About a week ago, all news channels tuned in to cover the annual White House Correspondents Dinner, while the rest of America didn’t really care. It’s an annual ritual that’s more about inside baseball than what gets done around the country. The event is more symbol than substance. Yet, during an [...]]]> Senator Curt Thompson (D-5th)

About a week ago, all news channels tuned in to cover the annual White House Correspondents Dinner, while the rest of America didn’t really care. It’s an annual ritual that’s more about inside baseball than what gets done around the country. The event is more symbol than substance. Yet, during an election, symbols get covered more than substance and, overwhelmingly, media reports came back saying that our President was… cool. Many hailed this as a good thing. After all, being cool is a personality trait that many American’s admire. We listen to cool people. We buy things advertized by cool people. Cool people do big things in America.

Yet, John Cassidy over at the New York Times makes an interesting point. President Obama’s hipness is easily enjoyed by most partisan Democrats. It’s one of the many reasons we elected him to replace our seemingly tone-deaf President Bush. And with Mitt Romney being, in public at least, somewhat of a cardboard cutout, the prevailing opinion is this competition has already been won. But, Cassidy points out that the essence of hipness is that “you operate on a more refined plane than most: you are more fashionable, more discerning, and more discriminating than the average boob.” Another word for all of this? Elitist, and this is a word that carries a much more loaded tone for this President, especially amongst independents.

So, do voters really vote for cool? The United States is unique in the sense that we don’t separate ceremonial and political duties between two heads of state; our President is responsible for both. Americans want a leader that represents us well on the world stage and at home. Not only that, the confidence and ease reflected by a leader cracking jokes smoothly during a dinner or while interacting with normal Americans can translate into confidence in the nation itself. It’s a subtle relationship, but it’s there.

The issue is that, while we’re in a recovering economy, it’s not recovering with the certainty that the market needs it to have. Who cares about cool when you don’t have a job? Putting food on the table for oneself and their family tends to make people more focused on the bottom line and a ‘What can you do for me?’ mentality. Different qualities than inspiration matter the most to people in that situation, and there are far too many Americans facing this set of circumstances right now.

It’s not unfair to say that a President’s personality plays a lot into how well they do in elections or manage a country. But, how much is ‘coolness’ a part of that package? For folks dealing with the effects of the Great Recession, it’s not much, and they’re a sizable part of our country at the moment. Yet, with small signs of economic recovery, this same population might not feel that they are suffering as much of a burden and react accordingly. Either way, being cool is probably more beneficial for the President during boom times rather than bust, but any edge counts when an election is going to be as close as the one we’re experiencing this year.

While much of the Georgia blogosphere, including myself, usually focuses on national politics or the various soap operas playing out in our state government, I did want to bring up an issue that will have an unfortunate impact on our district here in Gwinnett County. Last Thursday, a proposed lottery gaming [...]]]> Senator Curt Thompson (D-5th)

While much of the Georgia blogosphere, including myself, usually focuses on national politics or the various soap operas playing out in our state government, I did want to bring up an issue that will have an unfortunate impact on our district here in Gwinnett County. Last Thursday, a proposed lottery gaming complex proposed for the OFS site in the Gwinnett Village portion of our district was blocked by the Georgia Lottery Board. Not only would this have created a huge tourist destination in our area and finally redeveloped the mostly abandoned and unused OFS site at Jimmy Carter Boulevard and Interstate 85, it would have also created the largest lottery retailer in the region. This would provide a much needed infusion of dollars into our economy, as well as into the rapidly vanishing HOPE scholarship.

Replacing the old OFS plant, the facility was going to cost about one billion dollars and include, along with video lottery terminals, a hotel, restaurants, and even a concert amphitheater. The positives were easy to see: about $350 million going towards HOPE lottery funds, and 2500 new, permanent jobs, not counting the construction and off-site jobs from economic growth in the air. 9 other states, including Delaware, successfully operate these types of gaming facilities (and yes, they look like casinos, but all the games would be lottery based with no “high stakes poker tables” and the like). If implemented properly, this would have been an overall net gain for folks in the 5th District, in Gwinnett, and in Georgia as a whole. Having a diversified economy is an important investment for any county, and the complex would have been the perfect tourism boost. Additional money to cover the shortfalls in our vanishing HOPE program would be welcome and, to be frank, are sorely needed.

