Again, it is not their rules.

It is because they are chronically underfunded and understaffed.

Asking our agencies to add another task, another burden every four years does not help them or our people.

We cannot take power away from our agencies and burden them even more, and expect Georgians to be better off.

Democrats pushed back today on the Republican led red tape rollback bill championed by Lieutenant Governor Bert Jones, calling the measure unnecessary and burdensome to state agencies already struggling with understaffing.

Good evening, and welcome to day 22 of Lawmakers for this legislative session.

I'm Donna Lowry.

We'll learn more about that bill on Capitol Hill coming up in a moment.

If you're a parent of a young child, you know you're paying more for child.

Child care.

Legislators want to give you a break, and we'll look at a Senate measure to do just that.

Also tonight, legislative measures to get a handle on drones, including who is allowed to use them and where they're allowed to fly.

Plus, what laws are needed to regulate air taxis as they travel throughout Georgia.

We'll find out.

But before we go any further, let's find out about the action at the Capitol.

From correspondent Sarah Kallis.

Hi, Donna.

The Senate voted on a controversial bill that promises to reduce bureaucracy for small businesses.

And the House approved health bills for women and children.

The Red Tape Rollback Act was debated in the Senate today, championed by Lieutenant Governor Bert Jones.

SB 28 is supposed to reduce rules and regulations that impact small businesses and allow the legislature to have a say in any new rules that state agencies may want to implement.

This bill bill really comes from the recognition that we do have a need at all levels of government to look at our rulemaking processes, to look at the rules that are on the books, and to ensure that the rules that are on the books are still meeting their intended purposes.

And very often, rules get layered on top of rules, and the original intent of the rule gets lost.

And so this bill is a really a five part bill to ensure that Georgia remains the number one state for business.

It would also require agencies to do an economic impact study of all of its rules every four years, and an analysis on any rule costing Georgians more than $1 million during the first five years of its implementation.

Part of the problem we have, senators, is we're part of the problem.

So far this year, we've introduced almost 250 pieces of legislation in this chamber.

We are creating more and more legislation that creates more and more government regulations every day.

We're in this building for 40 days.

That doesn't include the hundreds of bills that are coming over from the House.

I would expect before we leave here this session, there will be more than 1,000 pieces of legislation that will get passed by both chambers.

And then the governor has to scrub all of these bills and then decide, does he want to veto these bills or let them become law?

But Democrats say the bill is unnecessary, a power grab, and will hinder state agencies that are already understaffed.

It is not their rules.

It is because they are chronically underfunded and understaffed.

Asking our agencies to add another task, another burden every four years does not help them or our people.

We cannot take power away from our agencies and burden them even more, and expect Georgians to be better off.

This is a power grab.

Plain and simple.

This is DOGE coming to Georgia and the consequences of this bill could be far, far outreaching long after we've left this General Assembly and we've left this body.

Folks.

This isn't about efficiency.

And I thought the Republican Party stood for efficiency, not just in federal government, but state government as well.

As a matter of fact, I think this extra step in the process would create, it would create, as my colleague has already said, a lot more inefficiency in state government.

The bill was passed 33-21 along party lines.

In the House.

Members voted on two health related bills.

House Bill 124 would require health insurance to cover pediatric autoimmune neuropsychiatric disorders and pediatric acute onset neuropathic syndrome.

The bill is personal for representative Mitchell Scoggins and his granddaughter.

My granddaughter started getting sick about two years ago, and we couldn't figure out what was wrong with her.

And every two weeks she would get sick with either a stomach bug, COVID, or anything like that.

She would get sick and we couldn't figure it out.

She would come home with a fever, with no with no reason, and then she would have periods where she would just throw up constantly and we couldn't figure out what was causing what was causing it.

But we finally got her diagnosed with Hans disease.

It's tough.

It's really is.

It's tough to see your grandkids suffer.

And so as we dug into this issue, we found out that insurance didn't cover this.

And so that's the reason for this bill today.

The bill passed unanimously.

House Bill 352 would provide continuous glucose monitors for gestational diabetes patients on Medicaid.

