Georgia Gazette

I'm Bruce Dorton, and this is Georgia Gazette, coming up on today's program. Chinese New Year traditionally is not only just at the beginning of the year, but also at the beginning of the spring. The Chinese celebrate their new year, January 31st, Gary Guan explains what it means to be living in the year of the board. It was a chance to possibly get picked up and, you know, a chance in the dark, and, you know, it's kind of been cut short by the weather here. It was supposed to be a field of dreams, instead it was a field of mud. Mike Savage takes you to the Atlanta Braves Tri-Out Camp almost held this week in Atlanta. Those stories and much, much more ahead on Georgia Gazette, but first the news from National Public Radio. Welcome to Georgia Gazette, I'm Bruce Dorton.

On today's edition, Georgia Consumer Advocate Barry Reed targets unscrupulous home builders and contractors. The Taxman Comet, Greg Davis, is with the IRS, and he's here to share tax tips and information you'll need as you get your records in order. Sometimes trying to find something in the yellow pages is like being told to look up a misspelled word in the dictionary, where do you begin? Well, one possibility is with 511 telephone information services and we'll learn more about them. Those stories plus sports talk, the arts calendar, and a movie review, or two. Georgia Gazette is a radio magazine, enjoy it, and pass it on. You're listening to Georgia Gazette, I'm Bruce Dorton with me in the studio now, Greg Davis, a taxpayer service representative with the Internal Revenue Service, and of course it's tax time, and that's what we're going to talk about. Greg, welcome to Georgia Gazette. Thank you. First question I've got to ask, and I'm sure you get this a lot.

Why is it so difficult for people to get through to the IRS on the telephone? Well, we only have a limited staff available to handle telephone calls to our 800 numbers, and we service quite a few states with each call site that we have around the country. Like the one we have here in Atlanta, we service, depending on the day or the week, anywhere from three to six states, usually, and so we can have literally thousands of people calling at any one time, and we have approximately two to 250 people available. Okay. All right. What are the newest changes in the tax system this year? Well, let's see. Some of the main changes are that, like if you take itemized deduction for charitable contributions for amounts of $250 or more, whether it's cash or non-cash, you have to receive a receipt from the organization that you're giving the contribution to.

Also, the tax ability of Social Security benefits has changed somewhat after the tax act change from last year. If you, it's still 50% of the benefits would be taxable if you're over $32,000 in income, other income, other in Social Security benefits for a married couple filing jointly for an individual that's 25,000, and if it's over 44,000 now for a married couple filing a joint return up to 85% of their benefits may be taxable, and it's $32,000, I believe, for a single individual. Is there a date that an employer has to have their W2 form for the employee sent out? They should have them available to the employee by January 31st, and the employee should

have it in hand by February 15th. We start taking W2 complaints as of February 15th, and we'll send something to the employer requesting that they provide the employee with a copy if they have not received it by that date. Do the current rules or the past rules still apply when it comes to if you cannot file by April 15th, you can get an extension. Yes. How does that work? In order to receive an extension if you're unable to file by April 15th, or in this case, this year it's April 17th as the 15th on a Saturday, you fill out a form 4868 and submit it to IRS by April 17th of 95 requesting an extension, and it's an automatic extension through August the 15th. Now an individual filing attack has the ultimate, the final responsibility for everything being accurate, correct? That is correct.

If they go to one of these places that do your tax returns and a mistake is made, what recourse do they have? Who's liable? Well, ultimately you, the individual taxpayer, are liable for what is on your return. Depending on who you use to prepare your return, they may or may not agree to pay any additional tax due from any type of changes that may come at a later time from review of the return or if there was a mistake. That's something that's between you and that particular prepare. I'm talking to Greg Davis, Tax Pay of Service Representative with the Internal Revenue Service. Greg, if an individual has been calling and calling and could not get through to your customer service line, that 800 number, can a person come to an IRS office and look for and get assistance? Yes, sir. We do have walk-in offices available across the state of Georgia. We have four locations in the Atlanta metropolitan area and then in various cities around the

state. What about the people who may file and claim that extra number of dollars that do them and perhaps they made a mistake and more money is do them? How does the IRS handle that? If it's a basic math era or they say they put down the incorrect amount of tax on the tax return, we just make a correction and send out the refund with the corrected amount. We also send a separate note as advising that we did make a change on your tax return. This is the change we made and explain why it was made. What is that 800 number? By the way. It's 1-800-829-1040. Tax 1040. What's the biggest complaint? Consumer complaint you get from taxpayers? Let's see. Either they have not received their refund for some reason or having to pay their taxes basically.

