Common Cause | Rhode Island

Common Cause calls for pause to redistricting process

2011-12-13T13:13:00.000-08:00

Common Cause Rhode Island issued the following statement regarding the redistricting process in Rhode Island:

Common Cause Rhode Island expresses deep disappointment about the drawing of the proposed maps for Rhode Island’s congressional districts. The proposed maps, designated as “Plan E,” move over 100,000 people according to media reports, when the legal requirement to reapportion required a shift of approximately 7200 people. We believe the redistricting commission has not done due diligence in preparing these plans, using incomplete information to justify their decisions. Common Cause believes the commission should halt the process and wait until all of the necessary information is available before proceeding.

In 2010 Common Cause introduced legislation that would have prohibited the redistricting commission from considering the home address of incumbent politicians in the production of plans. In the first hearings of the commission in 2011 we asked that they not protect incumbents in this process. Both efforts were met with silence. We believe that no districts should be drawn to protect an incumbent politician, or advantage a particular candidate, whoever they may be.

While the commission’s consultant has publicly stated his intent to maximize minority representation with the current plans, including those for the General Assembly, we believe there is no way to assess that claim at this point. The redistricting commission has yet to receive any information about the turnout or voting behavior of the minority communities in Rhode Island, information that is necessary to determine whether districts viably meet the majority minority designation. According to a report by WPRI’s Ted Nesi, Congressman David Cicilline’s campaign had access to such information. The commission’s failure to receive this information is a result of Rhode Island being the only state in the nation to not fully participate in Phase II of the Census redistricting program.

Because of the lack of necessary information we believe this process should not move forward at this time.

My draft congressional plans

2011-12-06T07:05:00.001-08:00

At the Monday, December 5th hearing of the Reapportionment Commission I, John Marion, promised to put my draft maps for CD 1 and CD 2 on this website. Please scroll down and read the entry titled "Redrawing Rhode Island" for my maps and explanation. Note, these maps drawn by John Marion and are not endorsed by Common Cause or Common Cause Rhode Island.

Draft Congressional maps for Rhode Island

2011-12-01T06:54:00.000-08:00

On Monday, November 28th, three draft plans for redrawing Rhode Island's congressional districts were publicly released at a meeting of the state's reapportionment commission. Unfortunately those maps are not yet available online. Although certainly not an optimal solution, I'm posting the drafts, with brief explanations, here.

First up are the existing districts. This plan puts 19 cities and towns in each of our two districts and splits Providence roughly in half.

The first draft plan, labeled "Plan A"makes some drastic alterations to the current districts. It shifts Burrillville, Portsmouth, Middletown, Newport, Little Compton and Tiverton to CD2 from CD1. To balance population CD1 would receive seemingly all of Providence.

Draft "Plan B" takes a different approach. In addition to Burrillville, North Smithfield, Cumberland, Woonsocket, Lincoln, and Jamestown are added to CD2. Johnston, in turn, is moved to CD1 and seemingly so is the balance of Providence.

Finally there is "Plan C." This version moves Burrillville to CD2 and makes some changes to Providence.

We were assured that high resolution versions that will allow closer examination of these plans will be made publicly available soon. Let's hope.

Private caucuses no substitute for public deliberation

2011-11-07T06:15:00.001-08:00

The Democratic members of the Senate caucused last weed at a private restaurant to discuss the pension reform bill being considered during the special legislative session. Setting aside for a minute the fact that campaign money was probably used to pay for meals, instead of actual campaigning, this type of secret deliberation is troubling. And with the House Democrats poised to caucus today (Monday, November 7th) the question needs to be ask, is this a transparent process?

Common Cause has consistently been asking for public release of any amendments to Rhode Island Retirement Security Act of 2011. General Treasurer Gina Raimondo has said that there will be 37 proposed changes coming from her office, including one that is a result of a serious error. The General Assembly leadership has been silent on the question of whether the amendments will be released publicly. Our elected leaders will be voting soon on amendments that the public has no chance to see in advance, and that may only have been discussed at private party caucuses.

Redrawing Rhode Island

2011-11-01T09:54:00.000-07:00

Recently I had a chance to try my hand at redistricting Rhode Island. I made an appointment with Election Data Services and was invited to room B-5 to take a crack at drawing some lines using the same software being used by the official Reapportionment Commission. To make things easy I first tried my hand at creating two congressional districts. Because of shifts in the population in Rhode Island, a little over 7,000 people need to be moved from CD2 to CD1. Dividing a pie in half would be easy, right? Wrong.

Recently Rhode Island's members of Congress sent a joint letter to our commission requesting that, much as it does now, all communities be kept intact with the exception of Providence. My first map (diagram to your right) tried this. Although it's hard to tell, I moved the line between CD1 and CD2 within the City of Providence, but kept historic neighborhood boundaries in place. This map got me within a 100 person difference, or 0.01 percent, between the two districts. Courts have consistently said that congressional districts must be within 1% of each other so as not to violate the principle of one person, one vote.

Is that the only way to divide the pie in half? Certainly not. My second attempt started with the idea that Burrillville should be moved from CD1 to CD2. Why? well mistakenly I thought Burrillville was not considered part of the Blackstone Valley, and had more in common with Gloucester and Foster than Smithfield and Pawtucket. Of course I later discovered that both Burrillville and Glocester are considered part of the Blackstone Valley.

Nonetheless, operating under my false assumption, I moved Burrillville over to CD2 and took more of Providence for CD1. The result was a districts that is a more visually appealing split of the state. And again, I was able to keep the population difference between the two districts within several hundred, thus satisfying the 1% standard, and able to keep Providence neighborhoods intact. Of course visual appearance is just one of many, many criteria that can be applied to the creation of legislative districts.

The simple exercise of dividing Rhode Island into two equal parts illustrates the difficulty of this process, and the need for contextual information. Creating 75 House districts and 38 Senate districts is more difficult by an order of magnitude than this simple illustration. Factor in matters of race, ethnicity, partisan competition, geographical compactness and contiguity, and the process gets more and more difficult.

