ATLANTA — The Georgia Senate has approved a new round of $250-$500 state surplus tax refund checks with only Gov. Brian Kemp's signature now needed for the payments to hit taxpayer pockets.
The Georgia House approved the bill for the new payments — which are largely similar in structure to payments sent out last year — in February.
It's all but assured the governor will sign the legislation authorizing the payments. He thanked the Georgia Senate on Twitter for passing the bill. Kemp proposed this refund earlier in the year, following up on a promise he made on the campaign trail.
The roughly $1 billion income tax refund proposal comes out of the state's budget surplus. It provided for a three-tiered structure of refund payments:
- $500 for married couples filing jointly
- $375 for single filers with dependents
- $250 for single filers
The payments will only go to people who paid Georgia state income tax in both 2021 and 2022.
One change with this year's bill is that people who paid state income tax but are claimed as a dependent — such as a high school or college student who worked — can qualify for the $250 payment.
Georgia previously issued tax refund checks that drew from the state surplus last year.
That $1.6 billion measure drew out of a $2.2 billion surplus, and provided for $250-$500 payments to state taxpayers. According to the Associated Press, Georgia ran a surplus of about $5 billion for the 2021-22 fiscal year that concluded at the end of June.
Fearing revenue would tank amid the COVID pandemic, Georgia lawmakers cut 10% from the spending plan while developing the budget for the 2021 fiscal year in the summer of 2020. Once it became clear revenue wouldn't plummet, the state government then restored hundreds of millions of dollars back into its education budget.
However, other state agencies have continued along with reduced funding, in part creating the surplus.
Kemp's signed off on the amended 2023 fiscal year budget Monday. The $32.6 billion spending plan included nearly $1 billion in property tax breaks and $115.7 million to fund school security grants.