Okay. Anything new that we need to talk about? You think it needs to be passed on real quick? Well, there have been some changes also with the earned income credit. In order to claim the earned income tax credit, you do have to have a valid social security number for each dependent that you're claiming on the return. And if the social security number cannot be verified when we were processing a tax return, it will cause the earned income credit portion of your refund to be denied or held until it can be verified. You would receive a refund if any tax credit that was due. But the earned income tax credit portion of your refund would be delayed until that verification was available. So does that like telling someone if you had a child born on December 31st, you need to go out and get a social security number for this child? Well, a child under one is not required to have a social security number. But for earned income credit, they can require that you have a number on your return. And what is the earned income credit for this year?

The basic credit, the maximum this year with one child is $2,038 and with two or more children it's $2,528, any other major changes. Well moving expenses have been changed there no longer, an itemized deductible item. You can take it as a credit without having to file for itemized deductions. But if someone has been paid their moving expenses, how is that handled? Well, only the expenses of moving the household contents and personal possessions and the cost of traveling from the old to the new residents are allowed. Greg Davis, taxpayer service representative with the Internal Revenue Service. Thanks very much for taking your time and coming with us on Georgia Gazette. And again, that number is 1-800, taxed in 40. All right. Thank you, Greg. Thank you. A light snow was falling Monday when more than 1,000 braves wannabes showed up at the baseball field on the South Campus of DeCab College in Atlanta for open tryouts.

Let's as Mike Savage, what got tested there that day was patience. With an inch of standing water on the DeCab College baseball field, Atlanta Braves Scouts decided nothing would be accomplished by holding the tryout campus schedule. Move right over into the third base area and they're going to give you a pen, the give you instructions on filling out this part, just move right over there. Instead of playing in front of major league scouts, the large crowd was directed by braves officials just to fill out registration cards. Jack Lamar, the director of scouting for the Atlanta Braves, says he's disappointed the weather forced a cancellation of tryouts because he's certain a serious prospect would have been found. Had things gone as planned, the baseball player hopefuls would have been allowed to strut at least some of their stuff. The position players would have all run the 60 yard dash, okay, to try to find just raw foot speed and they would have thrown and field in their position, whether they be in

fielders, whether they be catchers, whether they be in outfielders, that's what they had done. Pitchers would have thrown off the mound and checked initial arm strength and gone from there. So they would have got the only thing that suffers in an open tryout camp like this, especially with the numbers, is the bat. It's very hard to give everybody a clear opportunity to swing the bat, but we're looking for that athletic ability anyway. So they would have showed us by their body, their actions, their arm strength, their fielding ability, how fast they run the 60 if we would have had an interest in letting them hit or not. Baseball players went out on strike August 12th in a dispute over a proposed salary cap system unilaterally supported by club owners. First the World Series fell by the wayside and now the April 2nd start of the regular season appears to be in jeopardy. One way owners hope to minimize their losses and keep angry fans at least partially satisfied is by fielding teams made up of replacement players. Usually Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angeloas has said no to that idea.

Other teams like the Atlanta Braves are looking to their farm systems and to open tryouts to find the 900 players that the 32 teams need to start the season, Chuck Lamar. We believe in open tryout teams. We believe in giving everybody that feels like in their heart they still have a chance to play in the major leagues that opportunity and we go through a lot of numbers throughout the country to find a few prospects. But I think we have a philosophy in Atlanta that we're going to try to turn over every stone to try to find a player. And that's the reason why 1500 men, many of them in their 30s, brave the rain, the snow, and the 30 degree temperatures to come to DeCab College Monday. Yeah well they, you know, had us fill out our cards and everything like that and the total state of appreciate is coming out and everything and the totals have a safe trip back. It was my dream to always play Major League Baseball, you know, I was, you know, this is a chance, especially with the strike going on, it was, it was a chance to possibly get picked up and, you know, a chance in the dark and, you know, it's kind of been

cut short by the weather here. If I hadn't come down here three days later I'd be kicking myself in the butt and say, you know, you should have went. So, you know, just give it a little effort, I enjoy the game, love the game, and see what I'd play for $50,000 a year, so I just, it didn't work out. The Atlanta tryout camp may or may not be rescheduled, but players Monday were told by scouts, don't call us and we may or may not call you. For Georgia Gazette, I'm Mike Savage. For listening to Georgia Gazette, I'm Bruce Thornton. With me in the studio now, sports guy extraordinaire, Herb White, sports show host and commentator for WCNN and very knowledgeable former NBA player with the Atlanta Hawks and good friend, sports talk to us, Herb, how are you today?

