Georgia Legislative Watch

The State Senate has passed the statewide water plan:

The Georgia Senate approved a drought management plan Friday morning by a vote of 39-12. The plan will now go to the state house for approval.

Just four days into the 2008 legislative session, committees in both the House and Senate have approved a plan that has been three years in the making. Its speedy progress through the plodding Legislature is as good a signal as any that lawmakers are eager to adopt some sort of water plan — even if a few acknowledge it might not be the best.

The State House will likely adopt the plan this afternoon.

You can read the statewide water plan here.

[UPDATE] The water plan also made its way through the State House by a vote of 131 to 37, but with an odd ending. State Rep. Mark Hatfield (R-Waycross) gave notice that he would move that the House reconsider the plan on the next legislative day (Monday, January 28th). Hatfield is in effect using House rules in an attempt to defeat the plan and the timing of this tactic gives him ten days to lobby members to do so.

I caught the end of it, but State Rep. Ron Forester gave a morning order today where he threatened impeachment of Lt. Governor Casey Cagle for violating his oath of office:

A state House Republican said Friday he would bring impeachment charges against Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle if the Senate refuses to consider a dozen veto overrides the House passed on the first day of the legislative session.

State Rep. Ron Forster said Georgia law requires the Senate to immediately consider the veto overrides instead of sending them to a committee, and threatened to call for Cagle’s impeachment if he doesn’t soon follow suit.

“Our constitution is the foundation of our society,” said Forster, a Ringgold lawmaker who chairs the Interstate Cooperation Committee. “We cannot have somebody ignore what’s written in the constitution. If you don’t like it, you can amend it, but you have to follow it.”

We reported this on Wednesday.

Forester has not formally submitted a resolution for this purpose and it’s doubtful that the House would consider it.

[UPDATE] The AJC has more on this:

“If you don’t like the Consitution you can change it,” said state Rep. Ron Forster (R-Ringgold), “but you can’t ignore it.”

Forster was referring to the Monday House votes to override Gov. Sonny Perdue’s vetoes of 12 bills. Cagle sent the dozen bills into the Senate Rules Committee. House leaders said Cagle’s action, in effect, buried them.

Forster, who never mentioned the lieutenant governor by name, accused Cagle of violating the Georgia Constitution because he did not call for an immediate vote on the bills in the Senate.
[…]
Forster circulated information about how to impeach an elected official around the House. He told his House colleagues Friday that if they launched a successful impeachment of Cagle, that doesn’t necessarily mean the lieutenant governor would be removed from office.

“An impeachment could be just, you know, a forfeiture of pay or some kind of penalty,” said Forster.