Most counties ignore school attendance mandate
In a recent AJC opinion, Sen. John Kennedy writes, “New law will better address and reduce chronic absenteeism.” I wish I could share his optimism. But the record tells a different story.
Since 2018, Georgia law has required every superior court chief judge to establish a Student Attendance and School Climate Committee in their county. These committees are meant to bring together local educators, law enforcement, mental health leaders and others to tackle chronic absenteeism.
Yet less than 10 percent of counties have complied.
Sen. Kennedy is right: The issue demands local insight and long-term commitment. That’s precisely what the 2018 law was designed to foster. The mandate remains largely ignored.
A law, no matter how sound, cannot solve a problem if no one enforces it. Without accountability, even the best intentions become decoration — words on paper, failing the students they were meant to serve.
ROLAND BEHM, ATLANTA
EV subsidies help grow the industry
First, the Georgia legislature and now the U.S. Congress have attacked subsidies for electric vehicles. Republicans say that they want to end the “EV mandate.” Of course, there is not and never was an EV mandate. What our Republican politicians seem not to understand is that the question is not whether the U.S. will move from gas-powered cars to electric cars. The entire world is moving toward electric cars. The real question is, “Where will those cars be built?”
Right now, China’s BYD is winning the race to be the world’s biggest supplier of electric vehicles. Subsidies can help the U.S. EV industry succeed and grow to be a major player on the world electric vehicle stage. Ending subsidies will greatly harm an industry that is already creating thousands of jobs in Georgia.
If we want the U.S. to create highly paid manufacturing jobs, we must enable U.S. electric vehicle manufacturers to compete around the world. Subsidies can help grow the industry.
LARRY AUERBACH, ATLANTA
Trump’s reforms look a lot like Hungary’s
Reshaping our laws and government to mimic another country (Hungary) seems fundamentally un-American at best and traitorous at worst. What would the Founding Fathers say? The Heritage Foundation, a Washington think tank and perennial swamp-dweller, provided the extremist agenda (Project 2025) the Trump administration is currently following, despite lies to the contrary.
The Heritage Foundation reportedly has a memo of understanding with the conservative Danube Institute in Budapest, Hungary, where conservative aspirants are groomed for positions in Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government.
The Trump administration’s ongoing attacks on higher education are straight out of Orban’s playbook — and, not coincidentally, Project 2025. Luckily, Hungary is roughly the size of Indiana; authoritarian “reforms” won’t be as easy to implement here.
JOHN MOREDOCK, ATLANTA
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