I'm doing great, Bruce, how about you? I'll just find, let's get the easy stuff out of the way for us today. All right. Superbowl. We're still picking San Francisco, everyone it seems like is picking San Francisco over San Diego, right? Certainly, because the bookmakers in Las Vegas have set the line at 20 and a half. Actually, it started out at 18 and a half, couldn't get anybody to bet on San Diego with that number. Now it's up to 20 and a half and I hear they're still having problems getting people to bet. Of course, what the bookmakers try to do is set the line, it doesn't really mean what they feel the outcome of the game will be. The line is basically what they think they can get half the people to bet on the chargers and half the people to bet on the 49ers, of course the bookies get their money right off the top. You know, we may be underestimating the chargers. Now I firmly believe that San Diego, that San Francisco is going to win, but I don't think San Diego is going to get beat that bad. You know, I think all the press and you know how we are in the media, I think we are just going to give a little fuel to San Diego and even if they do lose, they're going to make

a respectable showing. I agree with you. If somebody held me down and made me bet my house on it, I believe I'd take the points and go with San Diego. Bobby Ross is a guy who is well known for the preparation. He can get for his ball club. He won a national championship at Georgia Tech or actually shared one with Colorado. He's been in the NFL now, this is third year, I believe, and he's got his team in the Superbowl. He's had two weeks to prepare. He probably needs all of that for San Francisco, but I would think that San Diego may have a few surprises and can keep it within 20 to 21 points, I wouldn't be surprised. Speaking of Georgia Tech, let's go to college basketball. They have just recruited, and I believe they've signed the number one high school basketball player in the country. Correct. Correct, Stefan Marbury. But there's a little bit of controversy surrounding Marbury and his basketball career. Well, yesterday on our program, we discussed a little bit the way this whole thing has been treated in the Atlanta paper's Sunday.

There was a large article about Stefan Marbury. Stefan to indicate his intention was to go to Georgia Tech because of the fact that Bobby Cremons had put several point guards into the NBA, Mark Price, Kenny Anderson. People think Travis Bess, the current point guard, will go on and play in the NBA. Stefan said he wants to go there. It looks like he's only going to be there a year or two. Most people are indicating now. Is that the message that we want to send to kids? Is that the message that Georgia Tech is trying to put out that we don't really care. If this young man is going to come here to be a student with the intent to graduate, he's coming here to win some basketball games for us. The last few years, I think it's been a healthy attitude. The presidents of college and athletic directors have moved toward increasing the academic requirements for athletes to get into school and to maintain their eligibility while they're in school. I think that has filtered down into the high schools and the grade school. I think kids have been getting the message that not many of you are going to go on

to play in the NBA or the NFL kids. So the important part about going to college is getting that education. Now when something like this happens and the emphasis is put on, I'm going to tech so I can be a point guard in the NBA and I'll probably only be there a year or two. I think we're sending out the wrong message. I just think it should have been handled differently. I know from our show here at Georgia Public Television, Prep Sports Plus, where we honor kids who do well academically. There has been improvement with the no-pass, no-play in high schools today. I think kids are more aware than ever that they do need to do that. But I think when things like this happens, it goes across purposes with what we're trying to achieve. What else is going on college basketball wise around the state? What do we have coming up for? Georgia Tech lost a heartbreaker the other day to Virginia on the road, double over time game, missed some crucial free throws at the end, Travis Best, one of the better free throw shooters in the Collegiate Basketball at about 84-85 percent, missed several down the stretch. If you can still have went on the road, it's big in the ACC, but they weren't able to do

it. And Georgia beat Auburn Saturday night for a victory, so to even up their SEC record at three and three, Tech now stands at two and three in the ACC. Does Tech and Georgia get to play again? They will not play again, and there's been some controversy about that in the last week or so about Georgia wants to move the Georgia Georgia Tech game, which has been played in the Omnia and Atlanta for 12 years, back to a home and home basis, which has offended a lot of people because Georgia's seemed to have made this decision unilaterally, although they claim that they did tell Georgia Tech, so they'll be more on that soon, and I don't think it's been completely decided. I have offered a, what I think is a compromise for both teams to play, they open the cup and hammer, which is the basketball classic, they have every year in Atlanta, Tech and Georgia already play in that, they're the host teams, they take turns hosting that event. It's the same week right now as the Georgia Georgia Tech game, that's one of the reasons

they wanted to move the Georgia Tech game out of that week, they felt like the cup and hammer and the Georgia Georgia Tech game were siphoning off some interest from each other. I say, let Tech and Georgia open the cup and hammer each year and invite two more teams and you can go back to a four game format or a four team format, two games for each team, which it used to be, and I think that can solve the problem. But more on that later, we'll see what Coach Dooley at University of Georgia's ending at the balls in his court right now. Okay, herb whites, sports announces, sports commentator, and looks like soon to be sports arbitrator. Thanks so much for coming in and being with us again on Georgia, because that will see you next week. Always a pleasure, Bruce. Today is Friday, January 27th, composer of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in Salzburg, Austria on this date in 1756, author Charles Dodson, who wrote under the pen name Louis Carroll, was born in Cheshire, England on this date in 1832, inventor Thomas Edison received a patent

for his electric incandescent lamp, January 27th, 1880. On this date in 1967, astronauts Virgil Gus Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee died in a flash flyer. During a test aboard, there were Apollo 1 spacecraft at eight Cape Kennedy in Florida. And the Vietnam Peace Accords were signed in Paris on this date in 1973. People celebrating birthdays today include musical conductor, sketch Henderson, E-77, actor Troy Donahue, who was 59, ballet star, Mikhail Burishnikov, is 47, and actress Bridget Fonda turns 31 today. Good afternoon. I'm Kim Tiernan with this week's update for the Georgia Gazette Arts and Entertainment calendar. In music news, this Sunday at three, Beratone Wolfgang Holtzmer performs songs by Ravel Forey and Mendelssohn in his Atlanta debut at Spivey Hall. Spivey Hall is located on the campus of Clayton State College in Morrow.