However, with this refusal, the signs don’t look good for expanding the lottery in Georgia. Governor Deal signaled his opposition earlier in the year stating he opposed “increasing the gambling options in Georgia”, when asked about this particular project.  Governor Deal has additionally opposed other gaming proposals, such as horse racing and pari-mutuel betting, which would also generate tourism, jobs, and revenue for our states. While the Georgia Lottery Board is technically an independent body, all seven members are appointed by Governor Deal and they clearly got the message. So, it was no surprise that the Lottery Board has refused to have a vote on expanding our lottery to the video terminals that this proposed casino would need.

With the 2009 failure of a proposal to set up a similar complex in Underground Atlanta, we find ourselves at an impasse. HOPE is disappearing, but the Governor and fellow Republicans are refusing to look at any other ways to generate more funds for either HOPE or our colleges and technical schools.  $500 million has been cut from higher education budgets in the last three years.  There’s no effort by this crowd to try and find additional revenue. They are setting up HOPE and our higher education system for failure.  We rank last in job creation since the advent of the Great Recession, but are absolutely unwilling to permit the private sector to create the thousands of jobs that increasing lottery options would do.

I’ve written previously that our state is in a massive budget shortfall and we need to increase revenues. Our state government has already cut many programs to the bone and beyond, but it still hasn’t stopped us from being broke. Georgia’s tax strategy needs to be a broad-based system that’s as flexible as the market, consisting of taxes that are progressive, regressive, and proportional. This proposed casino would have been an integral part of that strategy, if it was being pursued by state leaders.

Unfortunately, there’s no backup now that this proposal has failed.  While the developer, Dan O’Leary, has vowed to keep on moving forwards, Governor Deal still remains opposed. The Governor of Georgia is enormous opposition to have, and he’s also representing those in Georgia who still oppose gambling in this state. But, the reality is we already have a lottery.  You can’t be ‘sort of’ a virgin, and you can’t ‘sort of’ allow the lottery. Either our state is a lottery state that fosters it so that we can help fund our HOPE scholarship program, or it isn’t.  Ignoring a system until it fails so you can say “See, I *told* you it wouldn’t work.” is no way to deal with the higher education situation we have currently.

Since our Governor won’t lead, we need to.  The work is already starting to happen in this area.  Resolutions like HR1640, sponsored by a Republican and urging the Georgia Lottery Board to adopt video lottery terminals, are part of the long process of changing attitudes. It’s the same progression that legalizing Sunday Sales went through. It’s still disappointing to see a well-thought out and planned proposal be abandoned like this. Georgia needs tax dollars in order to fill our empty coffers and fund programs, like HOPE, that invest in our citizens. We need to realize that a significant amount of money going towards that goal reaps us bountiful rewards.

On January 10th, Governor Deal took the podium in the House Chamber under the Gold Dome ad presented a 2012 State of the State address chock full of promises focusing on promoting Georgia’s economic competitiveness. At the start of March, the state legislature finally reached the beginning of the end. Day 30, [...]]]> Senator Curt Thompson

On January 10^th, Governor Deal took the podium in the House Chamber under the Gold Dome ad presented a 2012 State of the State address chock full of promises focusing on promoting Georgia’s economic competitiveness. At the start of March, the state legislature finally reached the beginning of the end. Day 30, otherwise known as Crossover Day, is the last day a bill has to pass at least one of the chambers, either House or Senate, and still have a chance of being signed by the governor this year. It’s traditionally a busy day and the 12-hour session this year didn’t disappoint. With passionate speeches like Governor Deals coming from Georgia’s leaders, it’s obvious that we spent most of those hours debating the various merits of legislation intended to improve our state’s economy.

Yet, nothing could be further from the truth. Instead of a day full of Democrats sparring with Republicans over differing economic ideologies, it was a day full of sparring over differing social ideologies. Though self-evident, it’s worth it to note that arguing over the latter usually gets people a lot more worked up. For example, take SB438 and SB490. SB438 prevents the health plans that our state employees use from paying for abortions, with no exceptions for rape or incest related situations. Under SB490, any group recognized by the state and organized for “religious purposes” could be exempted from covering birth control for their employees if they have “moral objections”. While trotted out to the tune of ‘these bills will save money for the state’, these bills are as related to economic competitiveness as trying to save money by building fewer roads.