A continuous glucose monitor provides real time data that helps expecting mothers maintain stable glucose levels, reducing the risk of emergency interventions and costly complications.

That bill passed 100 99-2 after the floor session.

House Democrats held a press conference to advocate for more protections for warehouse workers with House Bill 16.

The bill would require proper ventilation in warehouses, paid respirators and fair productivity quotas.

It's about creating a safe and healthy workplace for working Georgians.

Do we not all want that?

Lawmakers will be working in committees tomorrow in return for Legislative Day 23 on Wednesday.

That's my Capitol report.

Donna.

Thanks, Sara.

Child care is one of the largest expenses for Georgia families.

The Economic Policy Institute reports the average annual cost of infant care in Georgia is $7,644, or $637 a month for a 4-year-old, it's $6,500, or $542 a month.

Compare that to other expenses, such as roughly $6,600 for college and and housing at $9,700 a year.

So we're going to talk about child care legislation with two Georgia senators here in the studio is Democratic Senator RaShaun Kemp of Atlanta.

His committee assignments include education and youth.

And joining us from the Capitol is Republican Senator Brian Strickland of McDonough.

He is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had a late meeting today.

So we're so glad you're able to join us from the Capitol.

Welcome to.

Lawmakers.

Thank you.

Donna.

Happy to be with you all.

Thank you for accommodating me tonight.

Absolutely.

Chairman Strickland, I appreciate you wanting to come on the show to talk about SB 89.

In the midst of your busy schedule.

Tell us about it.

Yeah.

So SB 89 comes from a study committee I chaired last year dealing with the lack of access to affordable child care in our state.

As every working parent knows and is every employer knows, one of the biggest issues we're facing in Georgia right now for our working families is finding access to child care and affording child care.

So the study committee obviously found that's a big problem in our state.

We start looking at what the solution could be.

And there's many steps to this.

The first thing we're doing is Senate Bill 89 is creating tax credits, a new tax credit for all parents with children under the age of seven, and also expanding existing tax credit that helps with child care expenses.

And lastly, speaking of employers, every employer that you talk to, if they can, they would love to offer child care for their workers.

We have an existing tax credit that allows employers to get money back when they provide child care for their workers.

We're expanding that eligibility for that to make sure more employers can use that in our state as well.

Can you talk a little bit about how much this measure will cost the state, and how you consider it a good investment?

Yeah.

So it looks like our numbers are around $170 million for everything right now for the whole state.

But the way we look at it, for every dollar we spend here, we know it's the right thing to do to make sure that our working families don't have to sit at the kitchen table and say, does it make sense to have a career or to have a family?

You should be able to do both in our state, so it's the right thing to do.

But also from a financial standpoint, we know that if more people are working, more people have jobs, more people are paying taxes.

You actually see more revenue in the long run.

Okay, I'm going to talk to Senator Kemp, who's right here, a little bit about it.

You voted for this.

Tell us about that.

Absolutely.

Not only did I vote for it, I was able to arm wrestle Senator Strickland's son, Booker during the vote.

You know, it's something that hits close to home for me.

I have a 3.5-year-old, so we're paying more for daycare than we do for college.

I also have a 21-year-old that's actually in college right now.

So both ends of the extreme.

But this is truly a kitchen table issue for me and my husband having to decide, you know, do we have another child because of the cost?

You know, luckily we can afford it.

But there are so many families that aren't able to make that decision because of the burden that daycare and childcare have on their families.

And now I know this goes up to seven years old, so it's seven and younger, but the Democrats are looking at a different plan.

Talk about that a little bit.

Yeah, we would like to see it go up all the way to 17, because we know that, you know, childcare and other expenses do not stop when a child turns seven.

So we would like to see $200 per child up to age 17.

There are other initiatives that we would support in terms of just making the cost of caring for their children less of a burden on families.

All right.

Chairman Strickland, it will take more than just tax credit to help parents with childcare expenses.

We know that you would like to see employers receive some incentive to do more.

Talk about that a little bit.

Yes.