In Nuenin, Charles Wadsworth and Friends will present a concert for the Nuenin Auditorium Restoration Project, this Saturday night at eight at the Nuenin Municipal Auditorium. On the program is music by Dvorak and Beethoven, among others, as well as Brahms Hungarian dancers for piano and Schumann's quartet for piano and strings Opus 47. On the theater stage in Georgia, a streetcar named Desire has just opened at the Springer Opera House in Columbus, and will run through February 4. As part of the Augusta College Lyceum series, Shakespeare's The Tempest is tonight and tomorrow night at eight at the Maxwell Performing Arts Theater. Also in Augusta, the Velveteen Rabbit is on stage this Sunday afternoon at three at the Playhouse on Walton Way. It is part of the Augusta Players Imagine That series. This is the last weekend to catch the Island Players presentation of second time around at the Casino Theater on St. Simon's Island.

Finally, some jazz events to note in the state. The Rick Bell Quintet is at the Ritz Theater on St. Simon's Island tonight for Winter Jazz at the Ritz, beginning at eight. The Columbus Symphony welcomes Sandra Reads and her combo for a program called The Late Great Ladies of Blues and Jazz. Saturday night, they present portraits of the wonderful women who sang the great music of the Golden Age of jazz, including Mahalia Jackson, Billy Holiday, and Columbus' own Ma Rainey. If you have any questions concerning the listings on this week's Arts Calendar, do not hesitate to call us at 1-800-654-3038. For Georgia Gazette, I'm Kim Tiernan. You need a rougher or washing machine repair person, but you don't know what's heading there in under the yellow pages? Well, don't worry, there's a dial at 5-1-1 and similar telephone information services in cities throughout Georgia.

Sid Hoskinson looks into how they work. I'm talking today with Jim McKnight, he's the president of Info Ventures. What is 5-1-1, can you explain it? 5-1-1 is merely a dialing arrangement, just like 4-1-1, which most consumers in Georgia are used to in dialing to get directory information or the telephone number of people. 5-1-1, and there are more N-1-1 numbers than just that available in Georgia, 2-1-1, 3-1-1, 5-1-1, 6-1-1, 7-1-1, and 8-1-1. All of these numbers were made available by the Public Service Commission a little over a year ago for information providers to use, to provide information over the telephone of a variety of information to consumers at a very low fixed price, much like the pricing of 4-1-1. Well, with all those other 1-1 numbers available, why 5-1-1? 5-1-1 was the number that was assigned to us by the Georgia Public Service Commission

for use in the Atlanta dialing area. There's no real significance to that number other than that was one of the ones that was available and that was the one assigned to us and that's the one that we use. For instance, in Augusta and Athens, Morris Communications has 3-1-1, which they've implemented. Here in Atlanta, Williams Communications has 7-1-1, likewise, there's a number in Albany that the Albany newspaper has, a number in Bainbridge, I believe there's also some in Rome and Dalton, I don't know the exact number of assignments. Do those services differ at all from the 5-1-1 service? I think each service will be different because what the N-1-1, which is what they're called, say 5-1-1, in Augusta, they are designed to be local services for that local community, so that each service will be designed with that community's information needs in mind. The number in Bainbridge, Georgia, which I believe the weekly newspaper there will use,

the information included on that would be much different than the information included in Atlanta, primarily because the information needs are much different in those communities. So I think the key to all of this is they were designed from the very beginning to be local services and were designed to help people with information in those local communities do it at a very low price to the consumer. Well, let's find out first what they do. What happens? Why would I want to dial in N-1-1 number? When you dial the number, you have access to a myriad of information topics that are updated on an ongoing basis throughout the day. The largest user of the numbers is newspapers, so let's take a newspaper, for example. When you receive that newspaper in the morning, the weather report, the stock quotes, the sports scores are all static information that they have gathered in some cases from the

night before or the day before. That is the type of information that we update on an ongoing basis. A perfect example would be the weather, the last couple of days in Atlanta, which was touch and go, by calling the 5-1-1 number, you were able to have an updated weather forecast that was updated every time there was additional news. Sports scores as they happen. The winning lottery number at 11.01 p.m. the night is strong. As well as the entire yellow pages database, any information that's in the Atlanta yellow pages, any information that's in the Atlanta Journal Constitution classified ads is available by a live operator. So it's live operator for some things and what a recorded message and an updated recorded message for other things. That's exactly right.

