DAWSON COUNTY, Ga – State Rep. Kevin Tanner (R-Dawsonville) held the first town hall meeting of 2020 Saturday to update constituents on what happened at the state capitol during the first week of the 155^th General Assembly.

Tanner holds the meetings weekly alternating between the Gordon Pirkle Room in the Georgia Racing Hall of Fame and Wagon Wheel Restaurant in Dahlonega.

A near capacity crowd was on hand to hear the representative outline key issues legislators are expected to address

Tanner said, “The budget is the most important thing we do in the General Assembly. That’s the guide for running state government for the rest of this fiscal year and next year.” During the first week, lawmakers worked to true up the supplemental budget. Once that is done, they will begin working on the “big” budget.

Tanner laid out what he expects to be the hot button issues this session.

“One of the hot-topic items is the foster care system,” he said. “We made some changes to the law a year or two ago which I think helped. But we have a lot of people who stay in foster care too long. We need to move them over to a permanent family. That is important. That is something the Governor, Lt. Governor me and other members of the House feel like is a priority.”

Tanner said gangs and gang violence is an important issue for Gov. Brian Kemp. “Thankfully, we live in an area where we don’t see that much but in the metro areas around the state, it’s much more prevalent,” he said.

As chairman of the state’s Transportation Committee, Tanner is concerned about commercial transportation.

“Georgia’s population is exploding, our business community is exploding and the Port of Savannah is bringing in freight at a record rate,” he said. But major industries like the Kia Plant in West Point and Shaw Industries in Dalton are having serious problems finding commercial truck drivers to deliver their products.

“I chaired a committee in Savannah and the head of the Kia Plant said he gets 700 tractor trailer deliveries a day but can’t find enough commercial truck drivers,” Tanner said. “Their average truck driver earns about $90,000 a year.  A UPS driver with a route from Knoxville to Georgia earns in excess of $100,000 annually.

“There are some good paying jobs in the commercial trucking industry, but it’s hard to find help,” Tanner said. “If we are going to continue to grow and continue to be a leader in freight movement, we are going to have to find ways to encourage people to go into the industry. We’re going to be working now over the next year to start bringing forth some solutions.”

Georgia’ General Assembly operates on a biannual system. Some of the items left over from the first session of the 155^th General Assembly are likely to be considered in this session. The Senate’s desire to take over control of the Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport is one of those issues.

Rather than support the Senate takeover, House members opted to appoint an oversight committee made up of House and Senate members to oversee operations.

“We have had conversations over the past week, week-and-a-half, so I am hopeful we will see resolution to a lot of those things left over from the last session,” he said.

Tanner has championed the issue of mental health for several years.

“We need to make some changes and improve our mental health system, whether it is from a law enforcement perspective, a courts perspective, an emergency room perspective or the perspective of the person suffering from mental illness,” he said. “The youngest person to take their own life in Georgia was 9 years old. Dawson County is fifth in the state percentage wise in suicides among young people.”

To address the issue, Tanner chairs the 26-member Behavioral Health Reform and Innovation Commission.

“I’m a firm believer that government is not the fix for most anything. But I also believe there is a sector of the population who cannot take care of themselves. People who are like that, who are schizophrenic, bi-polar and don’t have families we have to be able to provide resources.”

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