---
type: "Bill"
title: "Ben Hill County; Magistrate Court chief judge; provide nonpartisan elections"
description: "A BILL to be entitled an Act to provide that future elections for the office of chief judge of the Magistrate Court of Ben Hill County shall be nonpartisan elections; to provide for the sitting chief judge of the magistrate court to serve out his or her term of office; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes."
jurisdiction: "us/states/ga"
legislature: "Georgia General Assembly"
session: "2019_20"
identifier: "HB 571"
citation: "Georgia HB 571 (2019_20)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Clay Pirkle"]
version_count: 3
action_count: 13
vote_count: 1
first_action: "2019-03-05"
last_action: "2019-04-30"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/9702952d-3f93-44c7-b3f2-f876305a23f0"
source_url: "http://webservices.legis.ga.gov/GGAServices/Legislation/Service.svc?wsdl"
source_hash: "e9f2477e393ebc5b7c49706fd933f37bfcec2263ecb78d2f439b018efd29c341"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-ga"]
---

# Georgia HB 571 (2019_20) — Ben Hill County; Magistrate Court chief judge; provide nonpartisan elections

A BILL to be entitled an Act to provide that future elections for the office of chief judge of the Magistrate Court of Ben Hill County shall be nonpartisan elections; to provide for the sitting chief judge of the magistrate court to serve out his or her term of office; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **HB 571/AP*** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20192020/186301.pdf)
2. **LC 47 0093/a** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20192020/183738.pdf)
3. **Local Ad** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20192020/183765.pdf)

## Votes

- PASSAGE — **106–60** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- Clay Pirkle — primary (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2019-03-05** House Hopper
- **2019-03-07** House First Readers `reading-1`
- **2019-03-08** House Second Readers `reading-2`
- **2019-03-14** House Committee Favorably Reported `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2019-03-18** House Third Readers `reading-3`
- **2019-03-18** House Passed/Adopted `passage`
- **2019-03-21** Senate Read and Referred `referral-committee`
- **2019-03-26** Senate Committee Favorably Reported `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2019-03-26** Senate Passed/Adopted `passage`
- **2019-04-08** House Sent to Governor `executive-receipt`
- **2019-04-30** House Date Signed by Governor `executive-signature`
- **2019-04-30** Act 121 `executive-signature`
- **2019-04-30** Effective Date

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/9702952d-3f93-44c7-b3f2-f876305a23f0`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Georgia legislature records).