Common Cause urges the public to get involved in the process by submitting your own maps. You can do as I did and use the official software to draw some lines, or take a first shot at it by using a free online tool called Dave's Redistricting Software. The official software allows you to draw districts using the exact data used by the commission, down to the very small Census block tract. Dave's Redistricting Software uses the Census block group data which is an aggregation of Census block tracts. Nonetheless it is a great way to start without having to leave your house.

If you have any questions or concerns, please give us a call at Common Cause Rhode Island at 401-861-2322, or drop us a note at contact@commoncauseri.org and we'll be happy to help you. Happy redistricting!

Common Cause seeks greater transparency during pension deliberations

2011-10-20T07:43:00.000-07:00

On September 30th Common Cause Rhode Island sent a letter to every member of the General Assembly requesting greater transparency and accessibility during this fall's pension reform session. On Tuesday, October 18th we saw the results of that when the House and Senate reconvened to introduce the Retirement Security Act of 2011. Both chambers of the Assembly are operating under rules applicable for only special sessions (House rule 40 and Senate rule 10.7) which skirt the normal processes for public notice.

The House of Representatives did pass H 6322 which provides a seven day waiting period between any vote in the House Finance Committee and consideration of the bill on the House floor. It also requires members of the House to submit any amendments 48 hours in advance of the scheduled consideration of the bill by the entire House. The Senate, however, has not even provided for this minimum level of transparency.

We are pleased about the creation of a new website, www.pensionreformri.com, and hope that the ability for the public to comment through that portal is used in a meaningful way.

Common Cause sent letters to the House and Senate leaders requesting further steps to make sure public participation is meaningful by moving hearings on the bill to a more accessible location. We also asked for any amendments to the bill to be made public in advance of their consideration. There is still time to make this process more transparent and accessible to the tens of thousands of Rhode Islanders directly affected, and the hundreds of thousands of Rhode Islanders interested in the process.

41st Common Cause Annual Meeting--The Future of Reform in Rhode Island

2011-09-14T06:11:00.000-07:00

You are invited to the 41st Common Cause Annual Meeting on October 5th, 2011.

We are please to present a discussion about . . .

In addition, we will be presenting the Excellence in Public Service award to;
Robert C. Corrente, former U.S. Attorney
Beverly Clay, former V.P. Operation Clean Government

For information about tickets, please call 861-2322 or email contact@commoncauseri.org

We hope you can join us on October 5th!

Did you receive our newsletter?

2011-08-26T11:40:00.000-07:00

At Common Cause Rhode Island, we strive to keep you informed about the latest efforts to reform our government. Our most recent newsletter, which you can download here, reviews our hits and misses during the 2011 legislative session. It also talks about our upcoming Annual Meeting on October 5th, when we'll be discussing "The Future of Reform."

For decades we relied exclusively on newsletters to send that message. That is no longer the case. If you have received this, you are signed up to get our e-alerts. Increasingly, we rely on our Facebook page and Twitter stream. However you chose to follow us, we're glad you are listening.

If you did not receive our latest newsletter and would like us to mail one to you, please give us a call at 861-2322 or reply to this email. We'll be happy to drop one in the mail to you.

2011-06-28T06:31:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday, June 28th, Common Cause released a report looking at a decade of "Access" to the General Assembly. The report is a follow-up to the groundbreaking 1998 report by then Secretary of State James Langevin and Brown University, "Access Denied." While compliance with the Open Meetings Act by the legislature has improved, the percentage of violations that occur at the end of the session has increased dramatically. You can find the study here.

Community forum on proposed I-195 Redevelopment District Commission

2011-06-12T07:43:00.001-07:00

BetterProvidence & Common Cause RI

present

A COMMUNITY FORUM

on the

Proposed creation of the I-195 Redevelopment District Commission

MONDAY, JUNE 13

6:00 – 7:30 PM

Doors open at 5:00 pm

The Spot Underground

15 Elbow St., Providence, RI 02903

With the surprising announcement of a proposed I-195 Redevelopment District Commission, uncertainty hangs over the state-owned land in Providence’s Jewelry District. With legislation to create the commission moving through the General Assembly this forum provides an opportunity to bring public officials, and other key stakeholders together so the public can ask questions about the rapidly evolving proposal. Some key areas to be discussed include:

Does the proposed Commission best serve the public interest, including the people of the City of Providence, as well as the State of Rhode Island?
Has there been sufficient public input in the legislative process?
Is the proposed commission an effective way to ensure efficient economic development of this large State-owned land parcel in Providence -- or is it “the next secure feed bag for the well-connected,” as described by the Providence Journal editors?

Moderator: Mike Ritz, Executive Director of Leadership Rhode Island and I Heart Providence

Invitations to speak have been extended to:

· The sponsors of the legislation and General Assembly leadership

· The Mayor of Providence

· The Governor of Rhode Island

· The Rhode Island Attorney General

· The Jewelry District Association

Forum co-sponsors:

The Jewelry District Association

Greater City: Providence

American Institute of Architects Rhode Island

This event is free and open to the public.

Media coverage is invited.

Common Cause on redistricting in Rhode Island

2011-05-19T11:12:00.000-07:00

Today, May 19th, Common Cause executive director John Marion gave the following testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on S 924, a bill to create the official reapportionment commission for our state:

Reapportionment and redistricting are crucially important exercises in our democratic system of government. Reapportionment, the process of ensuring that districts are of equal population is at the heart of the principle of “one person, one vote” that we enjoy because of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14^th Amendment. Redistricting, the process of drawing political boundaries, has been the subject of mischief for the two centuries since the original gerrymander occurred in Massachusetts in 1811.

Rhode Island has one of the most partisan, and least constrained redistricting processes in the United States. This bill would just continue the same partisan and legislatively dominated process we have seen in decades past. I would like to take this opportunity to point out some of the glaring weaknesses in the bill.

