Fresh Loaf

World renowned party machine and joker Vice President Joe Biden today will tour metro counties hit hard by recent floods:

Vice President Joe Biden will tour storm-ravaged parts of North Georgia on Friday as residents in five flooded counties begin to seek federal help for cleanup and recovery.

Biden, joined by FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, will brief state and local leaders on federal assistance and will meet with families suffering the storms’ aftermath. His visit comes a day after President Barack Obama declared a major disaster in Carroll, Cherokee, Cobb, Douglas and Paulding counties.

Meanwhile, where in the world is Sonny Perdue?

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Gov. Sonny Perdue has declared a state of emergency for 17 counties impacted by recent storms and flooding in metro Atlanta. The counties are Carroll, Catoosa, Chattooga, Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, Crawford, DeKalb, Douglas, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Newton, Paulding, Rockdale, Stephens and Walker counties.

“Mary and I are saddened by the human cost the recent storms have wrought… We are currently focused on rescuing victims of the storms targeting Georgia and preventing further damage. State personnel and equipment are being deployed to assist effected communities. The Georgia Emergency Management Agency is coordinating our response and managing the State Operations Center, the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Division are deploying boats, high-water vehicles, and testing water. Other state agencies are deploying manpower and additional resources.”

Those other state agencies GEMA will help wrangle:

Georgia Forestry Commission- Manpower and debris clearance, water tanker for Douglas County Hospital, water tender strike teams for structural fire support
Georgia State Patrol – Law enforcement for traffic control, road closures, helicopters
Department of Transportation – Road closure signs, bridge inspection, detours
Department of Human Services- Hospital coordination, shelter coordination, boil water advisories

Perdue says the state Department of Agriculture will help evacuate large animals and find shelter for pets. If you can’t find your pet, the department might be able to connect you with a local missing animals contact.

(File photo by Joeff Davis)

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Several state lawmakers with Glenn Beck posters in their Gold Dome lockers have convinced Gov. Sonny Perdue to cut ties with ACORN, the nonprofit organization that recently earned acclaim for its innovative approach to working with entrepreneurs and small businesses.

“I want to thank Sen. [Chip] Rogers and Reps. [Tom] Graves, [Mike] Keown and [Ed] Setlzer for bringing the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (“ACORN”) contract to my attention. In July, I directed my office to review all consulting contracts the state has with outside vendors to look for budget savings; that review did not identify the ACORN contract, because it does not involve state funds. The State of Georgia will not renew the contract, which expires in 13 days. Further, I have issued an Executive Order that prevents executive branch agencies from doing business with ACORN in the future and calls for a review of any existing contracts with ACORN.”

Perdue’s statement, on its own, is a little confusing. ACORN’s contract “does not involve state funds,” so it’s hard to tell how the state was paying the organization. Or what service it provided for the state. We’ve asked the governor’s office for some clarification.

The U.S. House and Senate have voted to cut funding to ACORN. On Sept. 11, the U.S. Census Bureau severed ties with the organization.

Perdue’s full statement and the executive order are pasted after the jump.

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President Sonny Perdue. It’s got a nice and rather frightening ring to it, dontcha think?

An Insider Advantage piece that says the governor’s rumored to be lining up a post-office position as  University of Georgia president recently caught the eyes of those rapscallions at the Marietta Daily Journal. Here’s some of what the MDJ cribbed from the IA article, which is now available only for subscribers:

As the storyline goes, Perdue — who is joined at the hip with UGA President Michael Adams — would consider being named by the Board of Regents as president of the University of Georgia at the end of his term. In exchange for the creation of an open seat via the resignation of Adams, Adams would then be in strong consideration to become the system’s new chancellor. Sound crazy? Well … so did borrowing $21 million in the middle of a world financial meltdown. But Perdue pulled that one off didn’t he?

