In This Issue
Laughingstock Legislature
There Could Be HOPE for Clayton Students
2008 Legislative Agenda
Legislative Highlights
Gail Davenport
Sen. Gail Davenport (D-Jonesboro) represents the 44th District (Clayton and Henry Counties) in the Georgia Senate. Contact her at 323 Coverdell Legislative Office Building, Atlanta, Georgia 30334; by phone at 404-656-7586 or by e-mail at gail.davenport@senate.ga.gov
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Laughingstock Legislature
Crucial issues were ignored and time was squandered while trivial, wrongheaded bills were rubber-stamped.
By Mike King
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 04/10/08
Members of the Georgia General Assembly, especially those from suburban Atlanta, like to make fun of Grady Memorial Hospital and its myriad problems. No doubt that has made it easier for the Legislature to justify repeatedly turning its back on the state's largest public hospital over so many years.
Legislators self-righteously blame Grady's crisis on the incompetence and irresponsibility of the Fulton-DeKalb Hospital Authority and snicker at how dysfunctional it is. But who now occupies the premium space at dysfunction junction? Who's the laughingstock now?
At least the politically appointed hospital authority has finally started turning control of Grady over to a nonprofit community board. That single step, which took both compromise and leadership, was credible enough to convince the Woodruff Foundation to contribute $200 million over the next four years to upgrade Grady's equipment and high-tech services.
In contrast, the state's legislative branch failed utterly this session to deal with Georgia's significant problems in health care, transportation, education and other issues. Legislators made the hospital authority's operations seem NASA-like in precision. The General Assembly failed to make good even on its own leadership's promise to find a dedicated, permanent funding source for Grady's trauma center and the 14 other trauma network hospitals around the state.
In many other states, the legislative process is more proscribed and professional. But in Georgia, it's a joke.
This year and last, House Speaker Glenn Richardson's ego clearly played a role in the breakdown. Richardson, a man of many ideas, doesn't hide his frustrations when things don't go his way. He's quick to anger, but at least people generally know where he stands.
In contrast, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle is more Eddie Haskell-like, coming off as an overly polite consensus-builder (although it's also true that he seems constantly to be testing which way the political wind is blowing). Yet when he fails at consensus -- as he has done twice in recent years -- he blames Richardson, an easy target.
And then there is Gov. Sonny Perdue, the lame-duck chief executive of the state. During the 2007 session, as the state dried up during a killer drought, his number one priority was his "Go Fish" campaign for Georgia tourism. This year he hopped a Delta jet for a trade mission in China during the last week of the session. His only significant contribution in the final weeks was to author an op-ed piece for Georgia newspapers declaring he was still against the sale of liquor and beer on Sundays, which, predictably, did not pass.
While trauma funding went by the wayside -- as did a two-year effort to allow regions of the state to vote on raising their own taxes to improve transportation -- the final day of the 2008 session wasted precious time passing plenty of worthless legislation. Take your pick of which will get declared unconstitutional first: allowing concealed weapons on public transit, in state parks and in restaurants; seizing the cars of illegal immigrant drivers when they are pulled over for a broken headlight; or busting a convenience store clerk for selling marijuana-flavored lollipops. All those brilliant ideas were endorsed on the final day.
Meanwhile, the usual spate of special-interest and lobbyist-written legislation slipped its way onto the calendar on the last day and managed to get passed. The measures included an 88-page rewrite of the state's entire hospital regulatory process that got less than 15 minutes of floor discussion, as well as a proposed constitutional amendment that would allow property taxes that are supposed to go to schools to be diverted for private redevelopment of blighted areas. To be fair, there was some merit in both measures -- which had sat around for the whole session -- but in the end, legislators didn't really debate them. They just settled for the word of the lobbyists that the measures would be good for the state.
Over the years, the Grady trustees were often accused of the same thing -- failing to make hard decisions, relying on contractors to tell them how to spend public money, closing their eyes to administrative reforms. They were dismissed as incompetent at best, corrupt at worst.
In the end, they lost the credibility needed to run the hospital, safeguard taxpayer money and maintain the last safety net for Atlanta's poor and uninsured. They have been replaced by a new board looking to restore public trust in the historic hospital.
Who will restore the public trust in the dysfunctional legislative branch of state government? Where should we start?
There could be HOPE for Clayton students
By Megan Matteucci
The Atlanta Journal Constitution
Published on: 04/10/08
Eligible Clayton County sophomores and juniors likely will receive their HOPE scholarships even if the school district loses accreditation.
Gov. Sonny Perdue will review a bill that allows students who graduate from unaccredited schools to still get their scholarship money.
Senate Bill 480, which passed the Senate and House last week, is for students who graduate from schools that had been accredited within the past seven years. If signed by the governor, the law would be valid until Dec. 31, 2010, which would include current sophomores and juniors.
The law could help hundreds of Clayton students who depend on HOPE money, district spokesman Charles White said.
"I think it helps from a standpoint because it protects their [students'] right to seek their opportunity to qualify for scholarships regardless of the circumstances of the accreditation issue," White said.
The Clayton school board is now drafting a resolution to send to legislators, thanking them for the legislation.
HOPE scholarships are necessary for Richard Penny, whose twin sons are in 11th grade at Jonesboro High School.
"It would help our family," said Penny, a father of three.
The bill likely will help Kaleb Penny, an honors student who wants to study photography at the Art Institute of Atlanta. His twin brother, Joshua, however, is hoping for a future at Brown University in Rhode Island. Georgia Tech is the backup for Joshua, an honors student and president of the Clayton Student Coalition. The HOPE scholarship would not be available for students who enter schools outside Georgia.
"We are still very, very concerned they would graduate from an unaccredited school," Richard Penny said Wednesday. "It's nice, but not good enough. We don't know how it will affect college admissions."
The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools gave Clayton County until Sept. 1 to meet nine mandates or lose accreditation. A loss of accreditation used to mean no HOPE scholarships.
However, it still makes it difficult for students to get into some colleges and obtain some scholarships.
Perdue has until May 14 to sign the bill into law, said Marshall Guest, a spokesman for the governor.
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