Day 38 was a wild ride with the focus on SB 233 Georgia Promise Scholarship Act (voucher) was added to the afternoon calendar for a vote on the House floor. There were many mixed signals coming from legislators on how much support was behind the voucher bill. After the debate where we saw both supporters and dissenters made their case from the well, the Pro Tempore Jan Jones requested to table SB 233. It was tabled by House vote. This just means they did not have the votes on the floor when it came time to vote. I know due to the advocacy of the many education groups it made the difference in the willingness of some of our rural republicans to stand strong. Please reach out to those who stood with you and K-12 education in our state a big thank you. We will have to rinse and repeat on Monday. We just need to reach out to our supporters the Dems and Repubs and let them know that we appreciate their stand and to please hold the line.
Thank you to all of you who made the effort to communicate with your Representative. It truly made a difference. It is becoming clear that with all of the changes being made to the bill they felt that they could turn some “no’s” to “yes”. They did capture some but we had many who showed a great deal of courage while they were under a lot of pressure.
Link to SB 233 Voucher debate Move to time 6:50 through 8:42 to view the voucher debate specifically and some of our favorite legislators.(maybe sarcasm font)
The FY24 budget has gone to Conference Committee where the House leaders and Senate leaders will attempt to hammer out differences of their versions of the budget. We are tracking this closely. More to come on both these issues. Have a good night!
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