State disability support, Medicaid spending hit the most by Kemp vetoes

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp’s final budget signing ceremony on May 9th resulted in some major changes to state spending.  

Among the governor’s vetoes are about $80 million in state general funds, appropriated by lawmakers to Georgia’s primary healthcare agencies. The state department responsible for family and child welfare was also hit by cuts totaling about $15.2 million.

Total vetoes across all state departments, not just health, stand at about $300 million.  

It’s not uncommon for the governor to issue budget vetoes. What is surprising, says Whitney Griggs with the consumer health advocacy group Georgians for a Healthy Future, is the extent to which certain programs, such as mental health support and healthcare reimbursement rates, were slashed.

“None of us expected this, especially for programs that had such bipartisan support,” Griggs said.  

The vetoes are supposed to help the state manage a $1.3 billion shortfall in Georgia’s fiscal year 2028 budget. That shortfall is associated with the signing of an income tax cut bill, House Bill 463, according to the governor’s Office of Planning and Budget, and of Senate Bill 33, which places limits on property taxes. 

Here’s a summary of what was cut from Georgia’s healthcare agencies to get the budget across the finish line:

Lapse on disability, behavioral health services  

By far one of the biggest individual cuts is around $9.2 million in new spending approved for the New Options and Comprehensive Supports waivers.  

During this year’s legislative session, lawmakers settled on adding 900 waiver slots under both programs, which help people with intellectual and developmental disabilities who are eligible for Medicaid afford care either at home or in residential care facilities.  

The state is managing a wait list of thousands of people who have applied for a NOW or COMP waiver, with just over 1,200 cited as having an urgent need for services, according to estimates made by a workgroup of the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities.  

“When somebody is on the urgent list for a waiver, it means that they are at risk of homelessness,” said D’Arcy Robb, executive director of the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities. “It means that they may be living in a hospital. It means they themselves may be senior citizens being cared for by very elderly parents.”

There are also many young adults who need services as they lose access due to aging out of school.  

After years of advocating for increased attention on the individuals and families who need support, getting those extra waiver slots approved felt like a huge win, Robb said. But then, they were taken away.  

“This was really disappointing news,” Robb said. “So, I really think it’s very important now to just keep up the awareness about this issue.” 

Additional cuts to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities would have supported infrastructure for the NOW/COMP waiver increase and the Family Support Services division. 

Also cut from the budget was $2.4 million to fund mental and behavioral health stabilization services at Level 1 trauma centers in counties without other types of psychiatric services.  

Meanwhile, some state lawmakers are hedging their bets on a $409 million forensic mental health hospital as part of the solution to Georgia’s behavioral health care crisis. That price tag only covers construction.  

The hospital has garnered strong support from local law enforcement, who say they’re overwhelmed by the number of people jailed with mental or behavioral health diagnoses that they are not equipped to treat.

Public health preparedness  

Funding approved by lawmakers to help expand Georgia’s physician workforce at certain hospitals and in rural areas have been cut from the budget.  

That includes $3 million for a pilot program training pediatricians for rural practice, $3 million to help develop a graduate medical education program run by the Morehouse School of Medicine and Phobe Putney, and $747,146 for residency slots in primary care medicine.  

Under the Department of Public Health, which saw the least budget cuts, funding for the Georgia Poison Center, the Coverdell Stroke Registry, and for maintaining clinical staff at a Trauma Recovery Center run by Grady Health was rescinded.

Healthcare for the elderly and disabled  

The Department of Community Health oversees Medicaid-funded services that help pay for independent living, as well as Georgia’s Pathways to Coverage Program and PeachCare for Kids. As an agency, it saw the largest amount of state funding vetoed, at about $68 million.  

Most of that falls under the Medicaid programs that cover pregnant people, children, people older than 65, and those with a disability.  

“The burden definitely falls on populations that are already struggling to access care,” Griggs said.  

Just under $20 million in cuts to provider reimbursement rates for autism services, dental care and certain EMS services are of particular concern to Griggs.  

“Especially when we’re facing so much uncertainty around Medicaid,” she said. “These rate increases were kind of a way to shore up providers and put a little bit more state funding towards it.”  

Normally, that state funding comes with a federal match, which is now left out of the total budget because of the vetoes, making the overall value of the budget cuts to the Department of Community Health about $172 million.  

An additional $2 million for caregiver support services under the Department of Human Services was vetoed, as was $3.2 million for the Georgia Memory Net, a state-funded program run by Emory University.  

Home and Community-Based Services for the elderly, of which 3,200 people were on the wait list for as of March 2026, and which is expected to see even deeper cuts from the passage of President Donald Trump’s spending package, saw a $1.4 million withholding of state funds.

This story comes to The Current GA through a reporting partnership with GPB News, a non-profit newsroom covering the state of Georgia.

GPB’s Health Reporting is supported by Georgia Health Initiative, a non-partisan, private foundation advancing innovative ideas to help improve the health of Georgians. Learn more at georgiahealthinitiative.org

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