GA PTA LEGISLATIVE UPDATES

 

 

 

GAPTA Legislative Update September 7, 2011

 

PTA                       

Takes

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Advocating for every child

Georgia PTA’s update on legislative activity – Sept. 7, 2011

 

The regular legislative session is still several months away but the legislature has been busy addressing areas that affect you and your child.  This fall there was a special session to address reapportionment and a special committee has been meeting to study education funding to develop short and long term solutions for that funding. A recap of these is provided below. 

 

Advocacy Conference- Sept. 23

 

It is important for PTA leaders and members to build a year-long working relationship with state and local legislators and to understand both the issues impacting children and how education is funded in Georgia. Attend the Advocacy Conference and learn how to be more effective advocates for children while participating in establishing the Georgia PTA legislative platform.  This year’s agenda includes hearing directly from a legislator about today’s issues and how to be an effective advocate.  Also included will be a step-by-step guide for action you can take now and throughout the year as well as an update on the hot legislative issues.  Sign up today on the Georgia PTA website: www.georgiapta.org.  The deadline for registration online is Sept. 21.  Mailed in registration forms must be postmarked by Sept. 16.

 

Reapportionment

 

All election districts are being revised from local to national as is required every ten years.  There are significant ramifications to this that will affect everyone regardless of where they live and who they favor.  The federal and state (house and senate) maps have been developed, approved by the legislature and signed by the Governor and now must be approved by the Department of  Justice at the federal level.  In Congress, Georgia gained one house seat so we will have 14 Representatives after the next election.  At the state level, significant changes were made to district lines. On the House side, voters will likely be voting in new districts (even if they are voting for the same representative) as the district numbers are shifted when reapportionment occurs.  On the Senate side, the district numbers stay the same even when the lines change significantly.

 

The local maps (commission, ward, school board, etc.) will be voted on in the legislative session in January.  (A few local maps have already been approved but the majority of the local maps will be voted on starting in January.) Each local delegation (comprised of all the state legislators who have some portion of their district in a county) will vote on that county’s local maps.  After they approve the maps the maps will be presented to the whole assembly which normally passes whatever the local delegation approved. While the commissioners and school boards may approve the maps, it is the local delegation that really has the final say.

 

The maps with the new state and congressional lines may be seen by visiting:

http://www1.legis.ga.gov/legis/2011_12/house/Committees/reapportionment/gahlcrMaps.html

 

The ramifications of the new lines and what it means to you will be discussed in further detail at the Advocacy Conference. You can ask questions about the significance of the changes.

 

Special Committee on Education Funding

 

There is a special committee studying education funding that has been meeting since July. Four subcommittees were created to address: Foundation Funding (textbooks and technology), Support Services (eg. School nurses), State and Local Partnership& Equity (Capital Outlay, which funds capital projects), and Title 20 Reforms (the laws governing education).  They are tasked with coming up with short and long term solutions for funding education needs.  The committee, as a whole, is charged with developing short-term recommendations by Sept. 30 that could be addressed in the next legislative session and longer term solutions that could be implemented over several years, as state revenues improve.

 

To date, they’ve come up with recommendations regarding funding for school nurses based on the number of students being served and also funding supplies for school clinics.  They’ve also come up with a recommendation for funding professional development for teachers.  These were approved by the whole committee and will be addressed in the next legislative session starting in January.  Also being looked at is the funding for textbooks vs. technology.  The current formula grossly underfunds textbooks and has no funding for technology.  Discussion has centered on allowing flexibility to use the funds for either and to increase the funding but no official recommendation has been voted on, yet. Another recommendation approved by the whole committee calls for repealing the 65% rule which requires 65% of all funds to be used on direct classroom instruction.  There are many problems with the formula, including its definition of what comprises direct classroom instruction, and there is no correlation between spending 65% and classroom productivity. (We were the only state to adopt this initiative, which PTA fought several years ago.)  Additional details on the recommendations can be found on the News page of Capitol Watch www.ciclt.net/gapta. An update on the progress of this committee and details about the recommendations will be presented at the Advocacy Conference.

 

See you on the 23^rd.  Sign up for the Advocacy Conference today!

 

Karen Hallacy

GA PTA

Legislative Chair

Stand together. Power up. Reach out.

Your Legislators:

State Senate – Judson Hill (R-32)
State House – Matt Dollar (R-045)

 

 Please visit www.georgiapta.org for more Georgia PTA information.