We resumed our legislative business on Monday, March 15, 2021. During the 10th week of the 2021 legislative session, more Senate bills made their way out of their assigned House committees and were voted on in the House Chamber. We also convened for a joint session to hear Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Herold D. Melton deliver the annual State of the Judiciary address. Legislative Day 40, or “Sine Die,” is quickly approaching, but there is still much more work to be done before we adjourn on March 31.
On Tuesday, March 16, Chief Justice Melton delivered his third and final State of the Judiciary address, which is an opportunity for the legislature to receive an update on what Georgia’s courts have accomplished during the previous year and what lies ahead for our judicial branch. During his speech, Chief Justice Melton reflected on his upcoming retirement from the Supreme Court, where he has served for the last 16 years. He also announced that the Supreme Court unanimously voted to name Presiding Justice David Nahmias, who also joined us for the address, as the next chief justice.
Throughout the pandemic and the Statewide Judiciary Emergency, the courts have remained open to address essential functions and critical cases, such as domestic abuse restraining orders, criminal bond hearings, mental health commitment hearings, and cases where an immediate liberty or safety concern was present. Under the direction of Chief Justice Melton and the state’s Judicial Council, state courts and the Supreme Court have transitioned to video conferencing as a safer alternative to in-person proceedings, among other necessary rule changes to get our courts to a fully functioning capacity during the pandemic. As a result of the pandemic, criminal and civil jury trials have been suspended for most of the last year due to the number of people involved and the length of such trials. However, suspending these trials created a backlog within the judicial system, and although the trial suspension was lifted in recent weeks, the backlog continues to grow, and it could take the courts up to three years to catch up on these trials. Due to the backlog of cases, the state’s statutory speedy trial deadline has been temporarily suspended under the Statewide Judiciary Emergency, but Chief Justice Melton urged the General Assembly to champion legislation to address this issue long term.
To aid with this issue we passed Senate Bill 163 to provide a solution to the court’s handling of backlogged cases. When the Statewide Judiciary Emergency eventually ends, SB 163 would allow chief judges of Georgia’s superior court judicial circuits or state courts to continue to suspend statutory speedy trial deadlines until the deadlines could be reasonably met. The bill includes a sunset date of June 20, 2023, to specifically target this backlog, but the chief justice of the Supreme Court would also have the ability to reinstate the speedy trial requirements at his or her discretion before this sunset date. This bill is a top priority to the Judicial Council and Georgia’s superior and state courts this session, and I am confident that this legislation will extend necessary support to the courts as they work through the case backlog over the next few years.
We also overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill 88, which offers several innovative solutions meant to strengthen the teacher pipeline for Georgia schools. SB 88 would:
· Allow the Georgia teacher of the year to serve as advisor ex officio to the State Board of Education, ensuring that our best teachers can help guide this important agency
· Require local school systems to support a nontraditional teacher certification pathway for veterans to become certified teachers.
· Revise the state’s tiered evaluation system for teachers to allow schools to focus their observational resources towards teachers who need more support in the classroom
· Require the Georgia Professional Standards Commission (PSC) to create innovative programs to promote teacher education programs at Georgia’s historically black colleges and universities
· Would direct the PSC to provide aspiring teachers with increased coursework in differentiated instruction and reading fundamentals, which would better prepare new teachers before they enter the classroom
