The editorial in this week’s Cranston Herald captures the mood of residents in many towns, regarding the direction that state-level governance is heading…

The state’s 13 percent hike in spending (yes, you read that right) doesn’t offer a dime to municipalities, school districts or, for the most part, social programs designed to keep people from crashing and burning.
Cranston trimmed expenses but still had to raise taxes. Next year, there will be fewer cuts to make and more resistance to raising taxes, especially since many homeowners are still trying to cope with the tax hike of two years ago, set against dramatically lower property values and, in many cases, household income….
If the state pleaded poverty after it slashed its own budget, that would be one thing. But telling communities to cut, cut, cut and then increasing its own budget by 13 percent is absurd and borderline obscene. Carcieri’s original budget proposal stunk but, somehow, the General Assembly managed to make it even worse.
Nice job, guys.
And given the spectacular job they did of doing nothing to address the current crisis, we can expect they will do the same marvelous job preparing for next year, when the stimulus money used to keep the budget hovering in the black will be long gone. At that point, with nothing outside the state jurisdiction left to cut, chances are we’ll all be handed a boost in our income and sales taxes.