A commenter at the AJC’s Political Insider column speculates that Perdue’s recent appointment of former House Majority Leader and Georgia Department of Transportation board member Larry Walker to the Board of Regents could help the governor transition from one mansion to another. The two are old buddies.

Perdue’s a UGA alum and would probably be delighted to be one of the few university graduates lucky enough to find a job in the Classic City after throwing his cap in the air. Even if it’s 40 years after the fact.

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After noticeably excluding them from his July 23 closed-door meeting with business bigwigs and local and state government officials, Gov. Sonny Perdue will reach out to some of the state’s leading environmental advocates tomorrow to discuss Georgia’s water woes.

Perdue’s invited approximately 10 environmental advocates, including the executive directors of such organizations as the Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, Georgia Conservation Voters and the Georgia Wildlife Federation, to join him in his office at 10 a.m.

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Gov. Sonny Perdue sat down with Georgia’s Congressional delegation today to discuss how the state will iron out a water-sharing deal with Alabama and Florida now that a federal judge has ruled metro Atlanta’s use of Lake Lanier for drinking water is illegal.

While governors of the three states check their day planners, the Peach State’s congressmen will weigh whether they want to make the issue a national one or keep the focus on Lake Lanier.

At an Aug. 14 panel discussion with business leaders and other elected officials, Isakson said his office has discovered more than 45 federal reservoirs might be in the same predicament as Lake Lanier — essentially, they were never intended to be used for drinking water, but somewhere along the way local governments started dipping in straws.

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Gov. Sonny Perdue has released a statement on Judge Paul Magnuson’s ruling that metro Atlanta’s use of Lake Lanier as its water supply is illegal:

“Obviously, I am deeply disappointed by Judge Magnuson’s decision today. His conclusions rely on decades-old assumptions about the construction of federal reservoirs and the role those reservoirs play in providing water supply for growing states such as Georgia. Our country has changed substantially since the 1940s, when many of these reservoirs were constructed, and I will use this opportunity not only to appeal the judge’s decision but, most importantly, to urge Congress to address the realities of modern reservoir usage. The judge’s ruling allows a three-year window for either Congressional action or an agreement by the states and we will work diligently with Georgia’s delegation and members of Congress to re-establish the proper use of federal reservoirs throughout the country.”

Perdue’s always talking about how the country has changed. Regardless, the AJC’s Jim Galloway, who knows where the bodies are buried, writes that Georgia’s Congressional delegation has scheduled a rare meeting on Monday to get lawmakers on the same page. His post is worth a read if you’re wondering about the political dynamics at play on this issue.

(CL file photo Joeff Davis)

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Benjamin Linus, aka Ima Georgia Sample, lives in Fulton!

Fake-ID artists who pay the rent by supplying underage suburban urchins with illegal pieces of plastic, be on the lookout!

Governor Sonny Perdue today announced that Georgia Department of Driver Services (DDS) is preparing to issue new and improved driver’s licenses and identification cards by fall 2009. The new cards will combat document fraud and protect the identities of Georgia’s citizens by using the latest credentialing technology.

“Everyone knows all we have done to reduce lines and waits at driver’s license centers, but another key priority of the department is safeguarding the identities of Georgia citizens and preventing document fraud,” said Governor Perdue. “These new cards will be the most secure our state has ever issued.”

The new cards will be produced in Conyers, Covington and Locust Grove starting in September. Costs won’t increase and you can still choose between a five- and 10-year license, because we’re all a bunch of transients. They’ll be more difficult to duplicate, the governor’s office says, and will include:

…several security features including ghost photos, a laser-engraved signature over the primary photo to minimize alterations and a tamper resistant coating placed over the card. The cards will feature machine-readable barcodes that can be used by banks, retailers and other businesses to verify the information printed on the front.

Emphasis added. Big Brother Sonny is watching you! Full release is pasted after the jump. (H/T to Mara Shalhoup for spotting the lovable “Lost” character’s address.)

