The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Legislators make slow progress on final day
Medical marijuana bill among those that passed as session came to close.
Georgia’s medical marijuana law would expand under legislation given final approval Thursday in the General Assembly, while the long-debated campus gun bill appeared to fall victim to the cruelty of the clock on lawmakers’ final day in session this year.
While Senate Bill 16, which would add six conditions eligible for treatment with a limited form of cannabis oil allowed in Georgia, made it through the legislative gantlet, other top measures involving guns on college campuses, adoption, sexual assault and taxes appeared to miss the deadline.
The House and Senate began the day by trading insults, a continuation of their respective postures when they quit Tuesday near midnight.
The usual late-session bickering was notably ratcheted higher this year, and top bills backed by leadership were still being used Thursday as bargaining chips or as blunt objects with which to attack a parliamentary foe.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Cowsert, R-Athens, accused House members of violating their oaths of office for gutting Senate bills and replacing them with House members’ legislation that sat unmoved in the Senate. House Majority Whip Christian Coomer, R-Cartersville, responded by accusing Cowsert of launching a “hypocritical tirade” as Cowsert himself is guilty of the same thing.
Meanwhile, the House resurrected a bill it killed Tuesday, a move that was sure to please Cowsert. The House added much of his Senate Bill 1, which would broaden and strengthen the state’s domestic terrorism laws, to an unrelated bill dealing with immigrants lacking legal status who commit felonies. This, after the House voted down SB 1 itself two days earlier.
Gov. Nathan Deal, making his annual Sine Die visit to the two chambers, praised lawmakers for at least trying to get along.
“I congratulate you for your efforts to reconcile many of those differences,” the governor said. “Not all of them have been reconciled, but that’s to be expected I suppose.”
Deal also had a warning for lawmakers lucky enough to see a bill land on his desk.
“Many of you work very, very hard on those bills,” he said. “I want you to understand that I may not sign all of them. I don’t want to shock you with that statement, but I want you to understand that if you have some concerns whether I will or not I’d hope you’d contact my office.”
One he is expected to sign is SB 16, the medical marijuana bill. House and Senate lawmakers brokered the compromise earlier this month, after the House backed off much broader expansion plans and the Senate no longer pursued a proposal that would have reduced the maximum allowable percentage of THC in the oil (it’s currently 5 percent in Georgia). THC is the component in marijuana that makes its users high.
The bill would add Alzheimer’s disease, AIDS, autism, epidermolysis bullosa, peripheral neuropathy and Tourette’s syndrome to the list of qualified disorders.
Additionally, patients in hospice care would also be able to possess the oil. Other changes include a 45-day reciprocity window for people who come to Georgia from another state, as long as they have a medical marijuana registration card issued by another state, a condition that’s allowed to be treated in Georgia and a form of the oil that is permitted here.
Under Georgia’s 2015 law, patients and, in the case of children, families who register with the state are allowed to possess up to 20 ounces of cannabis oil to treat severe forms of eight specific illnesses, including cancer, epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease.
“Today we’re going to provide more access to Georgians with very specific illnesses,” said state Sen. Matt Brass, R-Newnan. “And we’ll provide doctors more treatment options for patients.”
On other measures, comity was less forthcoming between the House and Senate.
Teams of negotiators were appointed to try to hash out compromises, but as the sun set agreement proved elusive. The House continued to push for state Rep. Earl Ehrhart’s bill that would impose new mandates on how colleges and universities report and handle sexual assault accusations. Opponents of the bill, Senate Bill 71, said it would protect those accused of rape at the expense of the victims, while Ehrhart and others say it would merely provide those accused with due process protections.
On guns, a joint House-Senate conference committee drafted an agreement after 10 p.m. but was unable to get the final votes. House Bill 280 had proposed to allow Georgia weapons permit holders to carry firearms on to most parts of public colleges and universities.
The House negotiators were seeking fewer exceptions to where guns could be carried while the Senate appeared to be advocating for more gun-free areas.
According to a copy of their compromised report handed out to lawmakers, negotiators added additional exemptions to the bill that included more areas on campus where high school students in dual enrollment programs attended class as well as offices or rooms used for disciplinary hearings.
The agreement appeared to include an additional exemption requested by the governor, who vetoed a similar measure last year: faculty offices where students might go for regular office hours.
As the clock approached 11:30 p.m., neither chamber had voted on the compromise plan, meaning the bill was likely dead for the year.