ATLANTA, Ga. (WALB) - Thursday March 6, 2025, is one of the most important days of every Georgia General Assembly session. It is known as Crossover Day.

What is Crossover Day?

Crossover Day is the last day that a bill can pass from the state House to the Senate or the other way around.

The majority of bills switch houses on Crossover Day, which is day 30 of the legislative session. The other house typically makes changes to the bill and adds its own amendments. If a bill is approved by the second house but with changes, the original chamber has to accept those changes.

What bills could be crossing over today?

Here are some major bills pending on Crossover Day:

• SB17 – Ricky and Alyssa’s Law. Requires local school systems to implement a mobile panic alert system capable of connecting disparate emergency services technologies to ensure real-time coordination between multiple state and local first responder agencies in the event of a school security. Also mandates schools provide blueprints for their mapping outline to provide law enforcement additional preparedness if they have to enter a school. Named for two people who lost their lives in the Apalachee shooting.
• SB61 – Automatic suspensions for students who make terroristic threats. Allows superior courts the authority to exercise exclusive original jurisdiction for the trials of children 13-17 to include the offenses of certain terroristic threats or acts involving public and private schools and attempt or criminal conspiracy to commit certain offenses.
• SB179 – Transfer of disciplinary/academic records. A student’s discipline and academic records must be transferred to receiving school within tan days of a student transferring in. HB268, a companion bill which passed the House on Tuesday, also sets up a database (known as the S3 database) that would store the disciplinary/academic records of students who may pose a security threats. Obvious privacy and profiling concerns there, but supporters, including House Speaker Jon Burns, said it will avoid miscommunications when a new students comes into a new district.
• SB120 – DEI ban. Would ban all state funding to private and public educational institutions that promote DEI programs. Supporters said it’s more going after structured DEI programs but detractors have a feeling it would be used way past that scope.
• SB34 – Data center costs. Would prevent power companies from passing on the high energy prices it costs to run data centers onto consumers. Data centers use a lot of electricity and water for power and cooling, and as they become more prevalent, this bill would prohibit the energy suppliers they use from upping consumer energy bills to make up for that, just because they took on a data center as a client.
• SB94 – Consumer Utility Company. Would create a consumer utility counsel to represent consumers in matters before the Public Service Commission or other agencies concerning public utilities. The bill asks for the recreation of a Consumer Utility Council that will advocate on behalf of all customers in the Public Service Commission when decisions are made about Georgian’s utility rates.
• HB533 – Wrongly Incarcerated Act. Would compensate Georgians who are wrongly convicted and jailed. It would set up a structure where a Georgian who is wrongly convicted would receive a set amount for each year they spend behind bars.
• HB686 / HR450: Sports betting. HB686 is the bill that would allow Georgians the opportunity to vote in 2026 on legalized online sports betting. HR450 lays out the landscape for how betting would work and it would automatically kick in if HB686 passes. In addition some of the revenue would go to Pre-K programs in Georgia (estimated to be as much as $150 million annually) and even more would go to responsible gambling programs.
• HB111/112 – Income tax credit/cut. HB 112 is a one-time tax credit for Georgia taxpayers who filed income tax returns for both 2023 and 2024. HB 111 is a continuation of Georgia’s effort to reduce the state’s income tax rate each year, eventually bringing it below 5%. Starting January 1, 2025, the individual income tax rate will be reduced from 5.39% to 5.19%, with plans to further reduce the rate by 0.10% annually until it reaches 4.99% in 2027.

The last day of the legislative session is scheduled for Friday, April 4, 2025.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp is set to sign the state’s new budget on Thursday. Kemp’s office said the budget includes funding for various measures, including providing relief to communities impacted by Hurricane Helene and other storms; bolstering security in Georgia Department of Corrections facilities and public safety; providing record amounts of school safety investments; and other items.

WALB will keep you updated on air and online as we follow what bills move across the legislative aisle.

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