Kemp’s efforts to limit court settlements occupy center stage, with nudges from Coastal Georgia business leaders

On the eve of the state legislature’s current session, Gov. Brian Kemp took the bully pulpit.

Speaking at the state chamber of commerce’s annual Eggs & Issues breakfast early last month, he exhorted Georgia’s business and political leaders to get behind his push for “tort reform” – to change state laws that he says excessively favor plaintiffs over defendants in personal injury trials.

The state chamber’s counterparts in Coastal Georgia followed the governor’s cue. They made it clear to lawmakers that as far as they’re concerned, the assembly had three legislative priorities: tort reform, tort reform, and tort reform.

Bert Brantley, president and CEO of the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce, said it was time for the state’s elected officials to fall in line.

“It’s an important signal that our elected leaders join with our Chamber in naming litigation reform as their top priority,” said Brantley, who took over the chamber in 2022 after serving two years as Kemp’s deputy chief of staff.

“Citizens need to be able to go to court when a dispute arises, but the process needs to be fair and not tilted towards either party. Our neighboring states have addressed these issues, and if we want to stay competitive, we need to start catching up.”

For Ralph Staffins III, Brantley’s counterpart at the Brunswick-Golden Isles Chamber of Commerce, nothing less than posterity is at stake in Kemp’s bid to recalibrate the balance between plaintiffs and defendants in personal injury trials.

“This issue transcends politics and industry,” Staffins wrote in an op-ed distributed to news organizations. “It is about the future of our state, and the millions of Georgians who have had enough of a justice system that too often rewards frivolous lawsuits and runaway verdicts.”

‘Judicial hellhole’

The push by Kemp’s allies to win legislative approval of his version of tort reform continued early last week at briefings at the state capitol sponsored by the Brunswick-Golden Isles Chamber of Commerce.

One after another, state insurance commissioner John King, Sen. Brandon Beach (R-Alpharetta) and Rep. Jesse Petrea (R-Savannah) took to the podium to declare the Georgia legal system’s handling of personal injury cases a “judicial hellhole.”

While insisting he wasn’t trying to protect insurance companies, King said Georgia’s legal system is “squeezing the life out of small business.”

Beach along with Gabriel Sterling, a top official in the Georgia’s secretary of state’s office, invoked the highly publicized case of a Georgia man who was awarded $43 million after he was shot and wounded in the parking lot of an Atlanta-area drugstore in 2012 as he tried to sell an iPad.

Lawyers for the man, James Carmichael, argued that the pharmacy had failed to provide customers with security, including lighting.

Such awards, Sterling said, were discouraging insurance companies from selling coverage to entrepreneurs seeking to establish businesses in economically impoverished areas of the state.

Beach, who is chairman of the chamber’s economic development and tourism committee, described the $43 million award as an example of “jackpot justice” and “out-of-control lawsuits” that were “tough on business” and whose costs were passed on to consumers.

In referring to the 2012 case, Kemp’s allies didn’t always do so accurately. Sterling claimed falsely that the iPad seller was committing a crime in the incident and killed. Beach said the shooting was the result of a “drug deal gone bad,” which also was false.

Rival bill

On Friday, three days after the contingent from Glynn County was briefed, Kemp’s version of reform cleared a major legislative hurdle. It passed the Republican-led Senate with most of its provisions intact in a largely party-line vote. The measure now moves to the House for more debate.

Senate Bill 68 calls for limits on owners’ liability for injuries that occur on their property. It also restricts special damages awarded for medical bills to the actual amount paid by the plaintiff and allows for trials to be split into stages juries can determine liability and damages separately. 

The bill’s sponsor, John Kennedy (R-Macon), insisted the bill wasn’t about “protecting corporate profits” or “caving to the demands of insurance companies” or denying Georgians their day in court.

Senate Democrats who opposed the bill said the legislation would not effectively reduce insurance costs and would make it harder for everyday Georgians to hold corporations accountable for misconduct.

They introduced a rival bill, SB 223, which they said would better address the issue of frivolous lawsuits. It proposes legal protections that reward businesses for taking steps to improve on-site safety for their customers. 

Other legislative priorities overshadowed

The Brunswick chamber’s legislative agenda for the current assembly session is not limited to Kemp’s iteration of tort reform.

The local lawmakers, lobbyists and businesspeople attending the chamber’s capitol day pressed officials of the Georgia Department of Transportation on the progress of infrastructure improvements relieve traffic congestion, especially at roundabout at the SR 99/spur intersection.

Glynn County Manager Bill Fallon said that work could start on the project as soon as next week.

The attendees also urged the transportation officials to undertake studies for possible improvements at the SR 303/SR 341 intersection, the paving of a new section of McKenzie Road, and the realignment of a section of DePratter Lane, as well as improvements to SR 99 at exit 42, near the planned Buc-ees.

The need for state funding for regional planning and beach nourishment projects in Coastal Georgia’s southern counties was discussed at a breakfast meeting of the Brunswick chamber attended by the region’s entire legislative delegation in December.

Nevertheless, with the spotlight on Kemp’s push to reform court settlements, beach nourishment efforts and other previously touted legislative priorities weren’t even mentioned last week.

Sen. Mike Hodges (R-Brunswick) told The Current on the second day of the chamber’s three days of briefings at the state capitol that there was no plan how the projects would be carried out.