Johnston
The inaccuracy of Steve Ahlquist’s tweet is worth noting, but it should be a springboard, not a stopping point: 86% of Johnston voters voted to approve a $215 million proposal to finance the largest modernization of education facilities in Johnston’s history. The results table he appends does indeed show that 1,100 people voted to approve…
Providence Journal reporter Mark Reynolds dipped into the pension situation in Johnston, on Sunday, focusing on this case: Fire Lt. William R. Jasparro was 41 when he ended his 20-year career as a Johnston firefighter in 1990. Jasparro’s retirement package paid him about $18,255 per year [with cost of living adjustments] — based on half…
Out of necessity (ya think?) they’re reforming pensions in Johnston. Stephen Beale reports on why: One of the biggest problems is with disability pensions. Out of 71 retired firefighters, 34 of them are on a disability pension, earning two thirds of their salary tax free. During the tenure of former Fire Chief Victor Cipriano, 15…
I actually agree with former Johnston Policewoman Michele Capelli’s lawyer that the town has no right to demand that she repay a disability pension excess that was given to her erroneously — much less simply remove it from her bank account — unless there was some criminal activity involved in giving her the money in…
It would be the work of a lifetime of academic study to unravel the thread, but I’ve been increasingly impressed (in a bad way) with the intricacies of Rhode Island’s structural corruption. It’s as if certain principles of the culture filter throughout local society to create an organic network whose instinctual task is to create…
Has the Johnston teachers union sold its junior members out? A cursory reading of Mark Reynolds’ 7-to-7 item in yesterday’s Projo could lead one to believe that the union has secured raises for it’s higher-paid members, but nothing for the lower tiers…Teachers at the 10th step will receive a 1.75 percent raise during the upcoming…
It appears that the most recent of the their multiple weeks off during the school year mellowed Johnston science teachers with regard to the new program that had recently been announced as foiled: During their winter break, local science teachers changed their minds and decided to participate in a project to improve science education across…
How much of life is phrasing? When it comes to the political battle with unions, the spats are like Abbot and Costello skits, which (for the young’ns) often hinged on a semantic misunderstanding. One must read to paragraph six to reach the punchline under the headline “Teachers deny killing science initiative” (emphasis added): The union…
