Providence

And Let’s Not Forget the Mayor’s Prior Check Incident

By Monique Chartier | September 9, 2010 |

Under my post about the new check situation involving the mayor, Tommy Cranston reminds us of the first, infamous check matter, this one also with the City of Providence triangulated in but starring both of the Cicilline brothers. the 75K check Yeah. Remind me: did that get paid back to the city? Right. Now, regardless…

Who Approved the Providence Mayor’s Unauthorized Raises?

By Monique Chartier | September 8, 2010 |

From ABC6. Providence’s Internal Auditor is telling City Council Finance Chairman John Igliozzi that Mayor Cicilline has been overpaid for the last four years. The internal memo written by James Lombardi explains that the city’s Home Rule charter caps the Mayor’s salary at $125,000 annually but that since 2006, the Mayor has been taking home…

Signature Coverage of Jon Scott, Independent Candidate for Mayor of Providence

By Carroll Andrew Morse | July 14, 2010 |

Jon Scott is running for Mayor of Providence, an office that is open in this election cycle due to current Mayor David Cicilline’s decision to run for Congress… Anchor Rising: You can make the case that the job of city mayor involves a more intense combination of the administrative aspect of governance and the pulling-people…

Management-Union Friendship and Money Seeking

By Justin Katz | March 3, 2010 |

Linda Borg’s Sunday Projo article, “In Providence, more collaboration than conflict,” weaves a tale of cooperation between the the city’s schools superintendent and its teachers’ union leadership: Call it a tale of two cities. While the superintendent and union president have been going at it in Central Falls, Brady and Smith have worked together on…

Let Them Throw Coins in the Water

By Justin Katz | January 13, 2010 |

Mike, of Assigned Reading, laments that union old-liners and their allies have taken the opportunity of hard times to smash positive education reforms: Hope High School in Providence has been a beacon in Rhode Island school reform. It was undoubtedly the worst school in the state just five or six years ago. But with RIDE…

Objectivity Isn’t Always the Best Approach

By Justin Katz | August 15, 2009 |

Like fairness, objectivity is a generally positive principle that needn’t be — shouldn’t be — the guiding principle in every circumstance. One circumstance in which a degree of subjectivity is appropriate, applied to a collection of objective criteria is the hiring of teachers, whatever their argument might currently be in Providence: The union claims that…

False Emergencies, Real Dollars

By Monique Chartier | June 12, 2009 |

Mayor Cicilline has repeatedly expressed concern for the burden of the taxpayer. I’m sure I speak for taxpayers everywhere when I say “thanks”. My question is, does his concern manifest itself anyplace other than the expired firefighters’ contract? Let’s be clear. I’m the first to ask for a fair contract between municipality and valued public…

Re: Nothing Egregious About This Picket Line

By Justin Katz | June 11, 2009 |

Without coming down on either side of the particular issue on the table (which, whatever else its effects, has helped to highlight the multiple dumbnesses of Rhode Island politics), I have to express an objection to something that Andrew wrote earlier today: … Vice-President of the United States of America is not a union job.…

Nothing Egregious About This Picket Line

By Carroll Andrew Morse | June 11, 2009 |

I guess I’m to the left of Bob Kerr on this one. I agreed with him in 2007 (and thought he wrote the best single item on the subject) when he wrote that the Providence Firefighter’s Local 799 threat to picket a statewide disaster drill, which could have shut down the drill, was wrong. I…

Campaign Contributions: Bready to Cicilline

By Monique Chartier | May 12, 2009 |

Under Marc’s post concerning the lawsuit filed by former Providence Tax Collector Robert Ceprano against Mayor David Cicilline et al, commenter Damien Baldino observes I don’t know if Richard Bready is a generous contributor to the City, but he is a generous contributor to Mayor Cicilline. Indeed. Richard and Cheryl Bready have made the following…