Expect a flurry of new — and sometimes dubious — claims to swirl around some very big Georgia issues when state lawmakers convene Monday for the 153rd session of the General Assembly.
Transportation, religious liberty, medical marijuana and education are among the issues expected to spark fiery rhetoric over the next few months.
But have no fear, PolitiFact Georgia’s team of intrepid truth-seekers will be there to keep tabs on all sides.
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In the meantime, our scribes have already run down some early claims on a couple of headline-grabbing topics: gasoline taxes and how medical marijuana might affect Georgians.
Abbreviated versions of those fact checks follow. For full version, go to politifact.com/georgia/.
Gas taxes
Lawmakers have talked for years about raising the rates of either Georgia’s 4 percent sales tax on gasoline or 7.5-cents-per-gallon excise tax on gas.
This year, though, leaders have signaled that growing concern over traffic congestion and economic development may force the political will into action.
A study committee that spent months last year studying the issue recently reported that Georgia needs to raise at least $1 billion more a year to repair bridges and highways and tackle congestion.
Former state Rep. Edward Lindsey, who is on the committee, claimed that the $19.3 cents Georgia motorists pay on every gallon of gas is one of the lowest rates in the nation yet one of the highest in the region.
PolitiFact Georgia found data from the American Petroleum Institute that confirmed Georgians pay less at the pump than motorists in most other states but the third-highest rate in the South.
But the same data showed that Georgia could double its 7.5-cent excise tax and still be third-highest in the South (or right in the middle among our neighboring states).
We rated Lindsey’s claim Mostly True.
Medical marijuana
With the return of a push to legalize medical marijuana comes a return of worries about what it could mean to allow the use of the drug to treat certain medical conditions.
The Legislature came close to allowing the use of cannabis oil, made from a certain strain of the marijuana plant, last year.
State Rep. Allen Peake, R-Macon, said the drug in his proposal cannot get users high.
Our research showed the oil would be made from a strain of marijuana that is high in a compound known to be an antioxidant and low in one known for creating a “high.”
Medical research on the drug has been limited, given marijuana’s inclusion of the Schedule I list of “the most dangerous” drugs. Limited studies, however, confirm that the cannabis oil is nonpsychoactive.
We rated Peake’s statement True.
But a second bill to allow vaporized, edible and smokable marijuana for medical use prompted Chuck Spahos, the executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, to warn lawmakers that one state with broader medical marijuana use saw traffic fatalities go up among drivers who test positive for the drug, while overall the fatality rate dropped.
“Colorado has seen a decrease in traffic fatalities by 14.8 percent between 2007 and 2012,” Spahos said. “But it’s up 100 percent for operators who tested positive for marijuana.”
Spahos was citing a Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Traffic Area study, which reported those numbers. But the official Colorado Department of Transportation’s statistics didn’t match the report.
The DOT figures confirm an overall decrease in traffic fatalities but show about a 39 percent increase for drivers who tested positive for marijuana. That’s still an increase, but hardly a 100 percent jump.
More importantly, the DOT notes that not every driver in a fatal crash is tested for drugs — making the data incomplete.
To be sure, there are clear dangers to drugged driving, much as there are for drunken driving. But the report and figures to back up the claim were flawed.
We rated the claim Half True.
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