However, other bills seen on the floor didn’t even try to keep up the pretense. SB 469 turns civil disobedience into an aggravated misdemeanor. Billed as a response to the Occupy protests seen last year, SB469 instead criminalizes one of the most passionate political activities a citizen can become involved in: protesting. SB292 requires that all recipients of Temporary Aid for Needy Families are tested for drugs. A similar bill in Florida was just found unconstitutional by a federal court. In fact, one of the few bills that could be said to help promote jobs in Georgia, SB401, which allowed individuals and businesses to defray power costs by installing solar panels, had to be snuck onto another bill in the form of an amendment. The original version had never been passed out of committee.

It’s disappointing to find Georgia’s leaders pressing full-tilt ahead with controversial social issues mostly influenced by national politics, instead of focusing on the progress of Georgia’s economy. We’ve got some important, ingrained problems that our state has to face in the fields of infrastructure, education, and taxation. This year, both bold ideas and not-so-bold ideas were proposed in an attempt to solve these problems, and it’s a sin that they were pushed aside to act on these sorts of bills instead. It does neither our constituents or ourselves any good if, as legislators, those issues are kicked down the road year after year.

Last week was Crossover Day in the Georgia General Assembly, which is the last day a bill is able to pass either the House or the Senate and still be signed into law this Session. It’s a long day, full of many bills to debate, and it’s easy to tell the general [...]]]> Senator Curt Thompson

Last week was Crossover Day in the Georgia General Assembly, which is the last day a bill is able to pass either the House or the Senate and still be signed into law this Session. It’s a long day, full of many bills to debate, and it’s easy to tell the general tenor of any given years Session by what types of bills are under consideration. Seeing as all the bills legislators were confronted with were social issues thinly disguised as ‘savings to Georgia citizens’, it looks like the Georgia GOP is passing the buck on jobs yet again.

The plain fact is that Georgia, while making tremendous strides over the last half of the 20^th century, still has a long way to go in reducing the gap between the “two Georgias”. Our state cannot depend on only Atlanta and Savannah in order to climb out of the economic hole caused by the Great Recession. Importantly, it was with this fact in mind that Governor Zell Miller inaugurated the HOPE Scholarship back in 1993. He knew that giving academically superior students (who otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford it) the chance to attend college would not only increase the size of Georgia’s technically proficient workforce, making our state more attractive to business, but also reduce the inequalities between the two Georgia’s in the process. However, last year, Governor Deal saw it fit to instead shift the HOPE Scholarship’s focus to ensuring a college education for those who are already assured of becoming a part of Georgia’s educated workforce.

The facts are stark. The Atlanta Journal Constitution has reported that Atlanta suburbs accounted for half of the 10,629 Zell Miller Scholars in Georgia, while some rural counties have none. In 2010, Georgia’s African-American citizens accounted for 30.5 percent of the state’s overall population. There are currently 74,278 students receiving the HOPE Scholarship. Of that number, only 17 percent are African-American. Of the 8,721 students receiving the Zell Miller Scholarship that attend Georgia’s research universities, only 320 are black, which is a mere 3.6 percent. The divisions that the HOPE Scholarship intended to heal are now enforced by it instead.

The HOPE Scholarship was not, and should not be, structured as an entitlement program for wealthy families that can already afford to send their kids to college. Georgia needs to invest in its children for the future, and in order to do that, we need to focus on sending the best and brightest who can’t afford it to our universities. Spending money on children who are already able to afford it means that Georgia’s human capital is going to plateau, not grow, as well as lack the diversity of background that has made America’s economy so innovative in the first place. If the government of Georgia doesn’t make this commitment, then it only shows that it is more interested in pandering to the base that elects it, rather than making a significant pledge to invest in the potential that lies not just in Atlanta’s suburbs, but in all of Georgia.

http://www.11alive.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=231859

It’s a legitimate question: Where did all the moderates go? And by moderates, I don’t mean the folks that every presidential campaign under the sun is going to be trying to court this year. Actually, the number of independent and moderate voters in America is on the rise and that’s probably [...]]]> By: Senator Curt Thompson

It’s a legitimate question: Where did all the moderates go? And by moderates, I don’t mean the folks that every presidential campaign under the sun is going to be trying to court this year. Actually, the number of independent and moderate voters in America is on the rise and that’s probably happening, in part, due to the issues that I’d like to discuss here today. No, I’m talking about moderate politicians. Last week’s announcement by Sen. Olympia Snowe that she was not seeking reelection this year have made me reassess how fast the political center is vanishing in legislatures across this country. This isn’t just a GOP issue either, because moderate Democrats like Ben Nelson and Democratic independent Joe Lieberman have fallen by the wayside as well, and the casualties from each party have only been increasing over the years.

