boston Tea Party.

France formally recognized the United States as an independent nation on December 17, 1777.

On December 15, 1791, Virginia ratified the Bill of Rights, giving the first ten Amendments a three-quarter majority required to become law.

Governor George Towns signed legislation on December 16, 1847 to build a State School for the Deaf and Dumb. The institution now known as the Georgia School for the Deaf was begun with a log cabin, $5000 from the legislature and four students and is still in operation in Cave Spring, Georgia.

On December 15, 1859, Georgia Governor Joseph Brown signed legislation outlawing public execution of criminals. The previous day he signed legislation prohibiting slave owners from freeing their slaves on the owner’s death.

General Ulysses S. Grant expelled all Jews from his military district, which covered parts of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky on December 17, 1862. President Lincoln ordered Grant to rescind the order.

On December 16, 1897, Gov. William Atkinson signed legislation recognizing June 3, the birthday of Jefferson Davis, as a state holiday.

President William McKinley visited Savannah, Georgia on December 17, 1898. While there, McKinley attended church at Wesley Monumental Methodist Church and visited Georgia Agricultural and Medical College (now Savannah State University) and the Seventh Army.

On December 17, 1902, legislation changed Georgia’s state flag changed to include the coat of arms on the blue band.

On December 15, 1939, Gone With the Wind held its world premiere at Loew’s Grand Theater in Atlanta.

On December 16, 1944, a German counterattack in the Ardennes region of Belgium created a “bulge” in Allied lines with particularly difficult fighting near the town of Bastogne. During the Battle of the Bulge, 89,000 Americans were wounded and 19,000 killed in the bloodiest battle fought by the U.S. in World War II. National Geographic has an interesting article published for the 70th Anniversary of the Battle.

On December 17, 1944, Major General Henry C. Pratt ordered the end of the imprisonment of American citizens of Japanese descent in prison camps.

WTBS began broadcasting under new call letters on December 17, 1976 and uplinked its programming to satellite to become “America’s Super Station.”

President Jimmy Carter announced on December 15, 1978 that U.S. diplomatic recognition of the People’s Republic of China would begin on January 1, 1979.

The United States House of Representatives Judiciary Committee released a report on December 15, 1998 that recommended impeachment against President Bill Clinton and introduced H.Res. 611.

On December 15, 2016, Republican Tim Echols was sworn in by Gov. Nathan Deal to a second term on the Georgia Public Service Commission.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Doctors from Macon debuted their latest music video public service announcement.

A music video filmed at The Medical Center, Navicent Health, and performed by local doctors and clinicians has gone national.

The catchy tune is an original composition by local musician and composer Christopher Griffin, and Dr. Edward Clark, a pediatrician with the Beverly Knight Olson Children’s Hospital, Navicent Health, was instrumental in having the song produced.

The participants volunteered to record the song, participate in the video and promote the video to try to minimize heart disease and the stroke risk of Middle Georgians. The music video was produced locally by Big Hair Productions and funded by the Navicent Health Foundation.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States for both men and women, with no regard for race or ethnicity, according to the release. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that one in every four deaths in the U.S. is related to heart disease.

According to the American Heart Association, stroke is the fifth leading cause of death and is the leading cause of serious, long-term disability in the United States. On average, someone in the U.S. suffers a stroke every 40 seconds, someone dies of a stroke every four minutes, and nearly 800,000 people suffer a new or recurrent stroke each year.

Georgia Senator Butch Miller (R-Gainesville) has been elected by his fellow Republican Senators as President Pro Tem of the Georgia Senate.

Miller, who has been in the Senate since 2010, served as Gov. Nathan Deal’s floor leader. [Senator David] Shafer, R-Duluth, gave up his leadership post to run for lieutenant governor, hoping to replace Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, who is running for governor.

Miller could not immediately be reached Thursday.

“This is a great leadership team that will work well together to advance Georgia,” [Lieutenant Governor Casey] Cagle said in a statement.

Miller had considered running for lieutenant governor in 2018, but he decided against it. His promotion to second-in-charge futher cements Gainesville’s dominance at the statehouse. Deal, Cagle and Miller are all from the Hall County city.

Kennesaw State University President Sam Olens announced he will step down effective February 15, 2018.

KSU Provost Ken Harmon will serve as interim president while the University System conducts a national search for Olens’ replacement.

The Board of Regents’ review into KSU was launched following the university’s decision to keep five cheerleaders who kneeled in protest during the national anthem at a Sept. 30 home game off the field before kickoff in subsequent matchups.

“Challenges to the institution were evident as I began my tenure and these trials, coupled with internal trepidations, made for a very difficult start,” Olens said in a statement announcing his resignation.

Gainesville legislators spoke to the Greater Hall Chamber of Commerce’s annual Eggs and Issues and previewed the 2018 legislative session.

Transportation spending, teacher raises and cash for rural broadband development — Hall County’s state lawmakers offered a glimpse of Georgia’s 2018 legislative session on Thursday.