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The U.S. Supreme Court today exempted a small Texas governing authority from the Voting Rights Act, a law that requires 16 states — including Georgia — to get the federal green light before changing the way elections are conducted. Gov. Sonny Perdue, pointing to the civil rights advances made both nationally and in the state, has argued the part of the law that restricts Georgia is no longer necessary. The court did not address that issue today.

From the New York Times:

The court, with only one justice in dissent, avoided the major constitutional questions raised in the case over the federal government’s most powerful tool to prevent discriminatory voting changes since the mid-1960s.

…

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the court, said the larger issue of whether dramatic civil rights gains means the advance approval requirement is no longer necessary ”is a difficult constitutional question we do not answer today.”

The court’s avoidance of the larger issue explains the consensus among justices in the case rendered Monday, where they otherwise likely would have split along conservative-liberal lines.

Justice Clarence Thomas, alone among this colleagues, said he would have resolved the case and held that the provision, known as Section 5, is unconstitutional.

”The violence, intimidation and subterfuge that led Congress to pass Section 5 and this court to uphold it no longer remains,” Thomas said.

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…that’s not the real story.

The veteran political reporter’s sources say the state agency wants to avoid ending the fiscal year with a deficit, possibly by tapping $75 million in federal funding. There’s also the question over what exactly Senate Bill 200, a piece of legislation that shakes up Georgia’s transportation power structure, means for GDOT.

At the same time – and this is where it gets interesting – talks have been underway between the DOT staff and the governor’s office over how to implement SB 200, the governance reform bill that gives the governor (through the new planning director) and the Legislature (through new budget authority) broader control over DOT. There are some loose ends that the bill does not address.

Some believe the two issues have become entangled in something of a quid pro quo, with the governor holding both a carrot (the bailout money) and a stick (the new rules which dissidents believe give the planning director – and through the planning director, Perdue – more power over issues like public-private partnerships and funding allocation formulas than the law stipulates.)

Others don’t see any such entanglement, but this week’s meeting should be interesting nonetheless. Even if there is no suspense about the new commissioner.

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Straphangers and transit wonks can breathe easy, as Gov. Sonny Perdue today finalized a $25 million agreement between the Atlanta Regional Commission and MARTA that will help the transit agency avoid drastic service cuts.

Perdue’s action today was largely just red tape. As governor, Perdue must approve all projects paid for by federal stimulus dollars. The Georgia Regional Transportation Authority approved the ARC and MARTA’s agreement on Wednesday. Perdue had hinted he would do the same.

In exchange for funding to keep its trains and buses running, MARTA will spend $25 million on transit-related projects. ARC stepped up to help the cash-strapped transit agency after the Georgia General Assembly failed to pass a bill that would have allowed MARTA more control of its funding.

Perdue today also approved $121 million worth of other stimulus projects, including streetscape improvements in downtown Atlanta, park improvements in DeKalb County, and oodles of roads.

Screenshots of those are after the jump.

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State Environmental Protection Division Director Carol Couch announced today that Georgia’s drought — the headline-grabbing phenomenon that forced Georgians to take shorter showers and watch our lawns turn brown — was officially over.

That also means the watering restrictions, which irked lawn-doting residents and hamstrung metro Atlanta’s landscaping industry, have been eased. (Here’s Georgia’s new outdoor watering schedule.)

Couch said she hopes residents — who surpassed Gov. Sonny Perdue’s 10 percent conservation goal — will continue using less water. But Georgians have very short memories.

Keep in mind that a drought can — and will — happen again. And Georgia lawmakers, who were quick to jump on the crisis but hard pressed to create actual reforms, squandered several opportunities to make the state better prepared when the next one arrives.

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1. The word is a ‘ghetto’ (We posed a question to readers — Is the word “ghetto” so off limits it’s become, um, ghettoized? — and y’all had some interesting things to say. Thanks!)

