When Gov. Nathan Deal handed in his list of last-minute additions to the state budget earlier this year, it included $10 million to buy land in Gainesville for a new technical college campus in his hometown.
The money was a down payment on the legacy Deal is building as he heads into the second year of his final term as governor. That legacy includes his nationally acclaimed criminal justice reform and, he hopes, a new school funding system.
It will also include a big tab for pet projects that will continue costing taxpayers long after he’s gone. Besides the new technical college campus, which could eventually cost $100 million or more, the former attorney, prosecutor and judge is expected to push for a new state courts building — probably the most expensive building in state history. Both will likely be done on borrowed money that won’t be paid off until the 2030s.
He's also expanded the Court of Appeals, and is pushing to enlarge the Supreme Court, both of which have long-term costs. There are also plans for new ports infrastructure and possibly increasing the $75 million that Georgia has already invested in restoring state-owned Jekyll Island's lost luster. And there are plans for reservoir in his home Hall County that could cost tens of millions of dollars more.
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