ATLANTA – Advocates seeking health insurance for more low-income Georgians are encouraged that Medicaid expansion is starting to draw support among what for years has been unified Republican opposition. Although…
Blog
LEGISLATIVE UPDATE: WEEK 2

Severe Weather Closed the State Capitol for Most of the Week
Severe weather disrupted last week’s legislative schedule, postponing budget hearings and other activities. As a result, some state agencies will now present their budget requests this week. Since there wasn’t much action at the Capitol last week, we’ve covered a few more health-related bills from the first week of session below.
Update on State Agency Budget Presentations:
State agency budget presentations now begin this week. For the latest schedule, check out the legislative session schedule here. Two upcoming meetings on our radar are:
- Appropriations Subcommittee on Human Resources (House)–where legislators will hear presentations about the human resource needs of the Departments of Human Services and Behavioral Health & Developmental Disabilities, as well as the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities
- Appropriations Subcommittee on Health (House)–where legislators will hear budget presentations from the Departments of Community Health and Public Health
Pathways to Coverage Waiver Renewal: Public Comment Opportunity
The Georgia Department of Community Health released the Pathways to Coverage waiver renewal application on January 21st. This release kicks off a short public comment period that ends on February 20th–and we will be asking you to comment! Governor Kemp suggested that Pathways could serve as a national model during his State of the State address. However, experts, advocates, and others continue to demonstrate that the program lacks accessibility, and is expensive and ineffective.
Launched in July 2023, Pathways to Coverage (a.k.a. “Pathways”) is a new Medicaid program designed for some low-income adults. Pathways requires participants to meet strict paperwork requirements to document that they are completing certain work or other activities to maintain their coverage. State officials initially projected that 30,000 individuals would enroll during the program’s first year. Eighteen months later, fewer than 6,500 Georgians are enrolled, indicating eligible participants are having problems enrolling and participating.
Key Issues with Pathways to Coverage:
- Administrative hurdles: The program imposes complex paperwork requirements, making enrolling and maintaining coverage difficult for eligible Georgians
- Limited impact: Pathways reaches a fraction (3%) of those who could benefit from full Medicaid expansion
- High costs: The program is five times more expensive per person than traditional Medicaid expansion despite covering fewer individuals.
How You Can Help: The Pathways public comment period allows Georgians to make their voices heard and urge state leaders to remove barriers and expand eligibility for our low-income friends, neighbors, and loved ones.
If you would like to stay up to date on how to provide public comments in response to the renewal of Pathways, please sign up for updates from the Cover Georgia Coalition.
Legislation on Our Radar
HB 81: Interstate Compact for School Psychologists
- Position: Support
- Status: House First Readers (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Bethany Ballard
- Summary: HB 81 would allow Georgia to join the Interstate Compact for School Psychologists. This compact makes it easier for school psychologists to work in different states by simplifying the licensing process. It also helps address the shortage of these professionals in schools. The bill creates a commission to manage the compact. It also sets rules for sharing information, handling discipline issues (for school psychologists, not students), solving disputes, and how states can join or leave the compact. The goal is to give students better access to school psychologists while still allowing each state to set its own licensure requirements.
- Why It Matters: Improves access to mental health support for students and helps tackle the shortage of school psychologists.
HB 89: Requires health care providers, health care facilities, and pharmacies to provide the Maternal Mortality Review Committee with psychiatric or other clinical records
- Position: Monitoring
- Status: House First Readers (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Sharon Cooper
- Summary: HB 89 aims to improve how the state of Georgia collects information on maternal deaths and provides care for mothers and babies. It gives the Maternal Mortality Review Committee more access to patient records, including mental health and pharmacy records, to better understand why mothers pass away during pregnancy or childbirth. The bill also creates a Regional Perinatal Center Advisory Committee, which will help make sure hospitals and doctors have the right resources to care for high-risk pregnancies and births. Lastly, the bill simplifies the process for investigating the deaths of pregnant women, so medical examiners don’t always have to go through a regional perinatal center unless special circumstances require it.
- Why It Matters: Helps identify systemic issues in maternal health care, improving outcomes for mothers and babies.
HB 94: Requires health insurers to cover fertility preservation services for individuals undergoing treatment for cancer, sickle cell disease, or lupus that may impact fertility
- Position: Monitoring
- Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Eddie Lumsden
- Summary: HB 94 would require state-regulated health plans to cover fertility preservation services for people undergoing medical treatments for cancer, sickle cell disease, or lupus that could lead to infertility. These services include procedures like freezing eggs, sperm, or embryos to help individuals have children in the future. The bill also sets guidelines and limits for what insurance must cover, such as evaluation costs, medications, and one year of storage for reproductive cells. Limits include restrictions based on age and the number of procedures covered.
- Why It Matters: If passed, this bill would help people facing serious illnesses more affordably protect their ability to have children while ensuring insurance companies have clear and consistent guidelines.
HB 97: “Private option” version of Medicaid expansion
- Position: Support
- Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Sam Park
- Summary: HB 97 would create a new coverage option for low-income Georgians ages 19-65 with incomes at or below 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL). Eligible Georgians would enroll in a health plan through Georgia Access (the state-run website where people can sign up for private health insurance). Under this program, the state would fully cover premiums and other costs for enrollees.
- What You Should Know:
- For 2024, 138% of the FPL is about $20,000 per year for a single person or $41,000 for a family of four.
- Currently, some low-income Georgians have $0 premiums through Georgia Access due to enhanced premium tax credits (ePTCs). However, these are set to expire at the end of 2025 unless extended by Congress.
- Why It Matters: If passed, HB 97 would enable more than 200,000 Georgians to get affordable health coverage, reducing the number of uninsured people in the state. With health insurance, low-income adults who currently fall into the coverage gap could go to the doctor when they’re sick, access medications to keep them healthy, and have much better access to health care.
HB 101: Annual reporting requirement for the amount of prescription drug rebates applied to premium reductions for the State Health Benefit Plan
- Position: Support
- Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Demetrius Douglas
- Summary: HB 101 would require yearly public reports on prescription drug discounts and savings (i.e., prescription drug rebates) for the state employees’ health insurance plan, which covers state workers and public school teachers. The report would show how much of the savings from these drug discount programs was used to reduce premiums in the State Health Benefit Plan. The savings would be detailed in both dollar amounts and percentages. The bill also removes any outdated laws that might conflict with these changes.
- Why It Matters: HB 101 aims to ensure that savings the company that manages prescription drug benefits for the SHBP receives are passed along to public employees and teachers.
HB 104: Equal Athletic Opportunities Act (House version of the Senate’s proposed ban on transgender athletes)
- Position: Oppose
- Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Brent Cox
- Summary: HB 104 would ban transgender students in middle school through college from participating in school sports that align with their gender identity. The bill bans transgender students from using shared spaces, such as bathrooms or locker rooms, based on their gender identity. The bill would also legally define “sex” as a student’s biological sex, as defined by their birth certificate.
- Why it matters:The bill’s reliance on biological sex as determined at birth effectively excludes transgender students from participating in teams that align with their gender identity. Not only is this discriminatory, but studies show that this type of exclusion causes significant mental harm to transgender adolescents and their families. Additionally, the bill proposes to penalize schools by withholding state funding if schools have policies that do not adhere precisely to the bill’s intent.
HB 109: EmPATH unit pilot program
- Position: Monitoring
- Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
- Sponsor: Representative Imani Barnes
- Summary: HB 109 proposes a five-year pilot program to create Emergency Psychiatric Assessment, Treatment, and Healing (EmPATH) units in hospitals across Georgia. These units are designed to help people experiencing mental health crises by providing immediate, short-term treatment in a hospital-based setting. The goal is to offer an alternative to emergency rooms and inpatient hospitalization for individuals in crisis.
- Why It Matters: The EmPATH pilot program could help ease emergency room overcrowding, improve mental health outcomes, and expand access to care in urban and rural areas by creating dedicated crisis care facilities. If the pilot is successful, the EmPATH units could be implemented on a larger scale, leading to a long-term shift in how Georgia handles individuals experiencing mental health emergencies.
Advocate with us at the Capitol!

