Education
- Implement reforms for Georgia’ Pre-K program using $50M of money awarded through the Early Learning Challenge Grant Program.
- Dedicate almost 82 percent of FY 15 new revenue receipts to education, with 68 percent of new revenue going to K-12.
- Allocate nearly $8 billion in next year’s budget to K-12 education – an addition of $547M, the largest single year increase in K-12 funding in seven years.
- $44.8M as a part of the K-12 budget to implement recommendations of Digital Learning Task Force, whose goal is connecting kids to the internet in every corner of the state, from rural counties to suburbs to metro areas.
- Create New Zell Miller HOPE Grant – cover 100 percent of tuition for technical college students
- Expand HOPE Grant strategic industry status to four more professions – cover 100 percent of tuition for technical college students pursuing welding, healthcare technology, diesel mechanics and information technology.
- Create a 1 percent interest loan program for students attending technical colleges – $10M in recommended budget.
- Implement new High Demand Career initiative
- Since taking office, Gov. Deal has increased funding for education by more than $930M
- Funding for Quality Based Education formula has increased 13 percent since FY 2011
Criminal Justice Reform
- Re-entry and reform (Phase 3), reducing recidivism rate means fewer crimes, fewer crimes, fewer victims, and few dollars spent on prison beds.
- Jail backlogs have dropped by nearly 90 percent since Gov. Deal took office.
Infrastructure
- $35M in recommended budget for Port of Savannah deepening.
- Intend to start dredging this year.
Tax Reform
- Eliminated sales tax on energy for manufacturing.
- Lowest unemployment rate in 5 years
- Reduced the marriage tax penalty on working Georgia couples
- GA has lowest tax burden on it citizen of any state in the nation
Conservative Budgets
- Maintained AAA bond rating from all three agencies, one of only 10 states in the nation to do so.
- Increased rainy day fund by 518 percent
- Increased the year-over-year revenues for each quarter since 2011 without raising taxes
Downsized State Government
- Reduced number of state employees by 12,750 from 5 years ago, a 16.5% decrease.
Job Creation
- Site Selection Magazine awarded Georgia the “Best State to do Business”
- 217,000 new jobs added in Georgia over past three years
- Workforce ranked No. 1 by CNBC – quick start program regarded as best in country
Health Care
- Affordable Care Act costing state $327M dollars
- Even without expansion, Georgia spends nearly $1,000 per person through state and federal taxes to fund current Medicaid and Peachcare programs.
Expansion would add 620,000 people to our taxpayer funded health plan at a cost of $2.5 billion over
Thanks to Cameron Fash of the law firm of Hall Booth Smith www.hallboothsmith.com governmental affairs for assisting in this story.
