The Georgia Budget and Policy Institute’s goal is to shine a light on people-first policies that help all Georgians share in the state’s prosperity. These are the policy priorities GBPI will track during 2020. Many are part of our People-Powered Prosperity campaign. For more insights throughout session, be sure to follow @GaBudget on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

Advancing Prosperity Through Fiscal Responsibility

Analyze state budget negotiations to ensure the result is sound and fair and to protect against budget cuts that affect critical services and programs like public safety and education.

Advance fiscally responsible tax reform proposals that strengthen state revenue, protect existing revenue streams and support working families. These priorities include:

Supporting Thriving Families

Expand access to affordable, quality early child care through increasing state funding for the Child and Parent Services (CAPS) program to increase the availability of child care subsidies for low-income working parents.

Protect the safety net so families and individuals with little or no income can get support by:

  • Increasing the investment and technical assistance for the Gateway system to streamline reporting requirements and improve the user experience.
  • Rejecting efforts to institute work reporting requirements.
  • Addressing the cliff effect, or abrupt loss of assistance, faced by many families working their way into the middle class.
  • Improving SNAP’s effectiveness by expanding SNAP workforce development programs across the state and raising SNAP’s income limit.
  • Maximizing TANF’s effects in Georgia by leveraging the state’s unobligated TANF reserves to fund work assistance, increasing benefit levels and eliminating the family cap policy.
  • Increasing state general funds for child welfare to repurpose TANF funds for their core purpose, providing cash assistance to more low-income families.

Raising Educated Youth

Support resources, innovations and investments to improve public education, including:

Building Healthy Communities

Expand access to quality, affordable health care by:

Developing a Strong Workforce

Build a strong, prosperous workforce, make a college degree more accessible and affordable and expand access to quality jobs by:

Empowering Culturally Diverse Communities

Encourage measures that empower immigrants and refugees while rejecting efforts to restrict their ability to prosper and thrive. This will involve:

Support GBPI Today

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