While partisans might say otherwise, losing the political center, whether it’s the rhetoric used or the politicians inhabiting it, would be a great blow to American politics. Legislatively, moderates pull their party closer to the attitudes of most Americans, help keep informal lines of communication between the two parties open even in the middle of open feuding, and, most importantly, work towards getting things done. Principled moderates are the sorts that work across party lines to avoid turning the more mundane aspects of government into a bloody political siege between hated opponents merrily invoking the buzzwords of the week loudly in front of the nearest camera. Acting like that tends to slow down the work of actually governing, especially when you’re in the weeds on issues such as infrastructure or emergency services. Yet, this is exactly what American citizens are seeing over and over again in Washington and other gridlocked legislatures across the county, and their displeasure at this turn of events is represented by Congress’s abysmal approval ratings. That is what happens when only the two opposing viewpoints of the extremes exist to debate each other; no common ground exists and therefore no respect is given to the other side.

It’s only become harder for those who try to inhabit that ‘No-Man’s land’ between two competing ideologies to get involved at any significant political level. Most who have that potential would rather sit out and not have to go through the extra stresses placed upon a moderate legislator finding themselves more beholden to their party and the primary voters in their district, rather than those who vote in the general. After all, the level of rancor in this country is so high that crossing across the aisle for just one vote can get someone labeled a traitor by their own base. It can get so bad that once any media attention is given to a bill, it’s assigned a ‘side’ and the other ‘side’ is now duty bound to prevent it from ever seeing the light of day. American legislators don’t find very many issues that they can publically come together on anymore, other than opposing child molestation or sex-trafficking. All this state of affairs does it make me depressed. It’s hard to offer solutions to something that’s been creeping up on us so slowly that it’s almost institutionally ingrained into our politics by now. But it does make me wonder that much more about how to get our moderates back.

By Curt Thompson

Much is made of the idea of “grading” a President’s performance. Even pollsters occasionally resort to asking people to grade various aspects of a particular president’s job performance.  Since Americans have almost universally experienced being graded in school and most of us have had some [...]]]> Does Obama Pass the Re-election Test?

By Curt Thompson

Much is made of the idea of “grading” a President’s performance. Even pollsters occasionally resort to asking people to grade various aspects of a particular president’s job performance.  Since Americans have almost universally experienced being graded in school and most of us have had some sort of job performance review in our work career, it’s something we can identify with.  Many of us have experienced failure in some form, and almost all of us know someone who has failed out of school or been fired for poor job performance.  It’s something we get as a frame of reference – especially when deciding whether to re-elect a sitting president.  Essentially, the pass fail grade is the ultimate performance review that either keeps you in the University or off looking for a new job in an uncertain job market.  That’s why pundits agree that a Presidential reelection race is almost always a referendum on the incumbent.

President Obama himself made note of this in an interview with 60 Minutes where he pointed out that, for example, if health-care premiums were up 50%, he likely wouldn’t be re-elected, and if they weren’t, he likely would.  Certainly the President’s erstwhile opponents like to bring up that interview.  Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has made a point in his stump speeches of saying that “By President Obama’s own standard of success, he’s a failure and doesn’t deserve to be re-elected.”  It’s a nice sound bite, especially among the tea party and fringe starting to dominate the Republican nominating process.  But is that, in fact, an accurate answer to the question or is that simply just an attempt at right wing sloganeering by someone who rests their entire campaign on negative attack?  Does President Obama “pass” the test and deserve re-election?

Quite a few folks have taken a stab at answering the question since Former Massachusetts Governor Romney brought it up and TV commentators started replaying that old Obama interview.  Most start out with a conclusion based on their ideology and work backwards.  Admittedly, I myself am an elected Democrat, but I did want to take some time to try and analyze the question myself and try to look at it through an objective a lens as I could summon.

So what do we look at when answering the question?  As a Democrat, I could be disappointed at the failure to close Gitmo, or the failure to get a public option into the Healthcare Affordability Act, and so on.  And if you look at the Republican talk on television and radio, Obama couldn’t even kill Osama correctly and should be blamed for the scandal of saving our domestic auto industry when the correct thing to do would to have been to let the entire industry fail in an act of anti-union spite.  None of that really makes sense as a frame for grading whether the president deserves or will get re-election.  If you’re in the crowd that cannot be pleased by anything less than a Bernie Sanders liberal or if you’re part of the crowd who has never considered any Democrat as a “legitimate” president, you by definition can’t be grading the President.  Your mind was made up long before Obama was even running for president the first time.  Nothing useful can come of analyzing results oriented science.

