In a national wrap-up on the topic of transportation funding this weekend, the Associated Press reported that the total amount of money available to Georgia from the Federal Highway Trust Fund has declined 12 percent during the five-year period ending in 2013, the latest year for which numbers were available.
That's compared to a 3.5 percent nationally during the same time frame. The amount of inflation-adjusted federal highway money available to Georgia dropped 18.8 percent since 2008.
Based on population, Georgia experienced the third-largest drop in money available from the fund since 2008 behind only Minnesota and Washington.
The above figures are sure to come up Tuesday at a session of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus, which will host a 3 to 5 p.m. public hearing in Room 515 CLOB.
Speakers will include Tommie Williams, R-Lyons, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee and Jay Roberts, R-Ocilla, his counterpart in the House.
The outreach to Democrats is yet another sign of how close floor votes on H.B. 170 in both chambers could be.
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One of the strategic problems for supporters of religious liberty bills has been message discipline: The authors contend that neither S.B. 129 nor H.B. 218 has anything to do with gay marriage.
But then you have this weekend message from Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, a formidable national group, which explicitly draws the connection:
There is. In at least 10 states, conservatives are fighting back with a string of Religious Freedom Restoration Acts (RFRAs). Although each state's may vary, the bottom line is that they give men and women of all faiths a powerful tool to stop the government from walking all over their beliefs on issues like marriage and sexuality. If Washington State had a RFRA, for example, Baronnelle Stutzman would actually have legal grounds for beating back the government's attack on her store.
In Georgia, where Atlanta Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran was sacked for writing a book about biblical morality, he could have filed a federal RFRA complaint in his lawsuit. But he couldn't, because Georgia hasn't passed the measure. But it isn't for lack of trying.
Georgia State Senator Josh McKoon has been working around-the-clock to get his RFRA through the legislature, which became inordinately more difficult this week when his own party sabotaged it. When McKoon stopped the Judiciary Committee from watering down the bill, Republican Majority Leader Bill Cowsert shocked everyone by ambushing SB 129.
A stunned McKoon, who assumed he had the Majority Leader's support, watched yesterday as Cowsert voted with Democrats to table the measure -- postponing protections that people like Kelvin Cochran need now. "I wanted to make clear that the government does have a compelling state interest to prevent discrimination..." Cowsert tried to explain later. Obviously, the Majority Leader has bought into the ridiculous propaganda that RFRAs somehow excuse real prejudice.
"This goes back to the civil rights, where (blacks) were turned down because of the color of their skin," say one gay activist. "Now you want to create legislation because you want to turn down a service to someone because they're gay, straight or transgender?"
That is "100-percent not true," McKoon fired back. "The critics of this legislation are using it to scare very good people, to try and raise money for their radical, far-left agendas. Thirty states have this legislation in place, the federal government has had this legislation in place for two decades, and the opponents can't cite to a single case of discrimination that has been shielded by a religious liberty defense."
Over the weekend, we told you that former attorney general Michael Bowers will take on the religious liberty bills on behalf of Georgia Equality.
Supporters of the bills are gearing up for a large state Capitol rally on March 3.
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Whether President Barack Obama really loves America, a question posed by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, provided significant fodder for news shows on Sunday -- and the Internet.
One of the videos lighting up the blogosphere over the weekend was a response that came from C.J. Pearson, a 12-year-old Georgia middle-school student:
Until now, Pearson was best known as the conservative activist behind the bid to lower the minimum age for candidates to run for state Legislature. He is also agitating for a much more curious proposal -- legislation that would penalize Georgia teachers for barring students from using the bathroom if it results in an accident.
Pearson's homemade video landed on the front-page of the Drudge Report ("Black middle-schooler slams Barack Obama in epic YouTube speech") and earned him an invite on FoxNews later this week.
We've been here before. See "Krohn, Jonathan."
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More Democrats are calling for answers from state House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams' New Georgia Project, after Creative Loafing delved into its shortcomings in registering minority voters last year. In a follow-up Friday, Bryan Long of Better Georgia, state Sen. Vincent Fort and former state Rep. Ralph Long III asked for more transparency:
"There are some things you don't do," Long III says. "If you're prepared to do what investors in your campaign want you to do, you're going to develop the data. They expect for you to come back with results. You can regurgitate the data and cough it up really fast for any inquiring mind who wants to know. If you can't answer questions about what you did with money, that means you didn't value the work..."
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The New York Times over the weekend told the tale of Wei-Hock Soon, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center, who has become one of the most prominent academics questioning global warming science. As it turns out, he takes a lot of money from fossil fuel interests -- including Southern Company -- and often did not mention the funding sources in his papers. A taste:
The newly disclosed documents, plus additional documents compiled by Greenpeace over the last four years, show that at least $409,000 of Dr. Soon's funding in the past decade came from Southern Company Services, a subsidiary of the Southern Company, based in Atlanta...
"Southern Company funds a broad range of research on a number of topics that have potentially significant public-policy implications for our business," said Jeannice M. Hall, a spokeswoman. The company declined to answer detailed questions about its funding of Dr. Soon's research.
The Times has published the original documents here.
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The controversial "private probation" legislation is back, but with some changes aimed at appeasing critics.
The Augusta Chronicle reports that lawmakers will once again consider changes to the law that allows private firms to supervise some offenders. Last year's legislation was vetoed by Gov. Nathan Deal. From The Chronicle's Sandy Hodson:
The high court decision stunned the probation companies and judges who preside over misdemeanor cases and city ordinance violations.
HB 310 would return tolling powers to the courts. Under the bill, judges could suspend the expiration of a probation sentence if the person is accused of violating the terms – such as failure to pay fines, restitution or fees owed to private probation firms.
You can find House Bill 310 right here.
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The Savannah Morning News is writing about H.B. 308, backed by state Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah, which would raise a tax break for the developer of a hotel project on River Street from a maximum of $300,000 to $25 million:
In addition to increasing the amount of income tax credits available to The Kessler Collection for restoring the 103-year-old power plant for use as a hotel, the legislation would allow credits for site preparation and design and construction of additions to the West River Street building.
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Over at PeachPundit.com, Jason Pye has latched on to some GOP shenanigans in Newton County, over the delegate selection process that ends with this year's state convention:
….People who took time out of what was a beautiful Saturday to get involved later received a letter saying, basically, thanks for your interest and money, but you don't have enough points to be a part of our party. Word is that even people who were elected to serve as precinct chairs, which are part of county committee, have been disqualified from participation, a move that is in direct violation of Article III, Section J of the county party bylaws.
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