When you dial into the number, you would get a menu that says if you want weather or stocks, if you'll push this number, you'll hear a recording. But if you need a live operator for anything, if you don't know the category, the live operator will transfer you back into it. If you want yellow page or classified information, our operators will help you. Are the operators Bell South operators? No, they're not. They're Info Ventures operators. They are hired and trained specifically for this project. So they are not for when one operators or zero operators, they're especially trained on how to access the information out of the computer database very quickly. Provide that information back to the consumer to satisfy their request. And if the consumer likes actually connect that consumer straight to the business or person that they need to talk to to complete their transaction. I would imagine given some of the information that people might want, your operators also are possibly trained in interpersonal skills and also interviewing skills because sometimes

it seems like it might be difficult to get at the information that a caller might really want. Very much so. Some of the requests of course are cut and dry, but some of them are very vague and don't follow the standard classifications of the information. So the operator very much has to query the consumer to find out what their needs really are. As anecdotally, they range all the way from the person who called, who wanted to find a live cow that they could then get butchered and put the meat in their freezer, which of course does not fit the standard request. All the way to the lady who had taken her car in for car repair but cannot remember the shop that they took it into, but she knew the part of town and you have to stay with those people and she remembered the repairman's name was Harry. To the lady just the other day who accidentally locked her grandchild in the car and had no

keys called us and we had to stay with that person until we could find a locksmith who could get out there immediately to solve the problem. So I think our operators would also tell you that's the fun part of their job. That's what makes it a job that has a lot of self satisfaction for the operator. And how does this service, how do you accommodate disabilities, physical disabilities on the deaf and other things? Several different ways and I guess I would have to be very straightforward in terms of the deaf with it being an audio service. We did not at this point have a teletext entry into the service. The newspaper itself does have access at Lanna, which is a computer based service. And as technology goes forward, our service will also have that accommodated. In terms of the visually impaired, we do have a policy that if visually impaired people

call and certify to us verbally that they're visually impaired, we do provide them special access to the service so that they can obtain information that they might not be able to obtain otherwise. And what do you mean by special access? We set up an arrangement with them to wait billing. Wow. Well, you got anything else? Nothing other than, you know, we still are developing service. It's very exciting and we're interested to probably more interested than you to see where you'll be a year from now. Well, thank you for being with us on Georgia. Thank you very much. Info Ventures president Jim McKnight talking with Sid Hoskinson about N11 telephone information services in Georgia. You're listening to Georgia Gazette.

I'm Bruce Dorton. Well, the phone now, Eleanor Ringel, our Georgia Gazette movie critic, Eleanor, once again, welcome and thanks for being with us. Oh, it's great to do this, especially when you have two interesting movies to talk about. Fortunately, one is real, real good and one is real, real interesting. The neat things they're both based on plays. The first one is called the Madness of King George, the year 1788, and King George III had already lost the colonies. Now he looks like he's losing his mind. Initially, Georgia's played wonderfully by Nigel Hawthorne. You probably have seen him in, well, he's just a great projector. First, Georgia's just your average royal crap pot. He's actually sort of a decent guy. But one day, his urine turns blue, his top turns muddy, his bowels turn untrustworthy. Modern experts believe that he might have suffered from a metabolic disorder that manifests itself as a form of madness. Anyway, he's had a commission and meet everybody else starts doing power plays. What I really loved about this movie is it takes a look at the whole sense of what is normal and what is madness in a system like the British aristocracy or the British royalty,

which is pretty crazy in itself. Maybe take a movie like The Lion in Winter or The ruling class, but Hawthorne's extraordinary performance gives madness its own voice, and he is definitely an Oscar contender. The other film is called Death in the Maiden, which I think a lot of people heard about because he was done on Broadway with Glenn Close and Richard Dreyfus and Jean Hetman. The movie's got Sigourney Weaver, Ben Kingsley and a guy named Stuart Wilson. It's sort of classed down, but still classy. What happens in the movie is Sigourney Weaver plays a former political prisoner and unnamed South American country who lets determine if the guest that's Ben Kingsley has just been brought home by her husband, that's Wilson, who's the same guy who raped and tortured her 15 years ago to the strands of Schubert's death in the Maiden. Weaver weaver brings her usual heroic intensity to just a simply underwritten part. The time I started thinking was like watching Lucy plot something about, you know, Desi on the level Lucy show, so you guys, some real good actors and a real empty play directed by of all people, Roman Polanski, who does everything he can to try and bring some

sense of danger, some sense of emotional mistakes of this material, but in this case the place is a thing and a sorry thing it is. No kidding. Desi and a Maiden it's called. Desi and the Maiden. Desi and the Maiden and directed by Polanski, he's had a pretty good track record over years. Yeah, it's about his father's just bad material to begin with. And the other movie, Madness of King George. Right. Okay, you like that one. Anything out on video this week we're talking about. I think that people might want to check out Wolf on video, the movie that starts Jack Nicholson as a weird wolf. It's also been taken by a mini to be sort of a yuppie parable of what you have to turn into to survive in business in the 90s, you have to be ruthless and wolf-like, directed by Mike Nicholson. It's actually the kind of movie that would probably play even better at home than it did on the big screen where it's a little bit disappointing. Was it Michelle Pfeiffer in there with you? Absolutely. Yeah. All right, and you enjoyed it. Yeah, well enough, definitely. All right. Thank you very much. Eleanor Ringel, ours.