The commission, as proposed, consists of 18 members; four each appointed by the Speaker and President and two each by the Minority leaders of the respective chambers. The remaining six members of the commission will come from what the bill describes as the “public,” but who are chosen by the Speaker and President respectively.

This design guarantees a partisan process with no independence. With a majority of seats (14 of 18) being chosen by leadership of the majority party, partisan redistricting cannot be prevented. And with public members being chosen by legislative leadership, without any stated process for citizens to apply for the seats, there is no measure of independence from legislative control. Under the proposed commission the real public has no confidence they are being represented in this process. Six states use independent commission where the legislature does not have control of the appointments, and the American Bar Association recommends that all states follow suit.

Additionally, while the legislation laudably proposes public hearings, no standards are set for the number or location. Given the impact of the redistricting and reapportionment processes on every citizen of Rhode Island, some minimum number and geographical dispersion should be articulated in the bill. Furthermore, public comment needs to be taken before the draft plan is created (as is specified in the proposed statute), as well as after the plans are drawn, so that the public can have maximum input. I have submitted model legislation designed by the Campaign Legal Center that deals with some of these issues regarding public access to the process.

The most important part of the legislation are the standards its sets for the redistricting process. Almost every state has a commission that must abide by stricter standards than those proposed here. The proposed legislation sets a bare minimum of standards. Other jurisdictions seek greater equality of population (2% rather than the legal maximum of 5%) for reapportioning state legislative districts. Other states add greater definition to the measures of compactness and contiguity. The use of minimum standards for reapportionment, and opaque definitions of compactness and contiguity allow for maximum flexibility in gerrymandering.

When it comes to protecting the rights of racial and ethnic minorities, this bill again falls short. 24 states give greater emphasis to providing representation for the historically underrepresented by mandating that “communities of interest” are taken into consideration. The proposed commission does not have any requirements for diversity in the membership of the commissioners.

The standards the commission abides by should be prioritized in the legislation. Without a ranking the standards relative weights cannot be given to the priorities. The commission, the public, and the courts who may eventually pass judgment on a plan do not know what to expect.

As you can see we have a lot of problems with how this is being done. We are happy to work with the sponsor and the committee to improve this bill and improve this process.

Clearer water in the Ocean State

2011-05-05T06:39:00.000-07:00

This week the Rhode Island General Assembly made a small bit of history; for the first time it began putting copies of committee votes online. OK, maybe that’s not worthy of being called a historical achievement, but it is certainly a step in the right direction. Common Cause Rhode Island, along with other government reform groups, worked with the legislative leadership to bring about this change. Along with the earlier addition of floor votes online, this brings a needed level of transparency to our lawmaking branch of government.

By any measure, the website of the General Assembly trails its peers, and the public is poorer because of it. If Justice Lewis Brandeis, who said, “sunshine is the best disinfectant,” is correct, then Rhode Island has been living in the dark ages. This change starts to peel back on the opaque legislative process to reveal how our committees work, and provide a tool for the citizens of Rhode Island to hold their elected representatives responsible.

Of course there are more changes we would like to see. For one, we would like it if the General Assembly would join the ranks of the 49 other states plus the District of Columbia who have live streaming of their legislatures online. And Common Cause Rhode Island will continue to work toward that. But it’s worth taking a timeout to appreciate what we have accomplished so far. So three cheers for some transparency in Rhode Island.

Ethics panel must have authority over legislators

2011-04-28T11:00:00.000-07:00

On April 13th, the following Op-ed by John Marion and Amy Goins appeared in the Newport Daily News.

Ethics panel must have authority over legislators

by John Marion and Amy Goins

Should members of the General Assembly, our most important elective body, be immune from the ethics laws that govern all other elected and appointed officials? According to the March 2nd Guest View column by Steven Brown of the American Civil Liberties Union, the answer is yes. Common Cause couldn’t disagree more. Not only do we believe that Mr. Brown is incorrect in asserting that the Ethics Commission is anathema to a democratic system of government, we assert that strong ethics enforcement is important to an economically vibrant state.

But first, some background is in order. In June of 2009 the Rhode Island Supreme Court held that the “speech in debate” clause of the state Constitution provides immunity from prosecution for members of the General Assembly. The Court reasoned that this immunity trumps the ethics amendment that was passed in 1986 and created a commission with jurisdiction over “all elected and appointed officials.”

In response to that ruling, Common Cause has proposed a constitutional amendment be put on the ballot to allow for a limited repeal of the “speech in debate” clause to restore the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission. A resolution to put such a repeal on the ballot passed the Rhode Island House of Representatives on a vote of 68-5 last year before dying in the Senate. This year those resolutions are sponsored by Representative Michael Marcello (D-Scituate) in the House (H 5410) and Senator Edward O’Neill (I-Lincoln) in the Senate (S 634).

The crux of the ACLU’s argument against our amendment is that the Ethics Commission as an “unelected body” should not have their jurisdiction restored because they have the power to “adopt a legally enforceable code of ethics.” This should not be a matter of concern. There are many examples where the state cedes authority to appointed officials. The entire judicial branch, thankfully, is chosen exclusively by appointment. Appointed boards and commissions that perform quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial functions exercise much of the authority of the executive branch.

In fact, the “unelected” nature of the body is exactly what makes the Commission effective. The alternative used in many other states, and in the United States Senate, is an internal ethics body; the “self-policing” model. Those models fail because of a lack of independence. It is against human nature to punish oneself.

Mr. Brown bolsters his argument by citing a letter that Governor Carcieri sent requesting that the Commission dramatically broaden the definition of a conflict of interest. What Mr. Brown fails to mention is that anyone can write a letter to the Commission asking them to make changes to the Code of Ethics. Again, a perceived weakness is actually a strength. Any citizen of Rhode Island can file a complaint, or propose a regulatory change.