Since we are talking about grading whether the president deserves re-election, and by extension, we are trying to use that grade to predict whether President Obama will “pass the test.” It makes sense to get away from the party bases and try to examine what those independent, swing voters, and persuadable Democrats and Republicans will look at.  They’re the ones who will be delivering not a polling progress report, but the actual “pass/fail” grade after all. Here’s what they are likely to look at:

(Jobs = B-) Most is made of this area because, in the Obama interview, Obama himself stressed the need for unemployment to be lower than when he started his term in order to get re-elected without a fight. Republicans like to say that Obama promised unemployment wouldn’t go above 8% and it did; they want him fired over that alone.  However, that “promise” is a Republican lie – Obama never said that.  The reality is that the economy was losing 700,000 jobs a month when he took office and it was in much worse shape than he and we all were lead to believe during the 2008 campaign.  The Recovery Act did stop the hemorrhaging, but it was too small to do more than cover the wound, yet alone heal it.  Both R’s and D’s ironically agreed that to really have produced a net gain in jobs, we would have had to have enacted a larger Recovery Act with New Deal style infrastructure building programs. For good or bad, depending on where you stand on the issue, there were not the votes to do that. Up to now, we have produced 1.2 million new jobs and have had an uninterrupted 23 months of private sector job growth (the longest growth stretch since the tech bubble burst in 1999).  In normal times, that would earn a higher grade.  But long term and minority unemployment are still stubbornly high and Obama set the bar on this.  Now, the real effect of this on his re-election depends on how the trend continues through the summer and fall.  If it continues in the right direction, his grade could be adjusted, but for now he gets a “B-”.

(The Overall Economy = B) The stock market is up. Corporate profits are up even by Clintons’ or Reagans’ standards. The American auto industry was saved (in my opinion, his biggest long term domestic feat outside of healthcare). Our GDP is growing without interruption (even if it’s slow growth). Still, economic confidence is shaky and wages (and even common stock dividends, like those more average investors receive) are stagnant. Sure, there are factors beyond his control, like Greece and the Euro, but you take the test in the school the way it’s given.  Again, normally it would be a higher grade, but here perception matters more than reality.  This is essentially the essay portion of the exam.  Grading is subjective. The perception of the grader is more important than the reality of the statistics.  If things improve and if unemployment breaks below the 8% barrier, the grade could go up.   If unemployment edges up as it often does in the summer and then sticks in the fall, it will likely drop.

(America’s Standing in the World = A) Bin Laden, Somali Pirates, Libya, the Arab Spring, ending the war in Iraq, the wind down of Afghanistan, a willingness to confront China, and economic cooperation has lead to a general feeling we are leading again, rather than demanding tribute.  Here’s where Republicans have the hardest time attacking Obama.  That said, while voters always list this as one of the most important issues they look at, it is the least important of the important issues.  An A is still an A, but don’t overweigh it. Bush Sr. was also an excellent foreign policy president and lost re-election with a smaller percentage of the popular vote than any sitting president in a hundred years.

(Governing or “Passing legislation that matters” = C+ or “Incomplete”)  The first two years in office have been offset by gridlock for the last two years. Sure, there was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the Healthcare Affordability Act (despite the PR rollout on that being absolutely terrible), and the Recovery Act in the past four years, but there was the debt ceiling standoff, the failure of the DREAM Act, and the payroll tax cut in the last two as well. Obama seems to have recovered his footing with the passage of the Payroll tax cut and has finally found his voice in divided government.  Learning the art of constructive confrontation (something Clinton was a master of) has actually helped him pass about 2/3 of his jobs package to date. Compare this to the Healthcare Affordability Act, which, as a whole, is unpopular but each the popularity of each provision individually is quite the opposite. Breaking the logjam of filibustered appointments and calling the bluff of pro forma sessions of Congress has helped the President as well.  Still, the self inflicted wounds of pursuing compromise with those interested only in appeasement dragged his signature Healthcare Affordability Act through the mud and took us to the brink of default.  If the president can continue this path of constructive confrontation, I’m willing to give him an incomplete and not count it against his overall “GPA” but, as it stands, I give him a C+.