So with this study committee process, we obviously heard from parents, we heard from childcare providers, but we also heard from business leaders that said, more than ever, we have less people in the workforce in our state.

And this is a workforce issue.

We need to make sure that more people can work that are able to work.

And so it's something that I think you saw buy in from all across the state in.

And sure, there's more we can do.

This is definitely a great start, definitely something we do to help our families and our state.

And Senator Kemp is right.

I brought my five year old, my 7-year-old on the floor of the Senate.

We presented this bill, my five year old, my 7-year-old.

They were on winter break and my 5-year-old likes to arm wrestle.

Next thing you know, he challenged Senator Kemp and he beat Senator Kemp twice on the floor of the Senate.

Oh my goodness.

And so yeah, okay, I think you guys are going to need a rematch.

Let's talk a little bit about what employers could do.

So we want to in incentivize I guess the employers to to try to do some things within the, within their businesses and try to, to actually match some of the expenses that the parents have when it comes to child care.

That's right.

And there's an existing tax credit.

That's a federal tax credit.

But it's very limited by state law.

And so we're expanding that tax credit to make sure more people can take advantage of that.

More businesses can take advantage of that.

But we're also adding to that so they can actually get a credit for more of those expenses.

It's not something every business can afford.

We understand that.

But for the businesses that want to go in this direction and want to offer childcare, this definitely provides a more incentive for them to do that.

And it's certainly good that the state is going to take a lead on this.

Uh, as I'm sorry, uh, Senator Kemp, talk about what you what else you would like to see.

You see pre-K as a part of this, too?

Absolutely.

You know, don't get me wrong, this is a major first step in the right direction.

And so something to be very excited about.

But I campaigned on the fact that we need to expand pre-K, fully fund pre-K. As I shared, my daughter is three and a half, so she'll be going to pre-K at the later part of this year.

And I had to go into a lottery, just like any other parent, to sign her up for a slot.

So I definitely think that we need to expand pre-K, get more parents, the opportunity to send their child to pre-K without having that burden of cost on their shoulders.

As Senator Strickland, do you agree with that, that pre-K that there's there's more to this whole plan in terms of helping parents with childcare?

Definitely.

Our study committee had two pages of recommendations, including the expansion of pre-K in our state.

So that's definitely something I'm interested in as well.

This this bill is not meant to be the bill that solves the problem.

First off, we're acknowledging the problem, which is a very important thing.

If everything going on today in the world of politics, it's important for everyone to know that we get it.

You have so many of us every day now in politics that are living this.

As young working parents, we understand the issue and this bill is not going to solve the problem, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

So this it's passed in the Senate.

How are you feeling as as it goes over to the House?

I'm very optimistic so far.

This is one of those bills everybody wants to be a part of.

We welcome you to the party.

We welcome your support.

Love to have your help in the House, making sure this bill becomes a law that's signed by Governor Kemp.

Yeah.

And you you feel the same way about that?

Absolutely.

This is something that I think everybody can buy into, because we know that this is a big burden that's on many families across the state.

And one thing we didn't talk about is where the money is coming from.

I know that there has been the interest in making sure it comes out of the the surplus.

Um, can you talk a little bit about that, Senator?

Senator Strickland?

Well, the tax credit is actually on the revenue side.

And so it's on the front end of us collecting revenue.

So it's not something you actually see come out of the budget.

When you talk about the cost, that's less money the state would make.

When you look at it from that sense.

So but it's not one of those things with this proposal that requires us to use any surplus funds.

Right.

Apologize for that.

The fact that we won't be getting the money coming in because we have a nice surplus in this state, so that that's a good part of it.

Anything you wanted to add?

No.

I'd love for us to tap that surplus.

Okay.

I'm sure you would.

I want to thank both of you for coming on the show, I appreciate this.

We'll keep up with this.

Senator Strickland, thank you so much for for joining us from afar.

We'll have you down at the studio soon.

I hope.

That's right.

Thank you.

Thank you for having me tonight.

Okay.

Coming up, we're looking to the sky.

And the buzz about drones and air taxis and other technology.