This is not just an academic debate over the meaning of representative democracy. Every citizen of Rhode Island should be concerned about the lack of jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission because conflict of interest and political corruption are real threats to our economic well-being. Recent history shows that the legislature needs a vigorous ethics watchdog. In the last decade now Speaker Gordon Fox, former Senate President Joseph Montalbano, and former Senate Corporations Committee Chair John Celona, were all fined by the Ethics Commission. A robust watchdog of legislative ethics is clearly needed.

Restoring the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission over state legislators will also help to counteract Rhode Island’s image as a haven for corruption and lead to a stronger economy. Political corruption results in significant economic costs to states. In states where corruption is rampant, businesses face pressure to bribe public officials, and an uncertain business climate prevails. . Because of the higher cost of doing business, firms are discouraged from operating in corrupt states. Corruption is directly correlated to negative job growth. Restoring the Ethics Commission’s oversight of state legislators is not only good public policy, but also good for our economy.

While a dizzying number of initiative are being considered at the State House, we hope those doing the peoples’ business don’t forget this important issue. Until the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission is restored the General Assembly operates without a needed mechanism for accountability.

Common Cause and Operation Clean Government call on Governor Chafee to reconsider Ethics Commission Appointment

2011-04-15T07:26:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, April 14th, Common Cause and Operation Clean Government called on Governor Chafee to reconsider his recent appointment of a police chief to the Rhode Island Ethics Commission. Both groups feel strongly that an independent ethics watchdog should not have members who are also public officials. Here is our press release:

Common Cause Rhode Island and Operation Clean Government call on Governor Lincoln Chafee to reconsider his appointment of Barrington Police Chief John M. LaCross to the Rhode Island Ethics Commission. "We question the legality of Chief LaCross's appointment to the Ethics Commission given the statutory restrictions on who may be placed on this important body," says John Marion, executive director of Common Cause. "Our objection has nothing to do with Chief LaCross," Marion continues, "rather we are concerned with whether his appointment violates the state law barring those who hold public office from sitting on the Commission."

Section 36-14-8 (f)(1) of the Rhode Island General Laws prohibits anyone who sits on the Commission to "Hold or campaign for any other public office." Common Cause believes that statute disqualifies Chief LaCross from sitting on the Commission since Chief LaCross already holds a "public office" as the police chief in Barrington. The obvious intent of the prohibition from serving in another public office while serving on the Ethics Commission is to keep the members of the Ethics Commission as unbiased as possible, consistent with the Constitutional mandate (Article III, Section 8) that members of the Commission be both independent and non-partisan. The proposed appointment of Chief LaCross would contradict both the statutory prohibition and the intent of the framers of the Constitution and would be a significant departure from the goal of an independent Ethics Commission. "Since all elected and appointed state and municipal officials are subject to the ethics code, Operation Clean Government is concerned about appointing any serving public official to the Ethics Commission," says Margaret Kane, president of Operation Clean Government.

The Rhode Island Ethics Commission was created in 1986 by the voters of the state following that year's constitutional convention. Article III, Section 8 of the Constitution calls for an "independent non-partisan ethics commission." Common Cause has fought for more than two decades to ensure the Commission maintains its independence. Under state law only Governor Chafee can reconcile this problem, so Common Cause asks that he do so immediately, before Chief LaCross is sworn in as a member of the Commission.

Let's Move Forward on Legislative Staff Issues

2011-04-11T06:11:00.000-07:00

In recent weeks there has been an uproar over raises for staff of the Rhode Island General Assembly. Handling personnel of the legislative branch has been an issue for decades in Rhode Island, and was part of a focus of commissions in both the 1980s and 1990s. As a result of the work of those commissions we have seen drastic reforms of other parts of the General Assembly, including the elimination of legislative pensions, and a downsizing in the number of lawmakers. It's time to finish the work by focusing on legislative personnel.

Common Cause, along with the coalition Citizens for an Accountable Legislature has proposed a possible solution. We propose the creation of a position classification plan by a joint commission of the General Assembly. Such a plan would help organize the staff in a transparent and accountable manner by requiring job descriptions, pay scales, and an organizational hierarchy. Using such a plan to manage its employees will allow the General Assembly to create a career ladder for all legislative employees.

Two Tales of Open Government

2011-03-29T11:10:00.000-07:00

All eyes have been on the state of Wisconsin for the past few weeks as the state legislature pushed through a law restricting collective bargaining rights for public workers. On March 18th a County Court Judge issued an order preventing the Secretary of State from publishing the law because of a . . . open meetings violation. In the Judge's words:

“I think a legitimate question might be asked, how can something so apparently minor – the failure to provide timely notice prior to a meeting that led to the enactment of the 2011 Wisconsin 10 - how can a minor failure of notice really halt this bill in its tracks?

And my answer to that is - it’s not minor. It’s not a minor detail. . . [W]e in Wisconsin own our government. We own it. And we own it in three ways. We own it by the vote. We own it by the duty to provide open and public access to records so that the activities of government can be monitored. And we own it in that we are entitled by law to free and open access to governmental meetings, and especially governmental meetings that lead to the resolution of very highly conflicted and controversial matters.

That’s our right. And a violation of that right is tantamount to a violation of what is already provided in the Constitution, open doors, open access, and that northing in this government happens in secret.”

Meanwhile, on March 29th, the Rhode Island Supreme Court issued an opinion in a case involving the Central Falls receivership law. That law was introduced on June 8th, 2010 for the very first time, and signed into law three days later by the Governor on June 11th. Regardless of what you think about the substance of either issue, it's quite a stark contrast.

New House and Senate Rules

2011-02-15T06:30:00.000-08:00

Tuesday, February 15th, the Rules Committees of the Rhode Island House and Senate will take up their rules for 2011-2012. There are a number of very significant changes, especially in the House Rules this year. You can read more about them here. Common Cause is very pleased with most of the changes to the House rules, including:

Putting floor votes online
Moving toward putting committee votes online
Providing for an audio recording of all non-televised committee hearings
Not allowing new bills to be introduced after 11:30 pm.

