Progress Report: Economic Development Void in RI; GOP Fans Father-Daughter Dance Flames; James Diossa

It seems RI Future and RIPEC agree on at least one thing. “Rhode Island does not have a clear vision of how to expand its economy or a governmental structure that helps create jobs, encourage companies to expand, attract businesses and develop workers’ skills,” reports the Providence Journal about RIPEC’s report on the EDC this morning. We may not agree what to do about it, though. We think the state should invest more heavily into this sector.

The Cranston School Committee last night agreed to petition the state legislature to lift the state ban on father daughter dances. The reality is few people are actually worked up about this and the name isn’t a longstanding tradition in Cranston. It’s just about local Republicans trying to drum up animosity using the ACLU as their boogieman.

Good luck to Central Falls City Councilor James Diossa, who launches his campaign for mayor today.

Here’s Gina Raimondo on NPR’s Talk of the Nation yesterday talking about Rhode Island’s early effort to reform public sector pension benefits.

URI professors, who are teaching without a contract right now, are among the lowest paid college professors in the region, according to the ProJo this morning … yet political pressure from the Chafee Administration prevented them from getting an already-agreed upon pay raise. Stay tuned.

Here’s why Romney is losing.

Hilarious Saturday Night Live skit on some of the questions undecided voters are still asking.

On this day in 1957: “Under escort from the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division, nine black students enter all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.”

And on this day in 1690, the first newspaper was published in the new world. It was called Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick.