Governor Perdue, on the very last day he was able to, took the ax of his veto pen to roughly 25 bills yesterday – a FAR cry from the number of bills he signed. You can see the full list of every bill he vetoed in both 2009 and 2010 here.
Among the bills he axed that have already received much attention were Zero Based Budgeting, SB 291 (State Senator David Shafer’s gun bill), the JOBS bill, and a bill that would have enticed the construction of a $1 Billion indoor ski park – at Red Top Mountain/Allatoona Lake.
What is particularly interesting about the ski park bill is that the veto of it is being DECRIED by some fiscal conservatives. Yep. The same people that got all riled up about the “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska are now saying that Red Top Mountain – an area nearly as hot as it is down here in SWGA – needed a ski park that givernment needed to help fund. (And no, that was not a typo moments ago..)
Now for a brief discussion on some vetoed bills I haven’t seen as much discussion on…
HB 417 would have mandated that when a dispute arises involving insurance policies written in multiple languages, the English version would reign supreme. This would have been a back-door way to establish precedent as English as the official language of the land, and he was right to veto it.
HB 907, a special needs voucher bill that would have also mandated that middle schools in this State are only defined as those housing grades 6, 7, and 8.
HB 990, a bill that would have increased Federal regulation on trucking in Georgia.
HB 1028, a bill regarding forest land taxation.
HB 1236, a bill mandating that municipal court judges (local judges) be licensed and practicing lawyers.
HB 1407, a bill mandating a single administrator for all PeachCare dental programs.
Three local bills, HB 1422, HB 1465, and HB 1478, staggering the terms of the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners, creating a Water and Sewer Authority for the City of College Park, and expanding the city limits of the City of Dexter, respectively.
SB 239, a mandatory schooling program that Governor Perdue correctly criticized as limiting – if not outright banning – homeschooling in Ga.
SB 373, a bill mandating that cops “fully cooperate” with an investigation of their moral character. This was a good veto, given that some jurisdictions in this State would likely have used it to go on unconstitutional witch hunts into a person’s sex life or religious beliefs or similar private details.
Two bills, SB 374 and SB 480, creating a Legislative Economic Development Council and a State Council of Economic Advisors, respectively.
Overall, Perdue is rightfully going to be severely criticized over these vetoes. But he DID make a couple of solid moves of his veto pen, so any depictions of him as COMPLETELY evil/incompetent/whatever are not entirely fair.