We remain skeptical of several rules changes, including the new inclement weather policy that allows the House to roll over to the next day all their committee agendas rather than post them again with 48 hours notice. We are also skeptical of the Senate rules change limiting public access to the floor 10 minutes prior to the scheduled beginning of the session.

General Assembly to put votes online, in real time

2011-01-04T07:54:00.000-08:00

According to today's Providence Journal the when the Rhode Island General Assembly convenes today it will put its votes online, in real time. This is an important move toward a more transparent legislative process, and Common Cause salutes the Assembly for taking this step.

John Marion and Gary Sasse on Newsmakers

2010-12-12T17:43:00.001-08:00

On Sunday, December 12th, John Marion and Gary Sasse appeared on WPRI-TV's Newsmakers program to discuss the coalition, Citizens for an Accountable Legislature. You can watch it here.

Register for The Politics and Process of Judicial Selection

2010-11-06T05:40:00.000-07:00

If you would like to attend the panel on The Politics and Process of Judicial Selection this Monday, November 8, you must register here:

http://www.acslaw.org/chapters/lawyer/rhodeisland/rsvp

The reception begins at 6 pm, and the panel discussion at 6:30 pm

It will take place in the Waterman Room, at the University Club of Providence, 219 Benefit St., Providence, RI.

Citizens for an Accountable Legislature gains endorsement

2010-11-05T05:26:00.001-07:00

On Friday, November 5th the Providence Journal editorialized in favor of the Citizens for an Accountable Legislature agenda. Come read more about it here.

Common Cause co-hosts two educational events

2010-10-28T07:31:00.000-07:00

Common Cause Rhode Island is pleased to be co-hosting two educational events this November. Both are free and open to the public, although you must RSVP to attend the November 8th panel:

November 8th--The Politics and Process of Judicial Selection

Co-hosted with the American Constitution Society

Featuring:

The Honorable Ernest C. Torres, Senior Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island
Jared A. Goldstein, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of Law
Emily J. Sack, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of Law
David Fontana, Associate Professor of Law, George Washington University Law School

And moderated by:

Michael J. Yelnosky, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of Law

Monday, November 8, 2010
Reception: 6 pm
Program: 6:30 pm
The University Club of Providence
219 Benefit St.
Waterman Room
Providence, RI

You must RSVP here.

November 15th--The First Amendment: Five Freedoms, If We Can Keep Them--Where Do You Draw the Line?

Co-hosted with the Providence Athenaeum as part of ACCESS/RI the state's freedom of information coalition

A talk by Gregory V. Sullivan, professor of First Amendment and Media Law at Suffolk University Law School.

Monday, November 15th
Reception: 5:30 pm
Talk: 6 pm
Providence Athenaeum
251 Benefit St.
Providence, RI

Common Cause Urges State Senate to Finish Work

2010-10-28T07:18:00.000-07:00

In the Thursday, October 28th edition of the Providence Journal Common Cause takes the position that the Rhode Island State Senate should return to provide advice and consent for outstanding appointments. Common Cause would like to further clarify our comments. We believe that the Governor and the State Senate should fulfill their constitutionally mandated roles in appointments. In particular, we have held since the passage of the Separation of Power amendments in 2004 that the Governor can immediately make appointments to replace all vacancies on boards and commissions in Rhode Island. That belief was reinforced by the December 2008 Advisory Opinion of the Rhode Island Supreme Court in the CRMC case. Likewise, as long-time supporters of the 1994 constitutional reforms creating the Judicial Nominating Commission we have held that the Governor should abide by the law requiring him to make appointments within the 21 day time frame mandated in the statute. We have also long held that the State Senate should abide by its statutory requirement to provide advice and consent for those appointments too.

Upcoming Events for Common Cause

2010-10-26T09:18:00.000-07:00

We have two exciting events coming up at Common Cause Rhode Island. Please join us if you can.

On Monday, November 8th we will co-host a panel discussion on "The Politics and Process of Judicial Selection" with the American Constitution Society. The panel will feature a number of speakers discussion federal judicial selection, including Judge Ernest Torres, and Professors Jared Goldstein and Emily Sack. The event will be held at the University Club in Providence at 6 pm. You must RSVP and you can do so here.

On Monday, November 15th we will co-host a speaker with ACCESS/RI and the Providence Athenaeum. Attorney Greg Sullivan will speak on "The First Amendment: Five freedoms if we can keep them." The event will be held at 5:30 pm at the Athenaeum and is free and open to the public.

Save the Date! Common Cause Annual Meeting

2010-08-05T12:23:00.000-07:00

The 40th Anniversary Common Cause Rhode Island Annual Meeting will be held on Thursday, October 7th starting at 5 pm. The main program will be a debate among the leading contenders for Governor. Look for your invitation to arrive in the mail in early September. If you'd like to make sure you receive an invite please email contact@commoncauseri.org or call 861-2322.

Newsmakers: Murphy and Marion

2010-08-05T11:24:00.000-07:00

Ed Fitzpatrick: Voters' interests take a back seat in this political film

2010-08-05T11:21:00.000-07:00

Ed Fitzpatrick: Voters' interests take a back seat in this political film

Providence Journal

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Moderate Party sues over campaign finance rules

2010-06-21T19:45:00.000-07:00

Common Cause: Assembly should reconvene on ethics reform

2010-06-18T10:10:00.000-07:00

11:20 AM Fri, Jun 18, 2010

Amanda Milkovits

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- In the wake of a state senator's indictment, Common Cause Rhode Island called Friday for the General Assembly to reconvene immediately and pass a resolution to put a constitutional amendment on the November ballot asking voters to restore the jurisdiction of the state's Ethics Commission.