Join These Advocacy Events During the Legislative Session
Each week during the legislative session, we’ll highlight legislative advocacy days hosted by partner organizations. These events are excellent opportunities to engage in the lawmaking process by meeting your legislators and advocating for critical health issues.
Here are the upcoming events:
- February 6 – AIDS Watch Day at the Capitol, hosted by Georgia Equality
- February 6 – Strolling Thunder, hosted by GEEARS: Georgia Early Education Alliance for Ready Students
- February 6 – Morehouse School of Medicine turns 50! (Celebration at the Capitol)
- February 11 – Community Health Worker Awareness Day, hosted by Georgia Watch/ARCHI
- February 19 – Mental Health Parity Day, hosted by The Carter Center, Georgians for a Healthy Future, and the Georgia Parity Collaborative
- February 24 – Medicaid Expansion Advocacy Day at the Capitol, hosted by the Cover Georgia Coalition
- February 25 – Heart Health Advocacy Day, hosted by the American Heart Association
- March 4 – Cancer Action Day, hosted by ACS CAN
Please contact Anthony Hill at ahill@healthyfuturega.org if you have an advocacy event you’d like included in GHF’s legislative update.
We hope to see you at one or more of these impactful events!
GHF has you covered!

Stay up-to-date with the legislative session
GHF will be monitoring legislative activity on a number of critical consumer health care topics. Along with our weekly legislative updates and timely analysis of bills, here are tools to help you stay in touch with health policy under the Gold Dome.
- Follow us on social media
- Sign up for the Georgia Health Action Network (GHAN) to receive action alerts that let you know when there are opportunities for advocacy and action
- Remind yourself how the legislative process works
- Catch up with our 2025-2026 policy priorities
- Track health-related legislation on GHF’s website
- Find or contact your legislators on our website
- Write a letter to the editor about a legislative issue that’s important to you
Stay Connected
GHF In The News
Archive
- February 2025
- January 2025
- October 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- October 2023
- July 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- June 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- May 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- December 2018
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- December 2017
- November 2017
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- November 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- August 2016
- July 2016
- June 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- December 2015
- November 2015
- October 2015
- September 2015
- August 2015
- July 2015
- June 2015
- May 2015
- April 2015
- March 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- November 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- July 2014
- May 2014
- March 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
- August 2013
- July 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009