The Georgia General Assembly may approve a fourth Superior Court judge for the Piedmont Judicial Circuit, but it’s unlikely to fund the position.
“There will be none (funding) this year, but we’re eligible for a judge, so we’re going to go ahead and put in for one so that when funds become available, we’ll be at the top of the list,” explained Rep. Tommy Benton.
Benton, along with Reps. Terry England of the 108th House District, Michael Harden of the 28th and Tom McCall of the 30th, introduced House Bill 77 calling for the creation of the new judgeship for Jackson, Banks and Barrow counties.
But facing a budget shortfall of up to $2.3 billion, the General Assembly is not likely to fund the position, noted Benton. In addition to the cost of the judge’s salary and benefits, the state would have to pay for the judge’s office, facilities, equipment and support staff.
That scenario — new spending in a year of budget shortfalls — will be played out repeatedly as the General Assembly works on its budget. Benton, for example, was expecting the Hall County delegation, of which he is a part, to make a similar request for another judgeship.
According to Benton, Gov. Sonny Perdue’s budget, introduced last week, has $600 million in new spending even as the governor warns of cuts up to 10 percent.
As for the governor’s budget, while Benton said he had not yet had the opportunity to study it, he found some troubling aspects.
“I saw where he’s wanting to cut out the school nurses,” he remarked. “This was something (originally) that the state wanted to do, now he wants to cut the funding altogether.”
“I spent two and a half hours Saturday afternoon answering e-mails from people concerned about eliminating the school nurses,” Benton said.
The governor also proposes to do away with the taxpayer relief grant started during the Roy Barnes administration that is attached to homestead exemptions. On every property tax bill is a note of how much “relief” was granted by the state.
Benton predicts the General Assembly will break with the governor on that point.
“I think they are going to try to fund it,” he said. “I don’t know of any representatives who will vote to do away with it this year. I think what may be being looked at is the gradual phase-out like it was gradually phased in.”
The General Assembly, however, will have to find some substantial cuts.
“It was originally a $1.5 billion deficit, then it went up to $2 billion, now it’s up to $2.3 billion,” Benton commented. “That’s 10 percent.”
Perdue had asked department heads in all areas except medical (four percent) and education (two percent) to cut six percent from their budgets. Since education and Medicaid account for so much of the budget, balancing the budget without slashing spending in those areas will be extremely challenging.
“It could be that education has got to be cut more,” Benton said. “Education is $10 billion. Two percent of that is a lot of money. You cut any more than two percent, it’s all going to come back on the local taxpayers.