Joining us, two members of the House with legislation to try to get a handle on what's flying above us.

You're watching Lawmakers on GPB.

The Georgia Farm Bureau, a grassroots organization dedicated to preserving Georgia agriculture.

Farm Bureau advocates for all Georgia farmers at the state Capitol during the session and year round.

Georgia Farm Bureau, the Voice of Georgia Farmers.

It's good to have everyone back together.

Good news indeed.

Put your feet up a minute.

It's beautiful.

Where does that sound mean, man?

That's what I love doing.

Good.

I was thinking more.

A double whiskey.

Harriet.

Oh.

Freshly baked biscuits.

Always.

Well, this is all proving rather cozy, isn't it?

I got my head out the sewing room.

Oh.

Da da da da da da.

Keeps.

What I.

You understanding the past gives a sense of the future.

Heart like a lion.

This is the first time that anyone has seen this in 2000 years.

Oh, oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Something big is happening.

So hurry up.

We're driving in.

What?

This is amazing.

Well, I'm excited now.

Pompeii is a battle against time.

Wide open.

Oh!

Yeah?

You think I'm joking?

But look at this.

It did really happen.

Don't let anybody tell you who you are.

Yeah, I love this life.

History teaches us to honor the past.

We're jumping in with our eyes wide open.

When you look back, you're like, wow, that was pretty special.

This is something that's actually altering the course of history.

You're charged with keeping these stories alive.

Why don't you?

Welcome back to Lawmakers.

We're going to take time now to talk about aerial technology redefining our lives through drones and more.

The company VSI aerial describes using drones in Georgia for public safety, for agriculture inspections, urban planning and exterior cleaning, such as roof and window washing.

And then there's the growth in urban transport, small vehicles flying from one part of the state to the other.

All of it needs regulation.

And joining us are two lawmakers moving that forward.

Republican Representative Todd Jones of South Forsyth.

And he chairs the House Committee on Technology and Infrastructure Innovation.

Also here is Republican Representative David Clark of Buford, who is vice chair of defense and Veterans affairs.

Welcome to Lawmakers.

Chairman Jones, we're going to start with you.

So we had drone technology.

A bill actually passed last week to restrict how drones are used at mass gatherings.

That was HB 58.

So talk a little bit about Representative Gary Richardson's bill.

Sure.

That's a presumptive bill.

We wanted to make sure in terms of when we're putting together a large group of people, we wanted to make sure that it's safe.

We want to make sure that no one is using drones for any type of inappropriate purpose.

May it be terror events, may it be, I'll say, you know, videoing it when you're not supposed to be, you name it.

We want to make sure that when people come together in Georgia, that they know that they're safe, not just on the ground, but they're also safe in the sky.

And that's one area people probably hadn't thought about.

These drones are out there.

And then we have these events.

And so this actually defines exactly who can have the drones and and where they can be.

How close to people.

100%.

We wanted to say, look, you need to be an FAA operator and the drone needs to be FAA certified.

And we're saying that there's going to 400 foot buffer within meaning horizontally and a 400 foot buffer above above 400 feet.

The FAA takes over.

And then on top of that, the FAA and the state of Georgia will work together on what are called temporary no fly zones.

So this is going to put our I think it puts Georgia in a really good position when it comes to mass events and how drones will be legislated.

They're temporary, no fly zones for just any event that comes up where a lot of people are involved.

That's correct.

Yeah.

So let's let's turn to you have a drone bill to HB 205.

And this one deals more with homeland security issues.

And it's making sure that Georgia has an approved list of drones.

So talk about why this is important.

First of all.

Yeah I think first of all it's just a huge national security problem and a risk that's going on.

We know from at the federal government, Cisa, the FBI, and the DoD Department of Defense, they've said that it's a national security risk with the drones we have globally right now, because about 90% of the market is controlled by DGI and Intel, which is built in China.

And Chinese controlled.

And we know that data is being able to be stored and transmitted.

And we know with the Chinese government, the government demands that these companies.

Give them the details and the data and keeping them updated with those companies.