Now, there's a loophole that gives state legislators immunity from civil prosecution for their "core legislative acts." The Rhode Island Supreme Court ruled 3 to 1 last June that members of the General Assembly were immune from prosecution by the Ethics Commission because of the state Constitution's "speech in debate" clause.

Sen. Christopher Maselli, D-Johnston, who was indicted on seven counts of bank fraud on Thursday, had proposed having the Senate police itself on ethics. The bill never made it out of the Senate Rules Committee, which Maselli chairs.

Sen. J. Michael Lenihan, D-East Greenwich, had sponsored legislation to put the ethics question to voters in November, asking whether legislators should have immunity.

The legislation overwhelmingly passed in the House, 67-5, but found no traction in the Senate.

John Marion, the executive director of Common Cause, said Maselli's indictment shows the need for ethics reform. "Without passing this now," Marion said in a news release, "Rhode Island will go until at least 2012 without oversight of the legislature by the state's main ethics watchdog."

Ethics wasn't Senate priority

2010-06-17T08:02:00.000-07:00

Warwick Beacon

Jun 15, 2010

If there were ever a piece of legislation that could be considered a no-brainer, it would have to be the “ethics” bill submitted by House Speaker Gordon Fox (D-Providence).

The bill, which passed the House of Representatives by a 67-5 margin, would have asked Rhode Islanders to reinstate the power of the Ethics Commission to prosecute and investigate members of the General Assembly who use the public offices they hold to benefit themselves and their family members.

The State Supreme Court ruled in 2009 in the William Irons case that legislators could not be held responsible for their votes in the legislature thanks to the “speech and debate clause” of the state constitution. Irons, a former Senate president, had been accused of using public office to obtain financial gain for CVS and Blue Cross Blue Shield.

Fox’s bill would have created a ballot question that would have asked Rhode Island voters to change the constitution to restore that power to the Ethics Commission.

The Senate Leadership, however, had other ideas. The body’s leadership, Senate President Teresa Paiva-Weed (Jamestown, Newport) and Majority Leader Daniel Connors (Cumberland), refused to bring the measure up for a vote, and the rank-and-file members didn’t press them for a vote, which means the bill died.

The two argued that the bill might conflict with the 1st Amendment to the United States Constitution and that federal laws already outlaw bribery.

Both arguments are flimsy. First of all, those ethics rules already apply to other public officials such as mayors, governments, city workers, etc. Good government groups like Common Cause, Operation Clean Government, and the League of Women Voters argued that those same rules that apply to other government officials should also apply to the legislature.

We agree.

The issue isn’t about either speech or debate. The 1st Amendment allows for free speech, but it doesn’t mean that people can use free speech to commit fraud. It doesn’t mean that people can use free speech to commit bribery.

And while it is true that the federal government does have the ability to prosecute crimes like bribery, it certainly doesn’t hurt to have the Ethics Commission armed with the power to prosecute for that offense.

What does hurt, however, is that the Senate didn’t think it was a priority to affirm the highest possible standards for ethical behavior. Hopefully when the bill is reintroduced in the next session, there will be a different outcome.

Read more: Warwick Beacon - Ethics wasn t Senate priority

Edward Achorn: Designed to keep you in the dark

2010-06-15T08:15:00.000-07:00

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

By EDWARD ACHORN

In theory, we have something called representative democracy in Rhode Island. In practice, we have one of the most closed systems in America. It is run like an oligarchy — where very few people have access to information, the public is kept in the dark until it is too late for citizen pressure to make a difference, and decisions are made primarily to benefit leaders and the special interests that prop them up.

The cynicism of this system is on display every year, but it reached a kind of glorious efflorescence in recent weeks, culminating with last week’s mad dash to whip through scores of bills — on spending, taxes, gambling, energy, you name it — before citizens could weigh them and express their concerns.

The job of citizens, as far as our politicians are concerned, is to sit there without grumbling and pay through the nose. And to cast ballots every two years returning the same old crowd to office, many of them unopposed because the election system — with its master lever and dominance by special interests — is designed to make opposition difficult, if not futile.

The public’s growing desire to do something about illegal immigration, for example, was met this year with defiance by leaders of the General Assembly, who seem to side with businesses that want to exploit low-wage illegal labor and those who have a financial and political stake in making sure our duly enacted federal laws are not enforced.

House Speaker Gordon Fox (D.-Providence) stepped in before a bill based on the new Arizona law could even get a hearing. And Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed (D.-Newport) pulled a fast one on Sen. Marc Cote (D.-Woonsocket), who was pushing for implementation of an E-Verify system, aimed at reducing illegal hiring practices.

Senator Cote had followed Senate rules to obtain a floor vote on his bill, which enjoys strong public support and was co-sponsored by fully half of the chamber –– 19 senators.

But when the bill came up, President Paiva Weed did not call on the sponsor to make his case, the usual procedure. Instead, in a pre-arranged scheme, she recognized Majority Leader Daniel Connors (D.-Cumberland), who moved to recommit the bill (i.e., kill it). Refusing to recognize the objections of the thunderstruck proponents, the president immediately called for a voice vote, deemed that the “yeas” had it (though a recording suggested strongly that the “nays” were louder and perhaps in greater number), and that was that.

Any further objections were ruled out of order — the bill had been dealt with.

That seemed to suit most senators fine. But who represented the public, whose interest would be served by recorded votes on important issues (it would help them cast informed votes in November, for one thing)? Nobody, as far as I could tell — aside from Senator Cote, who seemed genuinely miffed.

Rhode Island leaders enjoy having the power to defy the public and render its representatives impotent.

But that power trip costs us dearly. An informed and active citizenry actually makes a state stronger and more vibrant. Citizens bring ideas to the table, help stop bad legislation, and form an important check against public corruption. That makes for a better-run state, with a stronger economy, less waste, lower taxes and fewer cozy deals for special interests.

Which is why well-run (and even not-so-well-run) states make an effort to bring the public into the loop.

