TSPLOST, health care, education: Business community lists priorities for Georgia Legislature

Savannah’s statehouse delegation members laid out their plans for the coming legislative session on Wednesday, with nods toward Medicaid and health care coverage expansion and another penny sales tax initiative, this one to assist with transit.

The "Eggs and Issues" event, hosted by the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce, is an annual forum involving Chatham County’s two state senators and six House representatives and chamber members. The chamber's governmental affairs committee unveils a list "legislative priorities" and "key pro-business policies and positions" at the meeting and each of the eight legislators offer brief remarks previewing the upcoming legislative session, which opens on Jan. 10, 2022.

Wednesday's breakfast was attended by business leaders, city officials from multiple municipalities, political action committee members and nonprofit executives.

The lawmakers spoke about draft legislation, ongoing goals and other topics — Sen. Ben Watson poked fun at his new salt-and-pepper beard, a product of "no-shave" November.

Rep. Jesse Petrea, a Republican who represents Chatham's islands, spent a portion of his time talking about Georgia’s burgeoning timber industry, urging those in attendance to choose paper bags over plastic at the grocery store.

Rep. Carl Gilliard, a Democrat who represents Garden City and a swath of west Savannah, recited the entirety of the preamble to the Constitution.

Rep. Derek Mallow, who represents many of Savannah's intown neighborhoods, quoted Chapter 25 of the Gospel of Matthew, a pointed selection for the group of affluent and powerful Chatham residents: “What you've done unto the least of these, you've done them also to me," Mallow said.

Eggs and Issues is just as much about networking as it is about communicating with the elected officials. The two newest members of the Chatham delegation, Rep. Edna Jackson and Sen. Billy Hickman, attended the breakfast for the first time as lawmakers.

Jackson won a special election in November for the seat left vacant by the death of Micky Stephens. Hickman joins the delegation thanks to the recently completed redistricting process, with the new maps extending his district into parts of Pooler and Bloomingdale.

TSPLOST

Listed among the priorities for the delegation was a measure that would allow single counties, by referendum, to hold their own Transit Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax.

It’s a 1 percent sales tax on top of every purchase within a county, and can only be used to fund transit capital, operations and maintenance needs specifically. Chatham Area Transit currently offers transit services in the county.

This TSPLOST would differ from the one on the ballot in 2012, which focused on transportation projects, such as roads, bridges and other infrastructure. That ballot item was voted down by 57% of voters and was a regional initiative that would have funded projects in a 10-county area.

The 2022 push will be to draft legislation that would allow for single-county TSPLOSTs, similar to how the current SPLOST and ESPLOST are structure. Voters would ultimately decide, via referendum, whether to implement a TSPLOST.

Expanding health care coverage

Georgia's expansion of the Affordable Care Act's eligibility in the state has been a long journey. In 2019, the Legislature passed SB106, which allowed the state to ask the federal government for permission to expand Medicaid, but only to people earning up to 100% of the poverty level. The ACA calls for expansion up to 138%.

Georgia passed a Medicaid wavier in 2020, called Georgia Pathways, that would expand Medicaid but require those seeking coverage to document 80 hours of community engagement — employment, education, job skills training or community service — per month.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services took issue with part of the waiver after COVID "made community engagement infeasible," a letter from the CMS read.

“We’ve gotta expand Medicaid expansion for real, and stop playing about politics. Because for people in rural areas, hospitals are closing down. The working poor are not able to afford to get sick,” Gilliard said.

Added Rep. Mallow: “Many of you may not know, but I was on Medicaid as a child, and I know how important Medicaid is to help families who don't have it all put together. Those who don't have everything that you may have are the folks that need the most opportunity."

More: Georgia clashes with Biden administration over Medicaid waivers

Education

Support for Savannah-area universities and technical colleges was a popular topic among the legislators. Edna Jackson hopes to join the House Committee on Higher Education and champion several college funding items listed as legislative priorities.

Savannah State University has asked for $6 million for infrastructure improvements as well as financial support for the rebuilding and restructuring of the College of Education, the marine sciences program and homeland security and emergency management program.

Georgia Southern University has requested $2.8 million for the Armstrong campus science lab center renovation and $3.3 million to install the necessary equipment for the Jack and Ruth Ann Hill Convocation Center on the Statesboro campus.

Savannah Technical College requested $719,000 for furniture, fixtures and equipment for the school’s 7 West Bay Culinary Institute, an off-campus facility that houses programs for second-year culinary, baking and pastry arts students as well as some hotel, restaurant and tourism management students.

There were no items regarding K-12 schools on the priority list, though the delegation said they would support the passage of legislation to create a program for Georgians between the age of 21 and 35 to get a high school diploma in schools established explicitly for this purpose.

Additionally, funding and initiatives to improve Pre-K access availability and quality are listed as a priority.

More: Edna Jackson sworn in at Georgia Capitol, just in time to vote on redistricting

Beaches and tax incentives

Other issues were included on the priority list, from a wide range of issues. They included:

• Support Tybee Island's $5 million funding request for beach and dune nourishment, stormwater management improvements and nature-based improvements to the area bordering the tidal salt marsh.

• Support the renewal of Georgia’s historic preservation incentives to encourage investment in the continued rehabilitation of Georgia’s historic commercial and residential structures.

• Support the film and post-production tax credits while advocating for the continued protection of these credits

Savannah Chamber 2022 Legislative Agenda by savannahnow.com on Scribd

Will Peebles is the enterprise reporter for Savannah Morning News. He can be reached at wpeebles@gannett.com and @willpeeblessmn on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Chatham lawmakers in Georgia General Assembly discuss priorities