With state government seeing tax revenue climb amid economic prosperity, the issues before state government this year focus on how to capitalize on growth rather than stave off decline.

The Greater Hall Chamber of Commerce’s annual Eggs and Issues breakfast featured Sens. Butch Miller and John Wilkinson, and Reps. Lee Hawkins, Matt Dubnik, Emory Dunahoo and Timothy Barr running their large audience through the issues and legislation coming up in the 2018 session that begins Jan. 8.

Right up front was the state’s budget, which is expected to grow 5 percent next year, according to Dunahoo, R-Gillsville.

Dunahoo said he expects to see an increase of $514 million in state education spending in 2018, or more than 40 percent of the new revenue next year.

“This includes $162 million for a 2 percent rate for our teachers,” he said.

Miller, R-Gainesville, also took a stance against lowering the age requirement of the school tax exemption. The state tax exemption for local property taxes is open to residents at 62 years of age, or three years earlier than retirement age.

“If we continue to lower that tax exemption for schools, we will not be able to continue to fund our schools,” Miller told the audience. “All of us went to school and most of us went to a public school. Someone before us paid their taxes in order for us to go to a public school.”

[State Rep. Lee] Hawkins [said] Georgia needs to expand light rail lines throughout the state.

“In the northern states, they developed this 100 years ago,” he said. “Unfortunately, our MARTA system was not developed along the same ideas — going to places of employment — but more about shopping.”
A commuter-focused rail line would “move a lot more people more efficiently” in the state, Hawkins said.

Miller, however, said in the short term the state needs to focus on making transit more efficient. Georgia has four major transit systems in metro Atlanta.

Muscogee County School District released its legislative priorities for the 2018 Georgia General Assembly.

MCSD Superintendent David Lewis presented the list of 10 concerns during Thursday’s meeting the Muscogee County School board conducted with the Columbus legislative delegation. In no particular order, Lewis said, the district’s priorities are:

1. “Release local school districts to pursue other health care options for their classified employees outside of the State Health Plan.”

2. “Improve the Public School Employee Retirement Savings plan.”

MCSD contends this plan is “inadequate and produces very little income for long-service retirees from custodial, plant service, food service and bus driving positions.” The district recommends a plan that rewards long-service personnel.

3. “Adjust QBE funding.”

QBE is the Quality Basic Education act, which prescribes the state’s funding formula for its public school districts. It’s 37 years old, needs updating and never has been fully funded, critics insist.

State Rep. Jesse Petrea (R-Savannah) pre-filed HB 657 to address increasing gun violence in Savannah.

Rep. Jesse Petrea, R-Savannah, pre-filed a bill that would penalize people for supplying guns to felons. House Bill 657 would make it a felony for any person to “knowingly and intentionally provide a firearm to a felon.”

“So many of these felons in our community — who have already lost their right to keep and bear arms — are being provided firearms by their family members, their girlfriends, or buddies,” Petrea said during a Thursday press conference with Chatham County District Attorney Meg Heap and Savannah Alderman Julian Miller. “These individuals know that they are providing firearms to felons. This is the population we need to target if we’re going to stop gun violence in this community.”

Under current Georgia statute, a person can be charged with a misdemeanor for giving a gun to a felon and can face up to 12 months in jail. Petrea’s bill would increase the punishment to one to five years in jail.

“It is not to target citizens who are law-abiding gun owners who are responsibly keeping and carrying firearms,” Petrea said. “The problem in our community is a very small demographic of felons who continue to commit crimes over and over again.”

The state representative says he’s not worried about the bill’s passage during the next legislative session. Savannah-Chatham Police Chief Joseph Lumpkin and Rep. Carl Gilliard, D-Garden City, already expressed support for the bill, Petrea said.

On the other side of the capitol, Sen. Lester Jackson says he’s working on a bill that would allow law enforcement to destroy seized weapons. Under current state law, agencies can house weapons for six months before turning them over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Jackson said.

“The GBI in turn sells them to a third party,” he said. “They wind up in pawn shops or those guns shows. Many of them return on the street. My legislation would give sheriffs or police departments discretion to destroy those weapons especially if they are commonly used in violent offenses.”

Amazon now has a registered lobbyist in Georgia, according to the AJC.

Jacob Oster, a lobbyist with expertise in “clean energy and technology,” registered Dec. 7 with the state ethics commission. Oster, who represents Amazon Corporate LLC, listed addresses in Washington, D.C., and Seattle.

It’s unclear on what issues or upcoming legislative proposals Oster might represent Amazon, but his registration is the buzz of economic development circles.

Amazon is a growing employer in Georgia, operating distribution hubs for its e-commerce network, as well as a corporate hub for its Amazon Web Services division.

It’s unclear the last time Amazon had an in-house lobbyist at the Gold Dome. The company has been represented by outside groups, including veteran Georgia lobbyist Graham Thompson, for some time. But the timing of the company adding an in-house lobbyist in Georgia is intriguing.

The Gwinnett Daily Post continued its coverage of Lt. Governor Casey Cagle’s speech to the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce earlier this week.