2. Atlanta: America’s ’second least safe city’? (The stats suggest that could be the case, but some aren’t so sure.)

3. Roy Barnes: Tanned, rested and ready (Barnes is baaaaaaaack! And the governor’s race is about to get a helluva lot more interesting.)

4. Biden to Perdue on rail funding: ‘Georgia gets nothing’ (VP: Just joshin’, Sonny!)

5. Less-than-fond memories of Barnes’ first term (Not everyone is enamored of the former guv and his bid to get his old job back.)

*This blog post has been edited to correct an error.

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Ah, civility. It’s a beautiful thing, ya know?

Gov. Sonny Perdue and Georgia Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears headed off a legal battle today when the two sides reached a compromise about state judges’ funding.

The governor, pointing to revenue collections that have been less-than-positive thanks to a hellish economy, recently ordered state departments to cut 25 percent from their June budgets. He issued the same ultimatum to the judicial branch.

Not so fast, Sears said. She pointed to the Georgia Constitution, that dusty old document which clearly states that the judicial and executive branches are separate. The issue became a bone of contention between the two branches. Just yesterday, Perdue said he’d withhold the funds and warned the judges against filing a lawsuit.

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TIME magazine has a hilarious pool report of today’s D.C. sitdown between Vice President Joe Biden, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray Lahood and several governors on the topic of high-speed rail. Gov. Sonny Perdue was among those in D.C. for the meeting:

Upon entering, VPOTUS ran into Perdue who appeared, to the VPOTUS at least, to be leaving before the meeting started. Banter and jokes followed.

VPOTUS: “Where you going?”
Perdue: “I was leaving.”
VPOTUS: “What the hell’s wrong with you?” (laughter)

VPOTUS shook hands around the table with several “Good to see you, man,” and “Good to see you, Ed [Rendell].” Said upon sitting: “…Georgia gets nothing. I’m only kidding, only kidding, only kidding.”

Biden knows, y’all. He knows.

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As Thomas “gluten-free” Wheatley and others noted earlier, Democrat Roy Barnes is running for governor.

Barnes held the governorship from 1999 to 2003. His re-election bid was thwarted in 2002 by a then-obscure raindancing fisherman from central Georgia named George Perdue. Please, call him Sonny.

Metro Atlantans have some good reasons to be excited about Barnes.

He’s smart. He’s experienced. He’s won statewide office already.

And perhaps most importantly, he’s more likely than anyone seeking the governorship to break the militant, city-hatin’ Georgia GOP’s chokehold on metro Atlanta.

But before we get our hopes up too much, let’s remember: Barnes four-year governorship wasn’t just bad. It was tragic.

Barnes began his governorship with astonishing promise.

From consumer-friendly healthcare reform, tax cuts, open-government rules, Roy had it goin’ on.

The most impressive of his early accomplishments was the creation of the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, a metro-wide agency that promised to at last impose sanity on Georgia’s unsustainable, sprawling growth.

Here’s what the Economist said in July 1999:

No other governor in the country has anything approaching [GRTA]—but then few cities have built new roads with anything approaching Atlanta’s abandon.

Under the GRTA (widely translated as “Give Roy Total Authority”), Mr Barnes can exercise complete control over transport and development in the 20 counties that make up the Atlanta metropolitan area, as well as in any other part of the state that falls out of compliance with anti-pollution requirements. This bill also contains a political masterstroke: it gives the governor the right to veto actions by the state Department of Transportation, which has been a law unto itself for much of this century.

So what happened?

Like in any good tragedy, it was Barnes’ strength that did him in. He over-reached.

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Gov. Sonny Perdue last week irked many fellow Republicans when he vetoed a bill that would have slashed the state capital gains tax. Critics warned the bill would have cost the cash-strapped state between $340 million and $1 billion in lost revenues.

“I’m scratching my head…If I were the governor, I would have said, ‘Where is that? Let me get my pen.’”