Because George and Gazette movie critically appreciates you and we'll be talking to you again next week. Thanks. Bye-bye. Well, according to the Associated Press, the most popular movies at the box office this past weekend were number five murder in the first. Nobody's fool came into number four, number three, dumb and dumber. Higher learning was number two and number one, Legends of the Fall. In the studio now, with me is Barry W. Reed, executive director of the Governor's Office of Consumer Affairs. And once again, Barry, welcome to George and Gazette. How Bruce good to be with you today? Well, let's create a hypothetical situation, say you buy a new home only to discover later that the foundation is cracked or plumbing is not insulated, then the builder refuses to correct the problems. Correct me from wrong, Barry, but in Georgia, there's not much you can do except take the builder to court. Basically, that's it. There are in existence a couple of homeowner warranty programs, but we're finding that home buyers are having a very difficult time getting those warranty programs to really

work for them. Bruce, just today I was looking through the mail and I brought with me a typical kind of complaint that we're getting. It's a growing portion of our caseloom, new home buyer complaints. Here's a lady out in North Georgia who bought a home, had it built actually, gets into the home, doesn't, goes through the home, looks at the checklist, does everything she's supposed to do, only to learn after she occupies the home that the builder has put the upper bathroom soil pipe or wastewater pipe right next to the bedroom wall between that wall and the great room. So anyone sleeping in that bedroom obviously gets treated to some very, very horrendous crashing sounds if the facility upstairs gets used. When she goes back to the building and says, look, something's got to be done about it. He says to her, well, you could have had it wrapped. Well, that was his answer. That was his idea of good consumer response or customer response. Of course, she didn't know that the whole pipe was there. I was nowhere in the world she could have seen it.

She needed some redress. We think also this is a code violation as it turned out for some other reasons related to the placement of that pipe. Bottom line is we now are seeking legislation in Georgia that would require mandatory arbitration where allegations of code violations are on the table, Bruce. Well, there was a bill a year ago that drew strong opposition that would require builders to be licensed and would establish a clearinghouse for consumer complaints. What do you feel about that? Well, we don't oppose any efforts to assist consumers, home buyers with this kind of problem. However, that particular licensing bill that you're mentioning did not really provide for consumer redress in the instance where you had been wrong. What it did was allow the state to set up a rather expensive bureaucracy to license individuals and allow them to pull licenses if complaints could be substantiated. But it didn't provide a vehicle for redress.

We feel mandatory arbitration in those matters is much more effective because that bill does provide for redress. It says in the case where that third party expert has heard the arbitration and rules in favor of the homeowner that the builder is bound to, in fact, make good on that problem. That was my next question. Would the arbitrator's decision be binding? That's exactly right. It would, in fact, be binding, of course, as any matter, Bruce, if it was serious enough, either the homeowner or the builder could take that decision to superior court. The only thing that could be appealed there, however, is whether or not the arbitrator acted within the rules and regulations set up by our office to administer that program. Is it correct that a Georgia general contractor only needs to obtain a permit before setting up shop? That's correct. Now, most of your subcontractors, the electrical contractor, the plumbing contractor, et cetera, those folks are, in fact, licensed. The contractor really is more of a broker.

In many cases, then he or she is a builder per se. And so licensing, the contractor, really, does not, the real problem of licensing, and the other states have told us this, Fred Jones comes in and applies for a builder's license and he gets one. He commits serious violations. The state takes action, pulls his license. Next week, Nancy Jones, her wife, is in there applying for a license, or Fred Jones, his son is in there applying. Bottom line is, the Constitution of the United States says it would be a violation of their rights not to give them an opportunity to an effect be a builder. It really doesn't, in our judgment, speak to the problem that I was talking about earlier where you've got a lady with a pipe coming down next to a wall where it should never been located in the first place. The chances of that lady under licensing bill getting assistance are between slim and none. Under arbitration, someone's going to have to go back in if the judgment is on the part of the arbitrator that is a code violation, somebody's going to have to go back in and move that pipe.

