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Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Lights, camera: Actors to their places!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Ah, the good old days of House Speaker Tom Murphy and Lt. Gov. Zell Miller are back — that era when at some crucial time, one or the other would lock down provoking a momentary crisis in the legislative process. Tuesday was the 29th legislative day of the 40-day session, meaning that one day remains for the originating body to pass its legislation over to the other. Presumably, legislation that doesn’t make it over by the 30th day is dead for the session — though in some cases, language from “dead” bills can be attached to other bills.
Tuesday was significant because the House just passed its “supplemental” budget for last year — the budget originally intended to make adjustments to last year’s spending. The main budget has not passed yet.
The House chose to add a dash of pork to the supplemental and to include some of Gov. Sonny Perdue’s new legislative priorities, like his “Go Fish Georgia” initiative. On the day the supplemental passed, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle informed the House that the Senate wants a clean supplemental budget, one that addresses emergencies and adjustments. Thus started the Miller-Murphy moment.
The Senate is right — right in two ways. One is that the supplemental should be for fleshing out last year’s spending and nothing more. The other is that, as presumed fiscal conservatives, Republicans shouldn’t be pouring in the pork — special approporiations for the golf and other halls of fame, for example.
Two or three useful bills did “cross-over” Tuesday. One would take 75 percent of the revenues from red-light cameras, after paying for equipment and maintenance, and divert it to the state for funding a trauma network. That’s next best to banning them altogether. It reduces the incentive for cities and counties to use traffic cameras as a revenue tool. One Cobb County intersection, at Windy Hill Road and Cobb Parkway, generates $1.7 million in revenue to Marietta.
The other bill that passed the House would allow judges to impose the death penalty — or some other — when 10 of 12 jurors agree on capital punishment. Now the decision has to be unanimous. Some jurors deceive prosecutors by hiding their opposition to the death penalty — and then simply refuse to agree, no matter the crime. A unanimous jury would still be required for conviction. The bill now goes to the Senate.
The budget standoff may sound like a crisis. But sit tight. Been there, done that. Miller and Murhphy work it out eventually.