John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island, says that Rhode Island is the only state that does not post audio or video of its legislature on the Web. Nineteen states post even committee hearings. Last week, Mr. Marion was standing in a hearing room at 1 a.m., listening to a debate on an important bill no one had ever seen before, with no camera or reporter present.

Some 20 states employ a system that alerts citizens by e-mail when some action has been taken, or is about to be taken, on a bill they are following. Such systems pay for themselves in less corrupt and more just government.

Rhode Island, naturally, has nothing of the sort.

Indeed, here the public confronts a Herculean task finding out on a timely basis even how their legislators voted on issues. It can be weeks before floor votes are published in the legislative journal. Those votes, taken electronically, could and should be posted instantly on the Web.

We could easily save money, curtail corruption and create a better informed electorate by bringing such reforms here. But that will never happen until taxpayers and law-abiding citizens decide that enough is enough, and resolve to show their status-quo representatives and senators the door.

Edward Achorn is The Journal’s deputy editorial-pages editor ( eachorn@projo.com).

Lynch proposes single-chamber R.I. General Assembly

2010-06-15T08:14:00.000-07:00

Mon, Jun 14, 2010
By Randal Edgar

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Saying that state government is "completely dysfunctional" in part because state lawmakers "just cannot get it right," gubernatorial candidate Patrick C. Lynch on Monday pitched a three-part solution that would revamp the budget cycle, give the governor a line-item veto and downsize the legislature.

The state attorney general, running behind lesser-known Republicans and a fellow Democrat he will face in a September primary, said Rhode Islanders would greatly benefit from the changes, which include replacing the Rhode Island House and Senate with a single-chamber legislature that he said would bring greater accountability.

"The responsibility of the elected officials is to work for the people, not the politicians at the State House," he said in a campaign release. "The culture of inside deals, budget gimmicks, quick fixes and a complete lack of long-term planning has left us in dire economic straits."

The proposals raised eyebrows among government-watchdog groups and political observers, including those at the General Assembly.

"Over the past eight years, Attorney General Lynch has introduced many pieces of legislation," said Larry Berman, spokesman for the House of Representatives. "I do not recall that his office ever proposed any bills on this subject, nor has his idea ever been discussed by his two staffers who spend a great deal of time lobbying the legislature."

John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island, said there are pros and cons to a single-chamber, or unicameral, legislature. Currently, Nebraska is the only state with such a legislature.

"Advocates say it's great because it saves money it streamlines the legislative process, but those against it say we have two houses because they help balance different values in the legislature," he said.

He added: "I don't think it's a panacea for the problems of the legislature. In the end a lot of it comes down to who is in the office."

Gambling, school aid top RI Statehouse agenda

2010-06-12T18:21:00.000-07:00

June 11, 2010 4:33 PM ET

By ERIC TUCKER

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - Gambling, wind energy, pension reform and education aid dominated the agenda of the Rhode Island General Assembly this year, as lawmakers in a state with a double-digit unemployment rate scrambled for ways to find extra revenue and cut costs.

Lawmakers wrapped up business early Friday, capping a busy election-year session and the first under new House Speaker Gordon Fox. It was a year when public policy issues, such as casino gambling and the decriminalization of marijuana, were debated with in the context of the state's economy.

In the frenetic final hours of the session, lawmakers approved a voter referendum on converting the state's licensed slot parlors into full-scale casinos and passed what they said was a predictable funding formula for school aid.

They also revived the prospects of a proposed wind farm off the coast of Block Island and overhauled the income tax structure.

The $7.8 billion budget for the fiscal year starting July 1, passed last week, limits cost-of-living increases for future retirees to the first $35,000 of their pension payments and also slashes aid to cities, towns and school districts. The budget depends on about $100 million in federal money that has yet to be passed by Congress, but allows the governor to make across-the-board cuts if the funds aren't approved.

Republican Gov. Don Carcieri said Friday he would let the budget become law without his signature.

Some of the economic changes were welcome but should have come sooner, given how long Rhode Island has been mired in a recession and its 12.5 percent unemployment rate, said University of Rhode Island economist Leonard Lardaro.

"We had every right to have things done sooner, and they should have been done sooner," he said.

A highlight of the session was the decision to seek voter approval for state-operated casino gambling at Twin River in Lincoln and Newport Grand in Newport. The slot parlors offer video lottery terminals but not table games. Supporters of the bill — which passed over the objections of Senate President M. Teresa Paiva-Weed — argued gambling was a critical source of revenue that needs to be protected, especially at a time when neighboring Massachusetts is mulling casinos.

That bill also heads to the governor.

Other measures that attracted considerable attention ultimately failed, including a bill that would have asked voters to restore the state Ethics Commission's power to investigate and fine state lawmakers for their votes at the Statehouse.

That measure died in the Senate. The commission's authority was hobbled by a state Supreme Court ruling last year that said lawmakers were shielded from ethics complaints based on their votes or other legislative acts. Critics of the ruling said it would weaken the commission's authority to police lawmakers who vote to advance their own financial interests.

"We were disappointed not only that it didn't get out but really disappointed that it didn't even get a fair shake in the Senate," said John Marion, executive director of the good government group Common Cause Rhode Island.

A bill to decriminalize possession of one ounce of marijuana or less — modeled after a similar measure in Massachusetts — also failed to get out of the Senate, where its sponsor, Sen. Joshua Miller, a Cranston Democrat, said he didn't see enough support to override an expected veto from Carcieri.

"With a veto threatening, it had to be wider than that," Miller said of the level of support.

Lawmakers also approved the creation of a funding formula for school districts, which supporters see as critical to the state's hopes of securing $75 million in federal grants in the national Race to the Top education funding competition.

And the state passed a new law aimed at cutting income tax rates for most residents. It also reduces the number of tax brackets and eliminates the flat-tax option for the state's highest earners.

"This is a day when Rhode Island can say it's opening its doors to do business," Rep. Steven Costantino, a Providence Democrat and chair of the House Finance Committee, said at a news conference announcing the changes.