Okay, let's take this letter that you sent us. What are the steps that you will walk through now? Well, basically, if a person gets a complaint, you mean under the bill, under the proposed bill? Where the situation is right now. Oh, okay. Basically, at this point in time, we'll go out on this one because the law is not an effect yet. Under Georgia's Fair Business Practices Act, we'll go out and investigate this complaint to see if, in fact, a deceptive act or practice has occurred. And currently, Bruce, we take the position that if you have sold a home in the Georgia market, and it does not meet code that you have committed a violation of the Fair Business Practices Act, in that it was an implied representation that the home was habitable, that it met all elements of code. So we'll go out and evaluate this complaint right now to see if, in fact, that occurred. Then, after we have our determination of fact, we'll call it, we'll call in the bill and say, look, we've got this complaint. Here's what we think. You want to go ahead and make some sort of redress here, or see if something can be worked out, or shall we pursue this matter further through legal channels? Okay.

If there is no code violation, what happens? If there is no code violation, the only thing this lady is going to be left with is the hope that she had a home warranty purchased, that she can go back to the warrenter, and see if, in fact, they can get the builder. During the first year, the warranty companies rely on the builders to go ahead and make whatever adjustments need to be made. Sure to that, if there is no violation that we can find, the only redress left now would be for her to take this matter to say, small claims court, if it's under $5,000, and we don't know what the total would be, if it's over that, she's going to go ahead and probably bring a private action. And that's regrettable, because, you know, there ought to be a better way of doing it. We think that arbitration bill would do it. What do you feel is the mood of the legislature toward passing a bill? The bill passed the House last year. There is a strong sentiment. It got into the Senate, moved all the way to the last day of the session before a few folks that apparently had not gotten what they needed from their professional representatives. The Home Build Association representatives had, in my judgment, not done a very good job of informing some of their members.

They raised questions at the last minute, and the bill got held. There is a strong sentiment this session to go ahead and pass this legislation into law. I think just about all parties concerned in the, I'm talking now in the House and the Senate, agree something has to be done, and this is seen as the most logical course of action. Let's talk a little about your office, Mary. If you, just for the benefit of our audience, I'm not sure that everyone really knows what the governor's office of consumer affairs does. What do you do? We enforce, we administer many of Georgia's consumer protection statutes. That is to say, the main one being the Fair Business Practices Act, which regulates the conduct of consumer transactions. When you or I would buy for household personal or family use, typically will be covered as a transaction under the bill. Basically that law deals with passing off goods and services as those of another, when in fact they're not bait and switch operations, just to give examples of the kinds of things that we look into and take action on. We have one of the strongest laws in the country in this area, and you're right, it's not

well known, but we do, in fact, have teeth of that law, and we use them quite readily when we feel wrong has been done to a consumer or a group of consumers in the marketplace, where the only state in the country, Bruce, whose consumer affairs office, has cease and assist authority prior to a hearing. This bill, when it was passed a few years ago by the General Assembly, has allowed us to intervene before the proverbial horse gets out the barn door. We're able to go out to that hotel where the phony jewelry salesman has set up out of a room operating, a lot of the fly-by-night, the solar energy panel guys a few years back, who were claiming to be scientific Atlanta representatives and they weren't, we were able to issue them a C&D and stop that operation. We have aggressive enforcement, prerogatives and authority, and people to go out and look into matters like this. We also enforce many other consumer laws. Laws dealing with transient merchants, I've mentioned a little bit of it to cease and assist, there's a law in the book that deals with them.

There are amendments to the current Fair Business Practices Act to deal with the regulation of health spas in our state, which is always a topical area and something we probably want to talk about on this show later on. Many, many avenue, you just think of all the purchases that you or I make that fall under the category, household, personal or family use, to get some idea of the kinds of caseload that our 15 or 16 investigators handle on a daily basis. This year, 40 of us will handle over 120,000 citizen complaints. 30% or more Bruce will be telemarketing fraud that we've talked about on this show earlier. We do many, many things of this nature, and you're right, in some instances it's kind of a dilemma to us because we don't know how to get better known. Sometimes we're afraid if we get much better known, we won't be able to do anything but answer the phone. Right now, there's lines just burn up all the time, but we're hopeful that we'll be able to stand up. You also have the power to find people. That's exactly right. After that cease and desist order, a law that I was mentioning, I also have the right

to levy a civil penalty, again prior to a hearing. It's interesting concept. The offender of the person I'm alleging has committed the offense, has 10 days if they disagree to request a hearing. I then, by law, have 15 days to appoint a neutral hearing officer, not a member of my agency. We have a pool and later on, it'll be with us, a new agency being formed to supply hearing officers to all state regulatory agencies. But right now, we have a pool of hearing officers, there are attorneys, and they'll hear that case based on the fact. But this is a way to get around the loss of time waiting on a court docket. I can tell you, judges really like it a lot because it's helping their workload and I know consumers like it because instead of the three to four or five, six month wait, we're able to get action within a month and a half by the time the hearing is set up and get a resolution on the problem. OK, Barry W. Reed, executive director of the governor's office of consumer affairs. As always, Barry, it's been a pleasure talking to you and every time you leave here, I've learned something new.

