This week’s Courier Herald column: Last week, members of the legislature’s appropriations committees held budget hearings with those that head state agencies, going over requests for new money and justifications for existing expenses. It’s the annual signal that the pageantry portion of opening a session of the General Assembly has ended and the hard work
This morning the conference committee on Georgia’s FY 2019 Budget met to announce an agreement on the final budget, likely to be voted on today in both chambers. Of note, the economy has continued to grow and the Governor’s revenue estimate has been adjusted upward. As such, not only will Governor Deal leave office with
This week’s Courier Herald column: On Friday, Georgia’s House of Representatives passed the proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2019, which begins July 1 of this year. Appropriations bills begin in the House under the stewardship of Chairman Terry England – a man who has learned to listen attentively and smile before saying “no” to many
Yesterday I dedicated this week’s column to a stall in both momentum and political will to fully implement school choice in Georgia. Today I’d like to focus on one bill – House Bill 430 – to explain why the gap between traditional local schools and public charter schools is even larger than is usually discussed.
The State of the State was the show, but the OPB has the plans for the dough. The Office of Planning & Budget has released the Governor’s budget request for FY2019, which begins July 1st. You can see the entire budget here. The document begins with a three page intro letter from the Governor, which
In this first week of the legislative session, members are circling their wagons and moving forward on the pieces of legislation they deem important enough to push during a legislative session and election year. During election year sessions members are more cautious and thoughtful not to push legislation that will induce an opponent to jump
This week’s Courier Herald column: The page has turned on the calendar and we have a fresh new year ahead of us. It’s a time of year brimming with optimism – even more so than usual if you’re a UGA fan. If you’re not, there’s still time to make a resolution to fix that. The
For the last several months, Congressman Ferguson (GA-03) has been wildly optimistic about tax reform. He is wildly optimistic about a lot of things, really. As a former Congressional staffer, I speak from experience when I say that I know how easy it is to become jaded about the world we are living in. But
This week’s Courier Herald column. This is the third in a series discussing the state’s fiscal structure and income tax policy. You can see segment one and segment two here. For the past couple of weeks, we’ve discussed Georgia’s income tax, which accounts for half of the revenue used to balance the state’s budget every
This week’s Courier Herald column: What are you going to believe? The facts, or what you know to be true? A bidding war seems to be breaking out among some of the Republican candidates for Governor with respect to who can cut state income taxes the most. Cutting taxes, is of course, a core mantra
