After the MLK holiday, legislators were back under the Gold Dome this week for joint Appropriations Committee hearings.  Led by Senate Appropriations Chairman Blake Tillery (R-Vidalia) and House Appropriations Chairman Matt Hatchett (R-Dublin), members of the House and Senate committees gathered for three full days of meetings Tuesday through Thursday to hear from leaders of the dozens of state agencies about their budget requests for Amended Fiscal Year 2026 and Fiscal Year 2027.  

Although legislators will consider hundreds of measures this session, passing a balanced budget is the only constitutionally required action item for the General Assembly every year.  Governor Kemp released his 400-page budget document detailing his spending recommendations for the upcoming fiscal year following his State of the State address last week.  On Tuesday, he came before House and Senate Appropriations Committee members to present his budget to the committee.  Highlights from his remarks included:

In his remarks, Governor Kemp also noted that Georgia’s debt ratio is the lowest it has been since the state first began issuing bonds over five decades ago, and that the state eliminated the outstanding unfunded liability for state retiree health benefits from $2 billion.  He said these measures have saved the state $240 million annually.  

Governor Kemp noted that his administration has saved Georgia taxpayers $9.7 billion through tax rebates, reductions in the state income tax, and gas tax suspensions.  Looking to the future, Governor Kemp also pointed out to committee members that Georgia’s rainy day fund remains full to ensure Georgia has the funds to combat upcoming unexpected emergencies.

After Governor Kemp’s presentation, state economist Robert Buschman went before the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to provide an economic outlook for the upcoming year as legislators begin to work on their proposed budgets.  He told committee members that personal income tax revenues have increased by 1.3 percent despite tax rate cuts.  Buschman noted that political and economic instability continue to have real market impacts and described the current economic situation as a slowdown, but not to the point of a recession.  

For the next three days, dozens of state agency heads presented their budget asks to the Appropriations Committees and were on hand to answer questions from legislators.  Next week, Appropriations subcommittees will begin to meet to do a deeper dive into each portion of the budget.  

The Senate is one step closer to swearing in its 55th member.  On Tuesday Republican Steven McNeel and Democrat LeMario Brown came out as the top two finishers in the six-way special election to fill the Macon-based seat of Senator John Kennedy, who resigned ahead of the session.  Because no candidate received more than 50 percent of the vote, McNeel and Brown will face off in a runoff election on February 17th.  The last Senate seat, which was vacated by Senator Colton Moore last week when he qualified to run for Congresswoman’s Marjorie Taylor Greene’s seat, will likely remain empty for a majority of the legislative session. 

The General Assembly will convene Monday through Thursday next week for Legislative Days 6 through 9.  Committee action will likely pick up considerably next week to allow legislators to consider some of the many measures that are still in play from the 2025 Legislative Session.  We also anticipate a significant number of bills will be introduced in the coming weeks with the March 6th Crossover Day deadline looming.   Also quickly approaching is qualifying— all legislators wishing to seek reelection (and their non-incumbent opponents) must qualify to do so at the Capitol during the week of March 2nd. 


This weekly Legislative Update report is courtesy of the Regional Business Coalition of Metropolitan Atlanta (RBC), an organization of over a dozen of the largest and most active Chambers of Commerce throughout the metro Atlanta region. RBC member chambers represent over 15,000 member companies who employ millions of metro Atlanta residents. The RBC’s primary goal is to represent the interests of RBC Chamber members on regional public policy issues impacting our transportation, water and air quality and to advocate for solutions that improve metro Atlanta’s quality of life and economic vitality.