Green Agenda for
the 2001 Session
The Georgia Green Party adopted its first Priority Legislative Agenda for the 1999
Session to demonstrate our commitment on key platform issues. As the 2001
session begins, we again turn our attention to the election process to that of making
public policy.
We are committed to organizing grassroots participation in advancing our Green
Party Platform and this Priority Agenda in the Georgia General Assembly. We
invite your participation to help make these ideas the law in Georgia.
The priorities of the Green Priority Agenda have been set by the Council, based on
the Policy Stands taken in the 2000 Platform
. The Council intends to share this
decision making power in democratic ways with organizational and activist
coalition partners on each issue. The Council has also named two of its members as
our Party's Legislative Advocates and they are responsible for attending the
Assembly daily while its in session, involving other Greens in the Party's legislative
work and working to pass bills to enact our Priority Agenda.
Our officers are authorized to designate a Party liason on each issue of this Agenda
to build or participate with existing Coalitions. If you would be interested in getting
involved in our legislative work, please make that known by contacting our
Legislative Advocates. They are:
Kerrie Dickson
Hugh Esco
The Quick Decision Council is authorized to designate a Party liason to speak on
any piece of legislation under consideration which is addressed by the Platform of
the Georgia Green Party. If you know of a matter being considered by the Georgia
General Assembly which we've taken a position on and which you believe we
should speak out on, please write our Clerk and ask.
If you would like to get involved in helping us enact this (or any part of this) Green
Agenda, please contact us and let us know how you would like to help . For more information about this agenda, follow the links or check out the resource sites listed
below each item.
The Green Agenda for the 2001 Session consists of the following policy initiatives:
A. Non-Violent Juvenile Offender Sentencing Reform Act: No youth
accused
or convicted of a non-violent crime shall be incarcerated. Communities,
courts, local and state government should fund alternatives to
incarceration and the elements of a restorative justice system.
B. Healthy School Lunches Act: Prohibit the use of BGH-treated dairy
products, irradiated meats and produce and the products of genetic
engineering in the preparation of school lunches. Phase-out over seven
years all non-organic meats and produce from school lunches. Establish
a
unit of the Department of Agriculture to cooperate with the Gorgia Organic
Growers Association to assist farmers in the transition from the use of
chemical inputs to operating practices that will allow for Organic
Certification.
Organic Consumers Association
Georgia Organics
Pure Food
C. Democratically Financed Elections Act: Prohibit the use of
private
money for public elections. Establish the Georgia Public Elections
Campaign Fund. Establish a method of qualifying for an equitable share
of
the Fund to allow all candidates for public office access to the resources
necessary to effectively campaign to the voting public.
Public Campaign
Center for Responsive
Politics
Data on
Contributions to Georgia's Congressional Delegation
D. Create a Pollution Victim's Compensation Fund to receive
dedicated
revenue from a pollution tax on all releases reportable in the Toxic
Release Inventory. The Fund is to be divided into separate accounts
and
disbursed to pay a) the health-care costs of Pollution Victims; b)
providing technical assistance to community groups in holding responsible
corporations accountable for containing and cleaning up uncontrolled
toxic
sites; c) funding grants for technical assistance by the Office of
Pollution Prevention to be matched by and to assist polluting industries
to
retool production processes to reduce reportable discharges; and d)
for
retraining, job placement and worker transition costs associated with
displacement created by production process changes motivated by pollution
prevention efforts.
E. Open Ballot Access. Amend
the Constitution of the State of Georgia,
Article II, Section I, Paragraph I to provide that the ballot access
procedures for political bodies and independent candidates cannot be
more
difficult than for members of political parties. Amend the ballot access
petitioning requirements to base the number of signatures required on
the
number of voters who actually participate in elections and not on the
number of people "registered and eligible" to participate. Provide for
Election Day Voter Registration.
The Voter Choice Coalition
-- The Georgia Green Party helped found this Coalition.
Ballot Access News
Center for Voting and Democracy
F. Use Georgia's share of the tobacco class action settlement
to fund the
start-up costs of a single-payer health care system. Create a
Georgia
Health Care Corporation to receive the tobacco settlement funds and
to use
them to provide universal access to health care in a system that includes
all providers, and assures consumer choice and freedom, including proven
"alternative" and "complementary" health care disciplines and practices,
and with emphasis and priority given to health measures and education
designed to prevent the need for curative health measures.
Universal Health Care Action Network