— House Rules Chairman Earl Ehrhart, R-Powder Springs, in the May 11 AJC

“Cutting capital gains taxes would have encouraged more investment into the state. It is a sad day when this type of legislation gets vetoed by a Republican governor.”

— State Insurance Commissioner and GOP gubernatorial candidate John Oxendine in a May 11 press release

“If Governor Perdue vetoes it, I hope legislators will consider overturning his veto. The JOBS Act could do a lot of good for Georgia.”

— David Raynor of the Georgia chapter of the National Federation of Independent Business

“Republicans I talked to in the legislature are angry and demoralized.”

— Pro-growth, anti-tax Wall Street Journal columnist Stephen Moore, writing about Perdue’s veto

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Among the many crazy things to happen on the last night of the General Assembly was the passage of HB 481, a Republican-backed, home-grown economic stimulus bill offered as a response to the federal spending plan being pushed by Pres. Obama.

In its early form, the House bill’s centerpiece was a tax credit for employers who make a point of hiring laid-off workers. But in the waning hours of the session, it somehow morphed into a billion-dollar capital gains tax break. That’s the sort of sweeping policy change that typically undergoes several days, if not weeks, of debate and discussion, as happened with the large corporate tax cut that passed a few years back.

But in this case, lawmakers voted to blow an estimated billion-dollar hole in the state budget almost as an afterthought: “While we’re at it… ” Every Republican reflexively voted in favor of the tax cut because, well, that’s what Republicans do, isn’t it? If you’d taken an extra-long smoke break, you’d have missed the whole shebang.

Just after the vote, I asked Sarah Beth Gehl, deputy director of the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute, if she was worried about the impact the action would have on balancing future state budgets. I expected a fiscal policy wonk like Gehl to be upset over such a rash move by lawmakers, but she shrugged her shoulders.

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Gov. Sonny Perdue just now issued signing statements for three bills and vetoed 16 bills.

These are always fun to read. We’re literally just opening up the attachment, but if you’d like to read them as well, check ‘em out after the jump.

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Earlier today, Gov. Sonny Perdue told reporters the soon-to-be-released April 2009 revenue figures were “not encouraging.”

He wasn’t fibbing. The revenue figures landed in our inboxes a few minutes ago. And to be honest, they’re rather terrible.

Net revenue collections of sales, personal income and corporate incomes taxes last month totaled $1.4 billion, down from $1.8 billion the same time last year. That’s a decrease of 20.6 percent. The year-to-date decrease in revenue collection is 9.6 percent.

According to figures released by the governor’s office, however, booze is still selling like it’s hot.

Perdue did note that last April’s figures were some of the highest the state had ever recorded. But man,  governor, you’ve made the right choice to veto the giant tax-cutting beast sitting on your desk. That thing might get you on Grover Norquist’s speed dial, but it’d just push the state deeper into the red.

If you’re a numbers lover, download the April 2009 revenue figures. (Warning: PDF)

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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Plant Vogtle

The Fulton County Taxpayers Foundation and its president John Sherman filed a lawsuit Wednesday in Fulton County Superior Court over Senate Bill 31, a controversial piece of legislation that allows Georgia Power to begin charging customers in advance for two new proposed nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle.

The lawsuit names the Georgia Public Service Commission, the quasi-judicial state agency that decides how much you pay for your electricity, and Gov. Sonny Perdue, who signed the bill on April 21, as defendants.

During the legislative session, a diverse group of critics called the bill unfair because some industrial customers are exempt from the rate hike. They also said the issue belonged in the Georgia Public Service Commission, where a full-time staff examines and studies the complicated issue of nuclear financing. Georgia Power hired more than 70 lobbyists the push the bill.

In court documents, the foundation’s attorney John Woodham — the lone-wolf barrister who successfully fought the Beltline’s main funding mechanism all the way to Georgia Supreme Court — calls the bill unconstitutional on numerous grounds.

