Georgia legislature takes break amid budget debate

They left the gate at breakneck speed but have come to a screeching halt.

The General Assembly will take an early, unplanned break in the 2020 legislative session starting Thursday. The session began its 12th official day Wednesday after kicking off last month.

The session will reconvene Feb. 18 to give lawmakers more time to debate Gov. Brian Kemp’s $28 billion fiscal 2021 state budget plan and funding cuts ordered by the governor.

In a letter Wednesday, House Speaker David Ralston said the decision to break was made after talks between House and Senate

Appropriations committee leaders, who oversee budget negotiations. Budget-focused committees and subcommittees will still meet during the break, he said.

“Decisions made on the budget touch the lives of every Georgia citizen,” Ralston, R-blue Ridge, told his House colleagues Wednesday from the House podium. “I don’t believe it behooves us as a body to come down here and speed through spending $28 billion.”

Kemp’s fiscal 2021 budget leaves major programs like Medicaid and public schools untouched. But his proposal would also trim more than $210 million during this fiscal year and another $300 million in fiscal 2021, which starts July 1.

After the House voted to approve the new session schedule, Ralston told reporters he’s particularly worried about proposed cuts to mental health services, public safety and criminal justice reform initiatives including accountability courts.

Ralston said it was negotiators for the House who convinced Senate leaders of the need to take a break and focus on the budget. He noted that since all spending bills originate in the House, members of the House Appropriations Committee get the first crack at reviewing the budget.

“They have the first real contact with the budget process,” Ralston said. “Department heads and agency heads have come in and said they don’t have the information to give us. … We started asking for this information as far back as late September. Some of the information we still don’t know.”

The proposed cuts would come as Kemp pushes for teacher salary raises that would cost about $400 million to fund. Some lawmakers like House Appropriations Committee Chairman Terry England, RAuburn, cast doubt recently on whether those raises should go through amid deep cuts elsewhere in the state budget.

The week-and-a-half break looks to throw off schedules for lawmakers who hold down full-time jobs in the off-season. The unscheduled pause felt irksome, but many agreed the need to slow down and work through the budget takes priority.