HB1407: HB1407 Civil Practice Act; scheduling of civil trials; provide

Georgia law currently lets courts place civil cases on a trial calendar with fairly loose rules. This bill rewrites O.C.G.A. section 9-11-40 to add detailed scheduling procedures for jury trials in civil cases other than divorce and domestic relations cases. It requires trial calendars to be filed electronically at least 120 days before trial, limits each calendar to three weeks and 30 actions, and sets deadlines for pretrial conferences, pretrial orders, and stipulations of continuance. It also requires the parties to file a joint report on witness locations, case complexity, trial length, and settlement likelihood, and directs judges to set the order cases are called for trial based on where parties, attorneys, and witnesses live. Cases involving people or witnesses far from the courthouse get specially scheduled. Attorneys with multiple cases on overlapping calendars have all but their top-priority case automatically continued. The bill also keeps existing rules on divorce trial timing tied to service by publication.

• Rewrites Georgia's civil trial scheduling law (O.C.G.A. section 9-11-40) to add detailed rules for trial calendars in most civil jury cases.
• Caps each trial calendar at three weeks in length and no more than 30 actions, and requires calendars be filed electronically at least 120 days before trial.
• Requires parties to file a joint report on witness locations, case complexity, expected trial length, and settlement chances within 14 days of receiving the trial calendar.
• Directs judges to set the order cases will be tried based on where parties, attorneys, and witnesses live, and requires special scheduling for cases involving people far from the courthouse.
• Automatically continues an attorney's lower-priority cases to the next available trial calendar if they have multiple cases scheduled too close together.
• Requires courts to notify attorneys and unrepresented parties by email or mail every two weeks about any cases removed from the trial calendar.

Civil litigants and their attorneys in Georgia's state courts, judges who manage trial calendars, court clerks handling electronic filing, and self-represented (pro se) parties who would receive calendar notices by email or mail.

The bill would change how quickly and predictably civil cases move to trial by setting firm deadlines, calendar size limits, and a required order for calling cases to trial, which could affect how long people wait for their day in court and how attorneys juggle multiple cases.

• Subsection (a) keeps the rule that civil cases are triable after defensive pleadings are due, but adds that most cases can only be calendared after all dispositive motions are resolved or the deadline to file them has passed.
• Subsection (d) limits trial calendars to three weeks and 30 actions, requires electronic filing and service at least 120 days before trial, and sets a 14-day pretrial conference deadline if requested.
• Subsection (d)(4) automatically continues a case if the judge has not ruled on all pretrial motions by the pretrial conference.
• Subsection (e)(1) requires parties to file a joint report within 14 days of the trial calendar on witness residency, case complexity, trial length estimate, and settlement likelihood.
• Subsection (e)(2) requires the judge to issue an updated calendar within 30 days setting the trial order, with different rules for local versus out-of-area parties and witnesses.
• Subsection (e)(4) and (e)(5) automatically continue an attorney's non-priority cases when that attorney has multiple actions on the same or overlapping trial calendars.
• Section 2 repeals any conflicting laws.

1. 2026-02-25House Second Readers (House)
2. 2026-02-24House First Readers (House)
3. 2026-02-20House Hopper (House)

• Rob Leverett (R, HD-123)Primary sponsor
• Joseph Gullett (R, HD-019)
• Matt Reeves (R, HD-099)
• Stan Gunter (R, HD-008)

• civil courts
• trial scheduling
• court procedure
• Civil Practice Act