---
type: "Bill"
title: "Guardian and Ward; county conservators; provide"
description: "A BILL to be entitled an Act to amend Title 29 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to guardian and ward, so as to provide for county conservators generally; to provide for respective rights and responsibilities of county conservators and county guardians; to provide that county administrators shall serve as ex officio county conservators; to make conforming changes; to revise and provide for definitions; to provide for the change of designation of county guardian to county conservator by operation of law under certain circumstances and subject to an exception; to provide for related matters; to provide for an effective date; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes."
jurisdiction: "us/states/ga"
legislature: "Georgia General Assembly"
session: "2025_26"
identifier: "SB 98"
citation: "Georgia SB 98 (2025_26)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: ["GUARDIAN AND WARD"]
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Ben Watson", "Bill Cowsert", "Brian Strickland", "Frank Ginn", "Kay Kirkpatrick"]
version_count: 4
action_count: 15
vote_count: 2
first_action: "2025-02-05"
last_action: "2025-07-01"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/60d6f4d7-f4e8-4663-9543-953f5056f7e5"
source_url: "http://webservices.legis.ga.gov/GGAServices/Legislation/Service.svc?wsdl"
source_hash: "d2669a76f6b2d13af0daf147399b19fb7967c53764cc94ab89d53a8eb080c9df"
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 SB 98 (2025_26) — Guardian and Ward; county conservators; provide

A BILL to be entitled an Act to amend Title 29 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to guardian and ward, so as to provide for county conservators generally; to provide for respective rights and responsibilities of county conservators and county guardians; to provide that county administrators shall serve as ex officio county conservators; to make conforming changes; to revise and provide for definitions; to provide for the change of designation of county guardian to county conservator by operation of law under certain circumstances and subject to an exception; to provide for related matters; to provide for an effective date; 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. **As Passed Senate** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20252026/233245.pdf)
2. **As introduced LC 49 2134** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20252026/231359.pdf)
3. **Committee sub LC 57 0226S** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20252026/232599.pdf)
4. **SB 98/AP*** (committee substitute) — [source](http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/20252026/237028.pdf)

## Votes

- Senate Vote #70 - 2025-2026 Regular Session — **50–0** (pass) · upper
- House Vote #298 - 2025-2026 Regular Session — **162–0** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- Ben Watson — primary (person)
- Bill Cowsert — primary (person)
- Brian Strickland — primary (person)
- Frank Ginn — primary (person)
- Kay Kirkpatrick — primary (person)

## Timeline

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

- **2025-02-05** Senate Hopper `introduction`
- **2025-02-06** Senate Read and Referred `referral-committee`
- **2025-02-18** Senate Committee Favorably Reported By Substitute `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2025-02-19** Senate Read Second Time `reading-2`
- **2025-02-20** Senate Third Read `reading-3`
- **2025-02-20** Senate Passed/Adopted By Substitute `passage`
- **2025-02-21** House First Readers `reading-1`
- **2025-02-24** House Second Readers `reading-2`
- **2025-03-13** House Committee Favorably Reported `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2025-03-21** House Third Readers `reading-3`
- **2025-03-21** House Passed/Adopted `passage`
- **2025-04-07** Senate Sent to Governor `executive-receipt`
- **2025-05-14** Senate Date Signed by Governor `executive-signature`
- **2025-05-14** Act 283 `executive-signature`
- **2025-07-01** Effective Date

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/60d6f4d7-f4e8-4663-9543-953f5056f7e5`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Georgia legislature records).