Tunnels, elevated highways, transit and autonomous vehicles are all possible parts of Georgia’s transportation future, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle told the Gwinnett Chamber this week.

“The future is going to be built while making sure we are building the infrastructure that can sustain the kind of growth, sustain the kind of prosperity that we want for our state,” Cagle said. “That means that, yes, we’ve got to be willing to go under, we’ve got to be willing to go over and around.

“When I say that, I mean, yes, we’re going to have to explore tunnels. We have to look at elevated road systems. We have to be in a position where we utilize our assets in the most efficient ways through reversible lane projects, putting a high priority to get into the city in the a.m. time frame and out of the city in the p.m. time frame.”

He broached the issue of transit, which is becoming an increasing topic of conversation among elected officials, particularly in metro Atlanta, who are struggling to deal with increasing traffic issues, including gridlock. Cagle called it a “tool in the toolbox,” and said autonomous vehicles will also have a role to play in the future.

“What you decide to do is your decision,” he said. “I just want to touch on this for a moment because I do think it is important. Often times, I think we look at something in a way that we see it today versus the way we see it in the future. All of us that have been to Europe have seen something that is very, very different in transit and in rail than what we have in Georgia.”

Toshiba paid Georgia Power and the other owners of Plant Vogtle’s new nuclear reactors more than $3 billion to reduce construction costs under their contract.

Toshiba has held up their end of the bargain, paying out $3.68 billion to Plant Vogtle co-owners Georgia Power, Oglethorpe Power, MEAG Power, and Dalton Utilities.

Toshiba, the parent company of Westinghouse Electric, originally agreed to make monthly payments through January 2021 but, under a new agreement reached earlier this month, delivered all remaining installments in a single payment of approximately $3.225 billion on December 14. Georgia Power’s proportionate share of the payment is $1.47 billion.

Parent guarantees were put in place to protect Georgia electric customers as part of the original contract for the Vogtle nuclear expansion. The payments will reduce the total cost of the plant for Georgia Power by approximately $1.7 billion with every dollar received from Toshiba being used to benefit customers.

Gwinnett County will spend $2.4 million over the next three years to study the effect of septic tanks on water quality at Lake Lanier.

Robins Air Force Base has installed 24 “noise cannons” to scare off birds from runways.

Oconee County begins demolition today of its old jail in downtown Watkinsville.

Camilla Mayor Rufus Davis and City Council Member-elect Venterra Pollard say they’re going to boycott future city council meetings.

Mayor Rufus Davis and Camilla City Councilwoman-elect Venterra Pollard have threatened to sit out future City Council meetings to draw attention to what they contend is “widespread discriminatory and segregationist practices; a new city charter; and the passive representation of certain officials, who are not serving their constituents.”

The City Council adopted the amended city charter Monday evening, which, according to a news release from Davis’ office, will “vest very strong, unprecedented powers in the city manager, which takes away from the already limited powers of the mayor and the City Council. The new charter will allow the city manager, among other things, to appoint all members to all of the city’s boards, all commissions, all committees, chairs, officers and the city attorney,” Davis wrote in a release he sent to media.

Pollard and Davis said the new charter would further minimize the power of the mayor and the council.

Japanese Consul General for the Southeast Takashi Shinozuka told the Rome Rotary Club that Japan is committed to removing nuclear weapons from North Korean control.

“This is no longer time for dialogue with North Korea,” said Japanese Consul General to the Southeast, Takashi Shinozuka, to Rome business leaders Thursday. “This is time to give them pressure, pressure and more pressure.”

Shinozuka, in a presentation to the Rome Rotary Club, said he is hopeful the international community, including China, can work together to deal with the North Korean threat.

The Consul said Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and President Donald Trump have already developed “a very good chemistry.”

In Georgia alone, Shinozuka said 640 Japanese companies have invested nearly $12 billion and provide close to 36,000 jobs.

Shinozuka revealed that Japanese Emperor Akihito, 83, has agreed to step down at the end of April in 2019 and pass the baton of the oldest continuous monarchy to his son Crown Prince Naruhito. The Emperor has no political power in Japan and is not considered the Head of State.

Brookhaven City Council approved several measures related to construction by Children’s Hospital of Atlanta.

The Brookhaven City Council on Tuesday night approved several steps that will enable Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta to move forward with its planned $1 billion North Druid Hills campus.

The 72-acre campus will serve as a catalyst for more than $40 million of transportation improvements in the surrounding area, officials said.

“We are thrilled to be in Brookhaven,” said Children’s CEO Donna Hyland in a statement. “This partnership will allow us to do what we do best – get children better, faster – while also having a transformative effect on the health, safety and wellness of our neighbors in Brookhaven, DeKalb County and beyond.”

“Our partnership with Children’s allows us to accelerate several key projects of vital importance to Brookhaven, while retaining and growing one of our largest employers,” said Brookhaven Mayor John Ernst in a statement. “Children’s campus is going to change our community in a positive way, but this cannot compare to the life-changing effect it will have on children from across the region and state.”