And so it's a security risk with these drones that we have being used by our federal government and state government of them transmitting that data back.

So having an approved list.

Talk, talk, talk about what that means and what that list.

Who decides and who will be on that list.

So Jima here in Georgia and Homeland Security Agency here in Georgia will put together a list by December 1, 2025.

And then in 2028, first of January, that list will go into effect.

And after that, there will be a approved list of drones that our Georgia agencies can use and operate those drones.

I think the most people think when they they think of the drones.

Now that you can just go out and buy them and they should be able to do whatever they want, but that is not the case.

And it's dangerous, isn't it?

Absolutely.

If you are a hobbyist, by all means, as long as your line of sight and you can still see your drone, we're probably going to be okay.

But once you go not line of sight, we need to make sure that you have the proper certification and operation.

We don't want that drone landing somewhere where it's not supposed to land, for instance, on someone's head, or in someone's pool or in someone's house, et cetera.

So we need to be very, I'll say, prescriptive in terms of how it is that we're going to legislate and how drones are going to be worked.

And you had a lot of support when you when you brought this bill to the floor.

I did overwhelming support.

I think it had one no vote.

Besides that.

It was unanimous besides that one no vote.

And I think people realizing with this war in Ukraine that's going on, you have about 100,000 drones on the Russian side and the Ukrainian side a month going at each other.

And so I think this is waking everybody up to understanding that drones can be great and they are great, and we use them a lot of good ways.

But also we need to be looking at how they can be used in a bad way also.

And so that's what House Bill 205 tackled.

Part of the problem.

And a few months ago we heard in the New Jersey area people were concerned about drones.

They weren't sure where they where they were coming from.

So this helps in terms of protection.

It definitely does a big step forward.

And it gives Georgia a voice with the federal government of collaborating, working together, because it's not just the federal government taking the lead.

States need to step up also.

And so this is a huge step forward.

Also, we added a three year time for these Georgia agencies to get in compliance.

They would know the list comes out.

And the average lifespan of a drone is about three years.

So I kind of was thinking also, there's a lot of agencies who have spent a lot of money on these drones, and so it gives that three year window and lets the federal government knows we're working with them hand in hand on behalf of national security.

I was amazed to think of all the different agencies and thinking about the agriculture, the film industry, all the different places that are using this.

So it's good that you're going to handle on it.

But I want to get into something else that is going up in the air.

Chairman Jones, let's move on to the the the people movers type thing.

So let's talk about the ones on the ground first.

We've talked to you in the past about the unmanned shuttles, like the one at the Braves Stadium that takes people from the parking lot to the game goes around the battery, the Cumberland hopper at the battery.

And we extremely popular.

But you're also looking at flying taxis.

And so I want I want you to talk about those a little bit.

Evtols Evtols.

Look we're going to take traffic off of the roads.

We are going to have highways in the skies.

This is for those of us that are old enough.

This is George Jetson coming to life.

We're going to be one of the first states, if not the first, to put them into operation by 2026.

We already have two vertiports on design in the northern Arc, and we're super excited because we're going to end up with a network of what I'm going to call lily pads all around the metro area and eventually all around Georgia, literally transporting people in the sky and taking them off of the roads.

I love the way you're so excited about this, and you've been talking about this for a while, and we're we're finally getting there as soon as next year in 2026.

100%.

We absolutely expect it.

We got the FAA guidance in terms of where we're allowed to fly them, which is basically down state roads and federal highways.

That gives us all that we need to know in order to connect the cities and connect the areas that we know Georgians want to visit vis a vis the sky versus just the road.

Okay, I said, Evtols electric vertical takeoff and landing.

That's what that stands for.

So describe how this is going to work.

Well, if you could imagine, uh, say you're in Alpharetta, Georgia, you're in Roswell, Georgia, there's a parking garage that conveniently is going to possibly be completely retrofitted to be a landing area.

And we only need about 42,000 square feet for three different landing and takeoff areas.

They're going to take off and land just like a helicopter, but they're going to fly horizontally like an airplane.

