General Assembly Acts on Taxes, TADs
and Cancer Treatment Centers

   The General Assembly reconvenes on Tuesday, March 4, for day 27 of a 40 day session. Below are highlights of action taken last week.

Speaker’s Tax Plan Gets Resistance
   Speaker Glenn Richardson’s broad based property tax reform initiative picked up resistance from the right and left political spectrums this week. Being a constitutional referendum, it requires a supermajority, or 120 votes, to pass and move onto the Senate. Recognizing there are only 107 Republicans, many of whom will not support the measure; the support of Democrats is a necessity. On Thursday the Democrat leadership in the House came out in opposition to the measure. That same day, Republicans who are weary of the proposal and looking for a way to oppose it got sympathy from Grover Norquist, who leads the anti tax lobbying group Americans for Tax Reform. Norquist urged Republicans to vote against the measure until further study could confirm the plan would not hike taxes.

Senate Property Tax Reform Plan Passes House Committee
   A Senate version of property tax reform has passed the House Ways and Means Committee and is in House Rules Committee awaiting a pass to the floor. As initially drafted, SR 796 by Senator Chip Rogers would freeze property assessments at present levels and then allow for two percent annual increases for residential property and three percent for non-residential absent a permitted reassessment on sale or improvement. The House Ways and Means Committee passed a substitute that caps local government spending based on two indicators – value of new housing added to the local property digest, and the rate of “government inflation” (percentage change in the price index for gross output of state and local government from the prior year to the current year as defined by the National Income and Product Accounts and determined by the United States Bureau of Economic Analysis and indicated by the Price Index for Government Consumption Expenditures and General Government Gross Output (Table 3.10.4)).

Senate Passes CON Carve Out
   The Georgia Senate passed a controversial measure this week to permit destination cancer treatment hospitals to sidestep the certificate of need process and compete with existing cancer treatment facilities. The Georgia Chamber, Cobb Chamber of Commerce and community hospitals remain opposed to Senate Bill 433.

Sales Tax Rebate Bill Passes House
   Legislation promoting more tourism development, such as Six Flags-White Water in Cobb County, passed the House last week. House Bill 1129 offers sales tax rebates for up to 25 percent of the construction costs for tourism projects that exceed $10 million in expansion or $25 million in new development. This legislation is listed among the priorities of the Cobb Chamber this session. It passed the House with one dissenting vote.

TAD Measures
   Following the Georgia Supreme Court ruling on February 11 that school tax revenues cannot be used to underwrite tax allocation districts under the Georgia Constitution, lawmakers in both the House and Senate have offered constitutional amendments to remedy the problem. House Resolution 1364 by Representative Chuck Martin has passed out of committee, but is being held in the House Rules Committee and is not likely to get any help out of Rules Chairman Earl Ehrhart. On the Senate side, Cobb Senators’ Judson Hill, John Wiles and Chip Rogers have introduced SR 1024, which is supported by Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle. These bills have the support of the Cobb Chamber and the Georgia Municipal Association.