In God We Trust Our License Plates

Those changes are among more than a dozen laws that went into effect Dec. 31 or Jan. 1 or are going into effect Jan. 10 or 15 and join many more laws that came into force at various times last year.

For a summary prepared by the Legislative Services Committee and the Office of the Legislative Counsel of all of the gifts the General Assembly gave us in 2010, check out the PDF with this article. But you might want to keep your legalese-to-English dictionary handy.

As a timesaving service, we offer you some of the highlights in more or less standard English:

• A new level of road safety. H.B. 1005, which became Act 381, did some interesting things regarding motor vehicles. Provisions that went into effect last May included the creation of a Zoo Atlanta license plate and some administrative adjustments to help enforce requirements for drivers to carry minimal liability coverage. The same law brought us new vehicle registration rules Jan. 1. If you buy a used car from a private citizen, you have seven days to register with the county tag office. And don't try sticking a piece of cardboard with a "Tag Applied For" message in your back window; displaying anything other than a real license plate, a temporary operating permit from the tag office or a dealer-supplied temporary tag is now a misdemeanor. But another provision could have a permanent effect on your driving experience. You now have the option to buy a sticker reading "In God We Trust" from the tag office to place over the county name on your license plate. Georgia Legislative Watch tells how the sticker slipped into the law, but all you need to know is that the next time you text while driving, you could see God when you look up just before rear-ending the car ahead of you.
• Humanity shown to dogs. As of Dec. 31, Georgia no longer allows the use of gas chambers to put down dogs and cats. You can thank H.B. 788, now Act 386.
• Don't call 678-NOT-HERE. If one of your pet peeves in life is calling what you think is a local business, only to find that the local phone number merely forwards you to a regional or national call center or just an out-of-town operation trying to grab business by hook or by crook, well, now you live in the right state. S.B. 368 (Act 419) makes it a crime to advertise a local phone number in a local phone directory if that number actually sends callers out of the area. Of course, you could turn to your Patch directory for local businesses and be pretty safe, but now the law's on your side as well.
• An appealing tax addition. Under S.B. 346 (Act 670), which could fairly be called the Make More Work for Tax Assessors Act, as of Jan. 1 you no longer have an excuse for being caught off-guard by your property tax bill. Now the county property tax authority must send you an annual notice of your property's assessment and estimated tax bill, regardless of whether the assessment changed. If your property has a new assessment, you are entitled to a report listing the old assessment, the new assessment, the fair-market value, a breakdown of what real and personal property is being assessed, a notice of your right to appeal the assessment, the name and contact information for the person who receives appeals, and details about your appeals options. You have 45 days to appeal, up from 30, and the county must show you all documents used to set your assessment, including the addresses of properties treated as comparable. The new law also has pages and pages about the makeup of the tax assessor boards and appeals boards and the qualifications for members.
• One good SPLOST deserves another. Georgia's love-hate relationship with special purpose local option sales taxes, better known as SPLOST, moves beyond the county level under H.B. 277 (Act 554), which aims to overhaul and decentralize the funding of transportation projects. Amid provisions about the Department of Transportation and the makeup of the MARTA board are the details about regions creating special transportation districts with regional boards and regional referendums to enact a 1-cent transportation-targeted sales tax, a TSPLOST. If the current SPLOST fight in Cobb County and similar recent battles in Cherokee, Douglas, Paulding and Bartow aren't vicious enough for you, just wait until next year when voters face a referendum to enact a sales tax to build roads in the next county over.
• Speaking of taxes. For all the CPAs, M.B.A.s and boat salesmen out there, the General Assembly has plenty to keep you occupied. H.B. 1186 (Act 644) saves public-private transportation partnerships (think toll roads) from paying property taxes. H.B. 1105 (Act 504) allows retailers to hold onto watercraft awhile longer before selling them, presumably when the market is more favorable, without paying taxes on them. H.B. 1198 (Act 483) adds to the state's definition of nonresidents who have to pay Georgia income tax; now, if you engage in commerce in some way in Georgia and receive stock options or deferred compensation, you might legally be a Georgia taxpayer. H.B. 1221 (Act 507) overhauls the sales tax system in ways that are vast, profound, and of little or no impact to consumers.
• Yes, those constitutional amendments make a difference. Remember in November when we voters refused to amend the Georgia Constitution to increase our license plate fees to pay for new trauma centers and rejected special treatment for multiyear transportation contracts? Well, we did approve special treatment for multiyear contracts that use expected energy savings to finance construction projects; it's an approach popular in some areas for school renovations. The referendum vote allowed S.B. 194 (Act 669) to go into full effect, so state agencies can enter into construction contracts relying on guaranteed energy savings.
• Something to look forward to. Not all of the 2010 legislation is in effect. Part of S.B. 310 (Act 549) won't kick in until Jan. 15. Starting that day, you'll need a license from the insurance commissioner if you want to manage pharmacy benefits for a living. Or, because the insurance commissioner will be responsible for regulating pharmacy benefits management, you might opt for the always reliable growth industry of government regulation.
• Kicking and screaming into the 21st century. It might be hard to believe while "In God We Trust" stickers potentially proliferate and pet gas chambers deservedly disappear, but the legislation that has the potential to do the most public good is S.B. 17 (Act 680), the Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Act, effective Jan. 10. The law sets out rules for electronic filing of campaign finance disclosure reports and lobbyist disclosure reports, increases the fines for late reporting, and forms the Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission to replace the Ethics Commission and oversee the disclosure system. It's not a perfect system. It could go further toward creating a clean, accountable government. But it's a start, and it's the kind of information that can make a meaningful difference in how people see their elected officials. 

If you're feeling at all despondent about Georgia government after reading about our new laws, check out the discussion revolving around California's new laws at one of our sister sites, La Mesa Patch, and you'll be happy to live in the Peach State.