View the 53-page lawsuit here (PDF). It’s a long and complicated read for those not learned in the language of legalese. But it lays the groundwork of what’s sure to be an interesting battle over one of the past legislative session’s most controversial issues.

(Courtesy Nuclear Regulatory Commission)

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Politico today rehashes an Insider Advantage article that reports U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal, R-Ga., plans to run for governor. The news site — famous for WINNING THE AFTERNOON! — included a picture of this “Nathan Deal” character, who looks eerily similar to … holy shit.

Gov. Sonny Perdue, you must respect the state Constitution and bow out at the end of your term, sir! The citizens of Georgia will not sit idly by as you try to hoodwink us into another eight years!

Thanks to Jason Pye, this egregious powergrab was caught before it gained momentum.

(Screenshot from Politico.com)

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Effective immediately, companies wishing to do business with the state of Georgia — and be paid with your tax dollars — best not have ties with Sudan.

Gov. Sonny Perdue today signed a bill that prohibits the state from contracting with companies that conduct business or have ties to the African country’s oil, power, mineral and military sectors. Profits from the sectors are widely believed to help perpetrate genocide in the nation’s southern region of Darfur.

Since 2003, more than 400,000 people have been killed and 2.3 million displaced by genocide in the African nation’s southern region of Darfur. The atrocities, which have been condemned by the United States, are carried out by militias funded by the Sudanese government.

“What this says is very simple,” state Sen. David Adelman, D-Decatur, the bill’s sponsor, said after its signing. “If your business or any of its affiliates are engaged in any business activities with the government of Sudan, you cannot do business with the state of Georgia.”

Companies that plan to do business with Georgia state agencies are now required to disclose international business contracts during the Request for Proposal, or RFP, process. If a company falsifies or fails to accurately disclose its ties with Sudan, it could be fined $250,000 or double the bid it submitted to the state, whichever is greater. The company could also lose the contract and be ineligible to bid on state projects for three years.

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On April 16, President Barack Obama gave rail lovers some long-awaited good news: As part of the president’s stimulus plan, he offered $8 billion to begin linking major U.S. cities with high-speed rail lines — and an additional $5 billion more to improve rail service over the next four years.

“We need high-speed rail,” Obama said. “It’s happening right now. It’s been happening for decades. The problem is, it’s been happening elsewhere, not here.”

By “elsewhere,” the president was referring to Europe and Asia. But he could just as easily have been talking about Southeastern states other than Georgia. Thanks to a lack of vision, little to no funding, and an almost cartoonish addiction to roads, the Peach State’s far behind many of its neighbors when it comes to rail.

Transit and transportation advocates say if the state’s leadership doesn’t work to catch up, Georgia could miss out on a nationwide rail renaissance.

Click here to continue reading this story.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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The new bill clamps down on what local government officials can consider a “blighted” area.

From Dave Williams at the Atlanta Business Chronicle:

Only neighborhoods truly in need of taxpayer-funded redevelopment would qualify as tax allocation districts under legislation signed this week by Gov. Sonny Perdue.

The legislation, designed to accompany a constitutional amendment ratified by Georgia voters last fall, tightens the definitions of “blighted” and “deteriorated” areas under the state’s TAD law.

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Under the new law, only neighborhoods marked by substandard buildings, high vacancy rates and high poverty and unemployment could qualify as TADs. That way, only properties too unattractive to lure private investment could be redeveloped with TAD money.

School boards — which chip in the largest chunk of funding if they participate in a TAD — still have a choice as to whether they want to participate in the projects.

The tough economy has forced some cash-strapped school systems to renegotiate — or even rethink — their roles in TADs. Atlanta Public Schools and Atlanta Development Authority officials are in talks to split nearly $18 million that had already been generated from the Beltline TAD prior to a 2008 state Supreme Court ruling that said TADs were unconstitutional. (The school board says it still supports the Beltline, just that it wants to begin kicking in money this year.) Gainesville City Schools recently voted to opt out of a TAD in which it initially planned to participate.

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