So this allows us we don't need runways, we don't need to create a bunch of different airports around because that is not necessary.

What's necessary is basically a landing pad.

And each one of those vertiports is going to have enough electricity to charge the air taxi in about 10 minutes, and they'll have about 60 miles of range.

And then about three or four people.

How many people will be in one.

Of them?

Four people are going to be transported along.

Of course, with the pilot, we expect that will be the start between 2026 to maybe 20 30-20 31.

We expect by the mid 2030s there will be 30-40 person evtols that will allow you.

Basically, you could live 50, 60, 100 miles from where you work and literally be able to have certainty that you're at work in 30 minutes.

We're super excited about all the opportunities that this is for people, but also for cargo.

I think the the fascinating thing is we're going to be able to see them on our roadways, like you go down 70-5 and you'll look up and they'll be there.

And and that is part of it too.

That has to be their route.

Right?

The interstates.

Yeah.

Right now we have to use the state roads and the federal roads, as I'll say, our Guideposts.

But as these mature and as the FAA gets more comfortable, as you may or may not know, in the air right now, we already have avenues for how airplanes fly, how helicopters fly.

If you're moving south, you're moving north, et cetera.

We're going to need to get that level of detail with the EV talls because coming out of this in 2026, we might have ten in the air, 20 in the air, but by 2030 we're going to have thousands in the air.

So we need to make sure that those highways in the sky are just as safe or safer than what we have on the roads.

It really does sound like The Jeffersons and Jeffersons.

I'm sorry, the Jetsons, The Jetsons when it comes to that kind of stuff.

So they'll be all over the place.

So right now this is putting Georgia in a good.

Your legislation puts Georgia in a good place when it comes to this.

Explain exactly what the legislation does.

So the legislation is probably some of the shortest legislation I've ever done in terms of line numbers.

But what it does is it officially puts Vertiports into our statute.

And what that does is that allows two important things to occur.

One, they can operate, which, of course, we need to do that in order to have the landings and the takeoff.

And two, it allows us to draw down on federal money to be able to fund the Vertiports at about 90% of what the costs are.

So that's super important.

And that also shows that the federal government understands the importance of us having a mixed modality may be the autonomous vehicles or may it be the air taxis in terms of mixing with what we're seeing already on the roads.

Let's talk safety real quick, because people are going to wonder about these flying all over the place.

So how do we know that they're going to be safe?

Well, first and foremost we have redundant systems are required inside of the air taxis minimum of six one that's being developed here in Covington, Georgia actually has seven redundant systems.

On top of that it has a parachute for the actual EV stall.

So if, God forbid, there is a tragic situation, the parachute will deploy and knock on wood.

What we'll see is the EV torque coming down at about 15 miles per hour into the ground.

So those are the type of things that we're looking at in terms of what safety is going to be and how important safety is, and having the redundancy, having the parachute.

And then on top of that, the air taxis that will deploy in 2026 have pilots and wait for this.

By 2030, 2031, they'll all be autonomous.

Wow, that's a lot.

I know you're listening to all of this.

What are your thoughts?

I'm excited about about the future.

Yeah.

And getting one of these drones one day and flying up there.

You'll be okay about it.

I think I'll have to watch it a little bit before I do that.

Before I do that, we'll see.

The first one will be the first.

Very reports will be in what.

We believe in Roswell.

Roswell and Alpharetta.

Okay.

I'd love to be able to have more operational by the World Cup in 2026.

Wow.

Yeah.

Vertical vertiports.

We're going to have to learn a whole new language.

All new language.

All of this is going to be fun.

Okay.

How excited you are.

We're going to get you on that first.

Test okay.

We'll see how that happens.

Thank you so much for coming in.

Thank you for all you guys are doing.

And we'll keep up with the bills and a whole bit.

So but that does it for Lawmakers for today.

And we're actually off tomorrow because the chambers will not gavel in, but they'll spend the day holding committee hearings.

And we'll tell you all about that.

Join us back here on Wednesday and we'll talk about the state list of careers in high demand in Georgia.

Have a good night.

We.