A state lawmaker files a bill to make sure the passport fees you pay the county aren’t going into somebody’s bank account.

State Senator Kay Kirkpatrick, whose district includes parts of Cherokee and Cobb Counties, tells WSB she was “incredulous” when she found out that it’s legal for some government employees to pay themselves with that money.

“About half the counties in Georgia do passport applications, and about 50 of them allow some portion of it to be taken home as income.

“I was just incredulous...Turns out, it’s a loophole in our law. That’s what I’m trying to close.”

Kirkpatrick says from what she’s learned, some county clerks are adding hundreds of thousands of dollars to their personal income--including $200,000 to well over $300,000 per year for some populous counties in metro Atlanta.

In the two counties where her constituents live, the fees are handled differently by the Superior Court Clerks.

“In Cobb, the number that I read was $425,000 over a two-year period. And that’s on top of the already pretty nice salary that the clerk collects, which is about $169,000. And then in this situation, the clerk apparently took home the expedited shipping fees as well, which was another $84,000 and change, which is when the GBI got involved with this because that part is not allowed in the law,” she said.

In Cherokee County, the clerk splits the $35 fee, sending $25 to the county’s general fund, and keeping $10 in a fund to spend on office expenses or staff gifts.

In some counties, the clerk keeps 100% of each processing fee.

Kirkpatrick’s bill would mandate transparency on where the fees go, as well as require the money to be split between the clerks’ offices and the counties’ general funds. It would end the ability for the clerks to have any of it as personal income.

“These are elected officials, but they’re using county resources, county staff, county time, county everything to do this,” says Kirkpatrick.

She says she has not yet spoken to any county clerks but expects to be hearing from them very soon, and understands that some might argue that the fees are an incentive for taking on the extra work of offering taxpayers the convenience of another place to get passport services.

Sen. Kirkpatrick adds that the bill does not address the law that allows tax commissioners, for example, to take home some money as personal income. Her bill is focused solely on the court clerks, and she says it probably became more obvious as hordes of people rushed to get or renew their passports as COVID travel restrictions eased--making for “a windfall” for some clerks.

“Just because something is legal doesn’t necessarily mean it’s right,” says Kirkpatrick.

©2023 Cox Media Group