The bill, which is sponsored by conservative Democrat Jared Nunes, creates a special board with the power to privatize any transportation project, allowing private corporations to levy unrestricted tolls on Rhode Island road users. Under the proposal, private corporations could approach the privatization board, and the board could approve privatization with tolls without any required legislative approval. (The bill does provide for entirely optional legislative review.) The language in the legislation is extremely broad, allowing a wide array of potential tolling schemes, including tolls on passenger cars.
As part of the Republican Policy Group’s campaign against RhodeWorks, Morgan and Reilly supported an alternate proposal without tolls. Controversially, their plan did not specify where all the money would come from. At the heart of their proposal was redirecting DMV revenue, money that has already been spoken for in the state budget. (This redirecting revenue tactic is not unique to the GOP. During her campaign, Gina Raimondo proposed paying for school construction by redirecting sales tax revenue that was already being used in the budget.) Despite this, the Republican Policy Group’s anti-toll plan became a major initiative of Morgan, Reilly, and other Republican representatives.
Privatizing roads and bridges to let private corporations charge tolls is a popular policy idea among Republicans across the country. In Indiana, for instance, Republican Governor Mitch Daniels successfully championed a plan to sell off the right to toll Interstate 90 to a foreign corporation, saying, “You’re either for this bill, or you’re against our future.” (Later, the plan went bankrupt.)
]]>Portsmouth Rep. Dan Reilly’s parents, who are the biggest income tax evaders in the state, are not claiming to the state Supreme Court that they don’t owe $1.3 million in back taxes, they are simply arguing that the state didn’t ask for it soon enough and thus kicks in the statute of limitations. Talk about being embarrassed by your parents!
RINP estimated there were about 1,000 people at the rally for the Woonsocket cross. Mayor Leo Fontaine guessed there were 1,500 people. John DePetro, who never met a fact he couldn’t bend to suit his own purposes, said there were 2,000 people there. Either way, the establishment clause of the Constitution is not a popularity contest.
And speaking of organized religion … Rhode Island is no longer the most Catholic state. That dubious distinction now belongs to Massachusetts.
Here’s a list of ALEC’s top 5 anti-environment pieces of model legislation.
Is the sailor kissing a woman at the end of World War II in the famous Life magazine picture a Rhode Islander?
Turns out Mitt Romney didn’t want his foreign policy communications guy to talk. Why? Because he’s gay.
Politifact: it’s true that URI has the second lowest paid public college professors in the region.
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