State Representative Alan Powell, HD 32 2022 Legislative Newsletter – Week Six 

From economic development to protecting our natural environment, your House of Representatives mulled over dozens of bills that would address a wide range of policy issues both on the House floor and with our committees this week:

House Bill 1044 unanimously passed to encourage and incentivize regional cooperation between Georgia counties, and provide a specific framework for regional development authorities:

• Allows three to five adjoining counties to create a regional development authority that would work to stimulate economic development and job growth within those counties.
• Provides a tax credit for each new quality job for eligible investment properties; this tax credit would be offered to the county determined by the state to have the lowest economic performance within the regional development authority.
• Requires at least half of the authority members from each participating county complete an economic development training course certified by the Georgia Department of Community Affairs.

House Bill 1134 allows the state’s attorney general to collaborate with local district attorneys to prosecute certain gang-related crimes across the state:

• Allows the attorney general to employ peace officers for investigative purposes.
• Works in tandem with the governor’s plan to create the Gang Prosecution Unit in the attorney general’s office.

House Bill 893 extends the collection of hazardous waste fees, which are crucial to supporting the Hazardous Waste Trust Fund and its work to restore Georgia’s environment. Originally set to expire this summer, this bill extends the sunset date of the Hazardous Waste Trust Fund to July 1, 2027.

House Bill 1147 modifies certain hunting and wildlife protection laws to help protect Georgia’s wildlife, including turkeys and other ground-nesting birds, as well as year-round protections for endangered loggerhead sea turtles that have low population numbers from nest-raiding predators, that have had a population boom in recent years and threaten certain wildlife populations. The bill allows property owners to hunt and trap raccoons and opossums year-round and removes bag limits to provide extensive protections to these animals.

The House also passed the following bills during Legislative Week 6:

House Bill 963 provides the annual update of provisions of the Controlled Substance Act for Schedule I and Schedule IV controlled substances.

House Bill 1021 decreases the minimum non-forfeiture interest rate for individual deferred annuities from one percent to 0.15 percent.

There were two important pieces of legislation introduced awaiting action:

House Bill 886 provides a chain of custody for added security of election ballots and materials.

House Bill 1400 repairs the flawed process to provide medical cannabis to eligible Georgia patients, by revising the number of Class 1 and Class 2 production licenses that can be issued by the commission; Medical cannabis was authorized 3 years ago and is still on hold due to a failure of due process of the license evaluation.

House Bill 999 provides for the establishment of scholarship accounts to be funded by the state in the amount of $6,000.00 per school year for each participating student; This bill is a school voucher bill and is in the House Education Committee.

To the readers in House District 32 who may have received misleading mail flyers dealing with school vouchers and promised scholarships: The problem is funding, and every dollar allocated to school vouchers means that many dollars are taken from school budgets, which creates an increase in property taxes for schools.

As we move through this session, I encourage you to reach out if you have any questions or concerns regarding legislation we have discussed or passed thus far. You can reach my Capitol office at 404-463-3793 or email me directly at [email protected].

As always, thank you for allowing me to serve as your state representative and legislative
voice at the Capitol.