(Bridging the Partisan Divide = D)  I, for one, wish I could give him a higher grade.  Many in my party actually didn’t want that divide bridged.  They wanted the same type of partisan governing that W and Rove took to new heights – the only difference is they wanted the Democrats and the left to be dictating the terms. Certainly, I would be hard pressed to think of a single elected Republican interested in trying to step away from the hyperpartisan divide.  Absolutely none of the Tea Party Republicans elected in 2010 were interested in it.  The Republicans have been willing to tank the economy to take back power.  That said, many in the middle really wanted us to step back from this abyss.  No matter whether it was that Obama overestimated his mandate and his abilities or underestimated his enemies’ unwillingness to engage on this issue, this campaign promise and theme has never materialized.  It’s not so much a broken promise, since he didn’t turn his back on it as W turned his back on “being a uniter, not a divider”. But he did not, by any measure, succeed.  I considered giving him an “F”, but held back. I think that with the new “constructive confrontation” strategy, as well as Obama’s own move to bypass the Congress and take the public matters back the “street” (i.e. public opinion), he’s started to pull things back the center of American voters.  We could be back in failing territory by November however, but for now I’ll give him a passing grade – barely.

Overall, I’d give President Obama a passing grade. If the pundits are correct, and independent voters look at the re-election of a president in this way, then Obama’s chances on his own look good. Certainly, the trend line looks like he’s improving. That’s without the additional blessing of having what seems to be a flawed opponent (either a far, far right opponent or an out of touch rich guy with a dog strapped to the roof of his car), but 9 months is forever in an election cycle. Let’s check back in September.

Atlanta, Ga. – February 6, 2012 – Senate Democrats called today’s Republican-proposed ethics legislation a smokescreen for [...]]]>

MEDIA RELEASE FEBRUARY 6, 2012

For Immediate Release Contact: Liz Flowers Senate Democratic Caucus 404-291-4755 flowersliz123@gmail.com

SENATE DEMS CALL GOP ETHICS BILL WEAK AND INEFFECTIVE Doesn’t stop influence peddling at State Cap, says Henson

Atlanta, Ga. – February 6, 2012 – Senate Democrats called today’s Republican-proposed ethics legislation a smokescreen for real and substantive an ethics reform.  ”While I am glad they are finally focusing on ethics, it is apparent after looking at this legislation that they have given up on doing anything substantive. We need to create real change not just change how people file reports and manipulate the system,” said Sen. Steve Henson, leader of the Senate Democratic Caucus.  Democrats have specific issues with the GOP-sponsored legislation. Drafters came to Democrats after a bill had been crafted, but Democrats were not included in developing this bill.  The bill introduced in the Senate includes an expenditure cap set at $100, but this cap can be easily circumvented by combining efforts with other lobbyists with gifts or meals to exceed any limits for legislators. Lobbyists could still treat a legislator to a $300 gift if it was divided between other lobbyists.  Almost humorously, the legislation contains a cost of living increase on the expenditure cap. This language underscores the problem of financial dependency by legislators on lobbyists.  ”When teachers in our state haven’t seen a cost of living increase since 2009, and public safety professionals haven’t seen a raise since 2008, providing a cost of living increase of gifts to politicians seems absurd. This change does not fix the ethics problem. It simply demonstrates how bad the problem has become,’ Henson said.  The proposed Republican bill does nothing to reinstitute rulemaking authority for the State Ethics Commission.  ”Under this legislation, the fox is still guarding the hen house,” Henson said.  Earlier this year, Senate Democrats introduced the Ethics Enforcement Act. This resolution would allow voters to approve a dedicated appropriation of funds for the State Ethics Commission at .01 percent of the state budget. The concept is to permanently fund the State Ethics Commission.  Senate Democrats also introduced legislation to create an Independent Ethics Commission. This proposal would remove control of ethics enforcement from the General Assembly and instead create an independent commission staffed by appointees of the Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court and Chief Judge of the Georgia Court of Appeals.  In 2011, Henson introduced SB 248. This bill addressed many of the concerns of Common Cause and others concerned about ethic reform. The measure includes a gift ban of $100. The bills was simple without the complexity and loopholes presented by Republicans The past year has revealed the inadequacy of ethics enforcement in Georgia. Recently, the commission did not have enough funds to send notices of violations by certified mail, resulting in the inability to collect fines. The State Ethics Commission has reduced $7.3 million in fines from 2011. ###

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