MorgueFile 

ATLANTA – Lawmakers will hit pause and take more time to review an environmental issue left unresolved by a 2015 court ruling.

A state Supreme Court decision highlighted an unclear requirement for stream buffers, which help reduce erosion and keep waterways clean.

Buffers are often easy to spot, growing in the form of brush, trees and other plants along waterways.

Georgia requires 25 feet of buffer, but the court concluded that this measurement only starts from where “wrested vegetation” is found. This has left shorelines that lack such growth – such as sand bars – without the law’s clear protection.

A proposal to address this void surfaced last legislative session, only to go nowhere. It would have set the high-water mark as the beginning of a buffer.

This time, lawmakers want to form a study committee.

“We don’t like to do knee-jerk reactions,” said Sen. Frank Ginn,R-Danielsville, who chairs the Senate Natural Resources and the Environment Committee and is sponsoring a measure calling for the study.

In his proposal, the group would be asked to balance the need to protect waterways with individual property rights.

The plan was met with support from the powerful state Chamber of Commerce, but others were less than impressed.

Joe Cook, with the Coosa River Basin Initiative, called it a “stalling technique.” Environmentalists want a clearer law that can be uniformly applied.

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Launching a new industry

Rural lawmakers see a potential economic boost in an emerging new industry – commercial spaceports.

“We talk a lot about passing meaningful legislation that will help rural Georgia,” said Rep. John Corbett, R-Lake Park. “Well, this bill here will help rural Georgia.”

The counties in southeastern Georgia have populations that are stagnant or dwindling, he said.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why,” he said. “It’s the lack of quality, high-paying jobs.”

Corbett was a co-sponsor of a bill that limits the liability of a company if a space flight participant is injured – a measure meant to make the state more welcoming to space companies.

His proposal cleared the House this week, as did a companion bill in the Senate.

Camden County on Georgia’s coast, in particular, has eagerly courted the industry.

“South Georgia is economically drying up. Rural Georgia is economically drying up,” said Rep. Jason Spencer, R-Woodbine, the bill’s main sponsor.

A spaceport, he said, presents a rare chance to reverse that trend.

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Downtowns bill advances

Plans to give tax credits to businesses that bring jobs to distressed rural downtowns easily passed the House this week.

The measure would offer tax incentives to businesses that buy and rehab older buildings in downtowns of communities with fewer than 15,000 people.

Businesses would have to hire the equivalent of two full-time employees to enjoy the tax breaks.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Penny Houston, R-Nashville, now moves over to the Senate.

Jill Nolin covers the Georgia Statehouse for CNHI’s newspapers and websites. Reach her at jnolin@cnhi.com.