ATLANTA — Gov. Brian Kemp announced Dec. 18 a pay increase proposal for state employees and additional school safety funding for the upcoming year.

In the announcement, held at the State Capitol, Kemp said he will submit an amended FY 2024 budget to the Georgia General Assembly in January that calls for a $1,000 state employee retention pay supplement for each of the roughly 112,000 state employees and 196,000 teachers and school support staff across the state.

“Given how hard these men and women had worked to serve Georgians during the pandemic to help keep our community safe and to make state government more streamlined and efficient, this seems wholly appropriate to me,” Kemp said. “As part of that effort to make state government more responsive and effective, we have heard from our agency heads about the need to retain those with valuable skills and knowledge.”

In 2022, teachers received the second installment of a Kemp-approved $5,000 pay raise. Another raise was approved earlier this year in the FY 2024 budget.

Kemp also announced plans to include more than $100 million, $45,000 per school, in the FY 2025 budget for school security and safety. The additional allocation is expected to be ongoing in the state budget for schools to use on personnel or infrastructure improvements that strengthen campus security.

“Our education system is the foundation of our state’s success,” said House Speaker Jon Burns. “We can’t talk about job creation, economic development, workforce and talent issues without making education, educational success, our focus.”

In 2019, the $30,000 grants were available for every public school in the state to use for campus safety improvements, followed by a second round of grants announced earlier this year totaling $50,000 per school.

Kemp said the $45,000 amount was suggested as an avenue for schools to be able to hire a school resource officer, if desired.

“That’s what it was designed for really, so we could have a school resource officer in every school if that’s what the locals do,” Kemp said. “I think especially when it comes to school security, local control is extremely important because there may be some schools that they could better spend their money on something besides personnel, maybe hardening the school, maybe cameras, it may be some sort of system or, or what have you. So we’re trusting the schools to do that.”

Lt. Gov. Burt Jones announced in October his school safety priorities, which include paid training for teachers to carry firearms in schools. According to the plan, annual stipends, proposed at $10,000 and funded by the state, would also be available to teachers who complete the firearms training program and hold a firearms training certificate.

Jones’s proposal also calls for expanding existing grant programs to allow state funds to be used to hire POST-certified security personnel.

“The safety and well-being of our students across the state is always my top priority,” Jones said. “I am looking forward to building on this announcement and enhancing school safety measures.”