Rhode Island Politics
When a new audit confirmed last month that David Cicilline had depleted Providence’s reserve fund, he defended the action, saying We had to make some difficult choices, people can disagree with those to accomplish a balanced budget, I believe those were the right choices in terms of protecting services and balancing all the equities. Then-Mayor…
Ted Nesi notes the similarity between the Central Falls and Providence deficits: [Central Falls’] budget shortfall was also pegged at about 17% when it filed for receivership during its 2009-10 fiscal year. But because of its small size, the actual amount of Central Falls’ deficit was only $3 million – a rounding error compared with…
Copied below is an excellent analysis compiled by John (under this post). To it, I would append one item – an additional culpable party: decades of elected officials who possessed the power to implement realistic benefits for tens of thousands of public employees and chose, instead, to further their own selfish political ends by making…
Normally, it would have been big enough news that the magnitude of Rhode Island’s unfunded pension liability is such that it made PBS’s NewsHour (tonight, best I can tell). This has been completely dwarfed, however, by some remarkable statements made during the program by Rhode Island’s General Treasurer. [NewsHour Economics Correspondent] PAUL SOLMAN: So, what’s…
Yay, according to Secretary of State Ralph Mollis, the Generally Assembly abided by the open meetings law–which they don’t think applies to them–abut 90% of the time. Political cover: check. Of course, as the ProJo reports and RI Common Cause’s John Marion emphasizes, that’s like saying you spent more days in first place even if…
From the AP via Turn to Ten. Rhode Island’s U.S. senators are asking that part of the $2.5 billion in funding for Florida’s high-speed rail projects be redirected to their state after Florida’s governor turned down the money earlier this week. See, there was a reason Florida turned down that money, a reason that the…
For the most part, I agree with Ed Achorn’s sentiment about Rhode Island: It’s not too late. Rhode Island can defuse the pension time bomb, perhaps the way businesses have had to, even though few workers were happy about it — by moving public employees into 401(k)-style plans. The state can move toward competitive taxes…
I noted that Warwick Mayor Avedisian was offering up a pragmatic, if typical, pension reform plan in that it dealt with reforms for future pensions. Avedisian took to the pages of the Providence Journal to explain his plan, but, as Ted Nesi notes, Avedisian tries to get away with shoving the past pension problems aside.…
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…
“Former majority leader now a lobbyist” blares the ProJo Political Scene headline. Meh says us. What else is new, right? Little more than a month after leaving the General Assembly, former Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors is back at the State House as a lobbyist. Asked what he was doing as he exited the office…