Longtime Georgia legislator Ben Harbin, a former chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, is resigning his seat next week to take a job with a national lobbying firm.
Harbin, a Republican from Evans, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he is joining Southern Strategy Group, which currently has two lobbyists in Georgia and represents several health care clients, including the Medical Association of Georgia.
Under state law, Harbin can’t lobby in Georgia during the upcoming year’s legislative session. The General Assembly has a one-year waiting period, meaning legislators can’t resign and then immediately begin lobbying their ex-colleagues.
Harbin was elected in 1994 and served as House Appropriations chairman after the GOP took over the chamber in the mid-2000s. House Speaker David Ralston, about a year after he took over the chamber’s leadership in 2010, found a replacement for Harbin as chairman. But Harbin has continued to serve on several committees, including Appropriations and the tax-writing Ways & Means panel.
Harbin said he has informed Gov. Nathan Deal and Ralston that his resignation is effective July 7.
He is just the latest of several Republican lawmakers to leave the House since the end of the 2015 session. House Majority Leader Larry O’Neal, R-Bonaire, resigned after Deal made him a tax judge. Longtime lawmaker Mike Jacobs, R-Brookhaven, was appointed by Deal to a state judgeship. And Rep. Mark Hamilton, R-Cumming, a House committee chairman, resigned to take a job in Tennessee.
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