Samuel Bell
How progressive activists defeated RI’s Democratic machine
There are those who want to give credit for what we accomplished in the September primary to some vague anti-incumbent sentiment, or even tolls. I’m writing this piece to dispel that notion. Progressives won big on Tuesday for two reasons: hard work and Rhode Islanders’ commitment to progressive change. This victory truly belongs to the […]
RI’s household debt exploded in 2015
When we talk about the Rhode Island economy, we tend to focus mostly on what’s going on in the public sector and the corporate sector. It’s easy to forget about ordinary households. But individual consumers form the heart of our economy. We are the ones who power growth, and when numbers move in the behemoth […]
Weak GOP turnout more evidence RI moving left
Bernie Sanders’s surprise double-digit win was undeniably the big story of the night, but progressives can find even more good news from the turnout numbers. At 121,923, total Democratic turnout was a whopping 98.6 percent higher than the GOP’s 61,394. To put this in perspective, Obama only won 77.9 percent more votes than Romney. To […]
Democratic Providence School Board chair endorses Republican for president
Providence Democratic School Board Chair Nicholas Hemond announced his endorsement of Republican Ohio Governor John Kasich, writing, “John Kasich should be president of the United States.” In an email, Hemond elaborated, saying, “I just appreciate the guy’s measured tone in a race that has been such a circus.”
‘Anti-toll’ Republicans sign onto huge pro-toll bill
Republican Reps Patricia Morgan and Dan Reilly have been making a major push to stop the truck tolls in the RhodeWorks proposal, yet have signed onto a bill that would drastically expand tolls in Rhode Island.
PolitiFactRI Asks Developers to Fact Check Developers
PolitiFactRI has a history of sloppy reporting and conservative bias that has generated national attention. But a piece on whether developers deserve huge cash handouts broke new ground.
Alert: Key hearing on Custom House tax breaks Thursday
This Thursday at 6pm, the Finance Committee of the Providence City Council is meeting to consider a generous tax break proposed for the Custom House downtown office building. Currently, the Custom House is downtown office space, and the developers want to convert the upper floors to apartments. And they want public money to do it. […]
Private sector debt dynamics don’t explain RI economic slide
The central contention of the real Democratic movement in Rhode Island is probably this: Since the right-wing Democrats rose to power under Bill Murphy in 2003, their bad economic policies have driven our economy into the ground. But one niggling alternate possibly has always bothered me. It’s boring and wonkish. It’s also easily checked by […]
Repealing car tax changes would cost $15.15 million, not $20.5 million
When Mayor Angel Taveras and Council President Michael Solomon hiked car taxes to balance the Providence budget a few years ago, they did not just hike car taxes on working families. They also cut taxes for cars worth more than about $24,000. Before the hike, the car tax had a $6000 exemption and a rate […]
RI’s tax cuts for the rich were 2nd biggest of decade
Kansas’s tax cuts for the rich were one of the biggest state policy stories of 2014. Sam Brownback, an ambitious conservative Republican, swept into the Governor’s office in 2010 and pushed for massive tax cuts for the rich. And he got them. By 2014, the top marginal income tax rate had fallen by 1.65 points, […]
Hearing tonight on extending Providence tax breaks
Property taxes are very high in Providence. Each year, homeowners must pay 1.925% of the value of their homes to the city. At 3.375%, the rate on apartments is even higher, and at 3.675%, the rate on commercial property is higher still. But when the wealthiest developers build big projects, the story tends to go a […]
The time was now for marijuana reform
There is little doubt that that Rhode Island will one day regulate marijuana like alcohol. The political winds are just too strong. The nation supports it. And we are a solid blue state. Even among the few Republicans, Ron Paul scored better here than he did in all but two other primaries. The real question […]
The 5 worst things in the House budget
The Rhode Island House of Representatives has put together a new budget, and there is a lot not to like. Here are my top five: 5. Slashing the corporate income tax from 9% to 7%. New House Speaker Mattiello, a very conservative Democrat from Cranston, has been championing this idea ever since he rose […]
How will Raimondo pay for her $60 million cut?
Gina Raimondo’s recent policy proposal on infrastructure raises a lot of math questions, but here’s one of the most glaring: How is she going to pay for the $60 million she wants to spend each year on school construction? She really doesn’t say. She tells us she’ll simply find the money by “taking just half of […]
RI lawmakers propose sequester to replace Sakonnet tolls
There’s a new plan out to replace the Sakonnet River Bridge Tolls. For the next six years, discretionary spending will be slashed in every department by 0.25%, until the total cut is 1.5%. Funneled into a transportation infrastructure trust fund, those dollars will hopefully eliminate the need for tolls on the Sakonnet River Bridge. If […]
How Chafee just saved our economy from a $124 million hit
On Monday, Lincoln Chafee did something incredibly important for our state’s economy. Following Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania, he stopped severe cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), a program that provides food assistance to families at risk for hunger. Passed in the most recent farm bill, these cuts were vigorously opposed by each […]
Elizabeth Warren slams pension cuts, hedge fund investments
In a recent interview on New England Cable News, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) was asked about Illinois’s pension cuts, which were much milder than Rhode Island’s more draconian version.* (The key bit starts at 11:35.) She did not mince her words. Calling pensions “a promise,” Senator Warren made it clear how she felt about breaking that […]
Whitehouse, Reed vote no on food stamp cuts in farm bill
Senators Sheldon Whitehouse and Jack Reed were two of the nine Democrats who voted no on the latest version of the farm bill, which slashes food stamps by $8 billion over the next 10 years. When the original Senate farm bill (which would have cut nutrition programs by $4 billion) passed, our Senators were the […]
WATCH: David Cicilline Gives an Awesome Speech
America faces a hunger crisis. Every day, more and more Americans go to bed hungry. Yet Democrats in Congress have reached a deal with the Republicans to cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as SNAP or food stamps, by $8 billion over the next decade. Fortunately, Rhode Island has a Congressman who fights […]
Department of Revenue website links to corporate lobby group
Here’s a revealing nugget about how conservatives win the policy debates in our state: If you spend a lot of time trying to understand the Dickensian world of city and town budgets, like I do, you’re going to wind up spending a lot of time on the Department of Revenue’s municipal finance website. They provide […]
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