The hectic and tiring Day 30 ended with the House adjourning close to 8:00 on Friday evening and the Senate adjourning a couple of hours earlier.  The legislature is in recess today and tomorrow then will convene on Wednesday and work three days.  Most of the action this week will be in committees.

The Senate Transportation committee will meet on Tuesday afternoon when we anticipate their version of the transportation funding bill will be presented.  On Wed. morning, Senate Appropriations will hold a hearing on the FY 2016 budget.  Also this week we expect the Senate Judiciary committee to consider repealing the sunset for process servers and the Senate Public Safety committee to consider initial two-year registrations for new motor vehicles.  The House Education committee will consider Governor Deal’s legislation calling for the state to take over failing public schools.

Bills that advanced last week include cityhood bills for Tucker, South Fulton and LaVista Hills, a watered down version of the bill allowing craft breweries to sell a limited amount of beer directly to patrons, a bill allowing Tesla to continue direct-to-consumer car sales in Georgia, a stricter Senate-version of a medical marijuana bill that would only apply to children with epilepsy, legislation allowing restaurants that can currently serve alcohol on Sundays to begin at 10:30 a.m. instead of 12:30, and protection for the aquifer that supplies drinking water to coastal Georgia.  There were also two tax breaks that passed the House last week, one to increase the maximum state tax credit to $5 million for rehabilitating historic structures, and the other that would provide a sales tax exemption of up to $650,000 for construction materials for the expansion of the Georgia Aquarium.

Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have questions or need information on any legislative issue. All bills can be found on the state’s site, and live action can be watched in the House and Senate chambers when they are in session.