Quick Read
Amidst all the other happenings in Rhode Islanders’ lives, it’s worth a moment to consider that we’ve reached the point that the General Assembly is delving into such levels of micromanagement as housing setbacks and in-law apartments in local zoning. That’s a sign that we’re doing things wrong. In the mania of the day (or…
Considering how frequently I criticize professional journalists, I may too infrequently convey how powerful I think their role can (and should) be. A recent Johnson Sunrise article by Rory Schuler, about the resignation/retirement of Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) Executive Directo Joseph Reposa, is an excellent example of what we’re losing. Without making a gooey…
News that the Rhode Island Republican Party is struggling to hit the qualification requirements to place any presidential candidates on the primary ballot points to a deep problem in our state’s political landscape. This is true even if we put to the side (for now) rumors that some large number of signatures were inexplicably invalidated.…
The featured image is by RIDOT of a broken steel rod on the Washington Bridge Westbound, one of the critically failed components that caused the sudden closure of Interstate 195 west on December 11. How these components went critical between July, its most recent inspection (link to report) until December 8, when they were purportedly…
Honestly, I expected the COVID experience to put an end to the high-school-civics-project of banning single-use plastic bags, but stores’ bag dispensers now sit empty, and Rhode Islanders have another reason to lean toward shopping in Massachusetts or online. In Rhode Island, our legislators have a chronic difficulty understanding consequences and the availability of alternatives. …
So much of Rhode Island’s predicament can be explained by incentives. People who rely on government for their prosperity, for instance, have a great deal of incentive to manipulate the processes thereof, whereas our community lacks institutions with incentive to counterbalance them politically. Something similar and related — though much broader on a social scale…
This has been lingering around my to-do list for a while, but the problem is only getting worse, so for the foreseeable future, it’s an evergreen topic in Rhode Island: Yes, this is a massive problem permeating all of our society, and there’s only so much a small state like Rhode Island can do about…
You may remember that truck-only tolls were passed with dire statements about the condition of Rhode Island bridges. “People will die if we don’t get this new revenue stream to repair Rhode Island’s poor bridges” was repeatedly stated or heavily implied during the debate about and passage of the proposed new, legally quizzical, unnecessary toll…
Nobody on your political bench can do much better than what you’re seeing now. Democracy has produced the government you actually wanted for so long that the bill is coming due. I wrote about the “Four Horsemen of Rhode Island’s Apocalypse” 15 years ago, and the situation’s only gotten worse as people not in the…
People just don’t want to find ways to live together, do they? (We should try objective government.)
Silly and local as it is, this is one of those stories that makes me despair for the future: A few years ago, some folks petitioned for Tiverton to give some land next to the library to a group that wanted to put together a dog park. People using it are supposed to park across…