Well, thank you, Bruce. I want to say hello to all your listeners out there and I hope they'll take advantage of our office if in fact they need to. Thanks again, Bruce. All right. You're listening to Georgia Gazette. I'm Bruce Dorton. My guess now is Gary Gwan, Gary is with the Chinese community center and is very active in the Asian community in Atlanta and here in Georgia. And we're going to talk about the Chinese New Year, Gary. Thank you very much for coming in. Thank you. I'm glad to be here. This, well, coming up, the Chinese New Year actually begins when? I'll generate the 31st. And it is the year of the bore? Yes. OK. That's correct. What is the significance of the year of a bore? Well, all these 12 zodiac animals represent some different things, but the bore is a particularly represent a prosperity. Oh, so it's anticipated to be a very prosperous year. And what are some of the celebrations we're going to see going on around Georgia?

I may mention for our audience, we have about 140,000 Asians that will be celebrating the Chinese New Year. Correct. 140,000. Yes. And it's not just Chinese. Right. Vietnamese, Korean, they all celebrate the same New Year. What is the significance of the Chinese New Year? Our New Year is obviously coming into a new year, but the Chinese New Year is a little different. Yes. Chinese New Year traditionally is not only just at the beginning of the year, but also at the beginning of the spring. And so it's basically according to the traditional Chinese concept that is the thing that started. So it's a life started, a new year started, so we all started as a very new beginning. And it's also celebrated all the accomplishments and good habits in the last year. So Chinese New Year is the most important holidays among Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese communities. Does the Chinese New Year start every year on January 31st?

No. It's a go by the Chinese lunar calendar. So it will be landed on different dates to what the calendar we are using. And it will be generally from January can always, always too much, beginning for much. So it's moved around each year. So any time between January and March, each year of the New Year can occur. Now the music that is played during the Chinese New Year, there is something special about that? Usually the music playing during the Chinese New Year are more likely the music that has a lot of celebrations and percussion music is more popular during that. So kind of Chinese trumpet, it's like a we call the sauna, and it's kind of a trumpet. We don't see any thing that equivalent here. We have some fairly large Asian communities all around the state, correct?

Yes. And it led to, was not always the largest, I believe you told me, was it Augusta? Yes, Augusta and Savannah was earlier, a lot of the Chinese after the Gold Rush is over in the western part. And they came over here for the Tenno from Augusta to Savannah and also the railroad building. Now what are some of the events that will be occurring that the general public may be able to participate in for the Chinese New Year? What are some of the things we should look for that will be happening? Well, for Chinese New Year, first of all, all these Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese communities are going to have all kinds of different celebrated activities. And as far as I know, the Chinese concert is going to be held on this Sunday at 29th, 7 o'clock at the Georgia Tech Center for the Arts. And also, there is two days celebration event in Chinese Community Center on February 4th and 5th, two consecutive days from 11 o'clock to 6 o'clock.

And you're going to have all kinds of different Chinese food there and also artistic space and all kinds of performing arts there and photos and some of the Asian games and the Dragon Dance. And in this event also, we add one new feature this year that is Chinese chess going to have an open challenge tournament there and we invite Vietnamese community participate with us. And Korean played Chinese chess too, but they go by different rules. So we basically invite the Vietnamese to participate in. And what is a Chinese New Year without a parade? Well, I don't think we can have a Chinese New Year without a parade. We're going to have a parade right in front of a Chinese Community Center. Okay, Gary Guan. And by the way, one last thing worth mentioning, there is no year attached to each Chinese New Year because, as you mentioned to me, it's a 60 year cycle, correct?

Yes, that is correct. Okay, Gary Guan with the Chinese Community Center and a leader in the Asian community here in Georgia. We thank you very much for coming in and is a proper for me to say happy New Year. Yes, all right. Here to you too. Chinese New Year starts January 31st. If you're interested in any of the activities in your community, you can contact the Chinese Community Center in your area or anyone in the Asian community. Thanks again, Gary. Thank you. And that's our program for this week, coming up next week, a conversation with Governor Zell Miller. We'll talk about his legislative agenda and his vision for the future of Georgia. Plus you'll learn some techniques you can use to help your kids better manage their money. Those stories plus herb white with sports, Alan O'Ringle with movie reviews, Kim Ternan with our Arts calendar. That's the next time on Georgia Gazette. I'm Bruce Thornton. I hope you enjoy today's program. Have a good day and a good week.

Georgia Gazette is a production of Peach State Public Radio News. The executive producer is Bruce Thornton. The series producer is Sid Hoskinson. The contributing editors are Susanna Capeluto, James R. Groves, Mike Savage, Brian Smith, Winston King, and Kim Ternan. Additional support provided by the staff of WUGA Athens and listeners like you. If you have questions or comments about this program, write to Georgia Gazette, 1540 Steward Avenue, Southwest, at Lata, Georgia, 30310. For Gazette copy of today's program, call 1-800-659-TAPE. The program number is the same as the date the program air. You can also reach us online to get our internet address just call 1-800-654-3038.