Other bills approved would:

— Legalize the sale of sparklers and ground-based fireworks.

— Remove the word "Retardation" from the state Department of Mental Health, Retardation and Hospitals.

— Allow independent candidates for elective office to receive matching funds.

— Suspend for up to one year the license of any driver convicted of four different moving violations within an 18-month period.

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Race to finish pulls along major bills

2010-06-12T18:18:00.000-07:00

By steve peoples AND RANDAL EDGAR

Journal state house bureau

Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed talks with Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors while the Senate was in recess for committee hearings Thursday.

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE — Having had little to show for its first five months of work, the General Assembly was poised to finish its 2010 session Thursday night after a 72-hour sprint to finalize high-profile laws on public education, gambling, a wind farm, taxes and dangerous drivers.

It was a frenzied pace at times for part-time lawmakers already looking toward their reelection fights this fall.

But officials from across the political spectrum praised the Democrat-dominated Assembly for a flurry of heavy lifting that began Tuesday afternoon as committees raced through hundreds of bills touching on everything from fireworks to municipal bankruptcy.

“I think that over the session they have dealt with a lot of issues,” said the Republican Governor Carcieri, citing the passage of an education-funding formula, an income-tax overhaul, a measure to help create a wind farm off Block Island, and another to ward off municipal bankruptcies. “They always get criticized because it all happens at the end. Unfortunately, that’s just the nature of the beast.”

Indeed, Thursday was the third consecutive day that lawmakers were expected to conclude their business after midnight. There was little public notice of votes, and agendas changed minute to minute, as top lawmakers brokered private deals to help shepherd bills to passage.

Government watchdog groups applauded the decision to end Wednesday’s business –– initially set as the Assembly’s last of the year — shortly after midnight, instead of forcing through dozens of new laws while most of Rhode Island was sleeping.

But they questioned the wisdom of continuing to rush to meet a self-imposed deadline to adjourn for the year.

“It’s only June 10. There’s plenty of time to keep working on these things,” said Common Cause Executive Director John Marion, noting that his organization’s two priorities — an ethics bill and another to improve access to public records — were likely dead for the year.

Senate leaders refused to allow a vote on legislation sponsored by House Speaker Gordon D. Fox to reinstate the state Ethics Commission’s authority, which was stripped by a recent Supreme Court decision.

Specifically, the proposal would have placed a question on the November ballot asking voters whether to allow the Ethics Commission’s to investigate and prosecute state legislators who use their positions to benefit themselves, their relatives or their business associates.

Without the change, “we’ve got a whole group of people exempt from ethics rules,” said a “disappointed” Carcieri.

Fox acknowledged earlier in the week that the ethics bill was not a priority, however. The governor had other priorities this year as well.

The term-limited Carcieri used what political leverage he had to ensure the passage of a bill — also backed by organized labor — to set the Deepwater Wind offshore-turbine project back on course.

The private company wants to spend $200 million to erect eight turbines off Block Island to serve the island. Deepwater describes its plan as a demonstration project that could lead to a $1.5-billion wind farm farther offshore.

But opponents, including Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch, argued the legislation is a special-interest bill designed to benefit one company at great cost to many ratepayers.

Once signed into law by the governor, the new law would send the power-purchase agreement to the Public Utilities Commission for another review.

Carcieri referred to the deal as “huge for the state long-term,” and AFL-CIO President George Nee agreed.

“This may have been one of the more significant years for economic development in the history of the state,” said Nee, citing the Deepwater measure, in addition to the likely passage of a measure creating a November ballot question on whether to allow a full-scale casino in Rhode Island.

Carcieri personally called Fox when the House followed the Senate’s lead in approving the Deepwater bill late Wednesday.

The governor waited until after the vote to say whether he would veto the $7.8-billion state budget approved by the legislature last week. A veto would have inconvenienced lawmakers by forcing them to return next week for an override session.

“Nothing’s ever perfect,” Carcieri said of the budget, noting that he would “most likely not” veto the package, but that his office would issue a formal statement Friday.

Meanwhile, in the rush to adjourn Thursday night, lawmakers were also expected to approve a bill to increase penalties for “habitual traffic offenders.”

Drivers convicted of four moving violations within an 18-month period would have to attend 60 hours of driver training and perform 60 hours of community service. They would also face fines of up to $1,000 and the loss of their license for up to two years.

Rep. Donna Walsh, D-Charlestown, said the bill would help to prevent accidents like the one that killed 27-year-old Colin Foote. Foote, a Charlestown resident, was on his motorcycle when he was hit by a Westerly woman who had more two-dozen moving violations.

“He was struck by a repeat offender,” Walsh said. “His mother and his brother were in the car behind him, and it was a heartbreaking thing.”

The Assembly was also poised to help the financially ailing Landmark Hospital in its bid to merge with Caritas Christi Health Care, a hospital chain based in Massachusetts. The measure would exempt any for-profit corporation that acquires Landmark from sales taxes for 12 years.

Rep. Peter Kilmartin, D-Pawtucket, said the bill was not perfect but would help to maintain Landmark Hospital for people in northern Rhode Island.

“We need to preserve those jobs, we need to preserve that hospital,” he said. “This is not the best way to do it … but for the legislative system, this is the best that we have.”

Local officials were among the largest constituency left wanting.

The legislature largely refused to enact measures introduced by the governor to help cities and towns cut costs.

While the budget approved last week allows cities and towns to reduce school spending by 5 percent for the coming year, other proposals — such as mandatory minimum health co-pays for municipal employees — were considered dead.

The only good news, according to Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian, is that communities don’t have to fear future cuts because there’s almost nothing left to lose.

“We’re almost down to zero,” he said.

With reports

from Bruce Landis

redgar@projo.com

Major issues left to last minute

2010-06-12T18:17:00.000-07:00

Thursday, June 10, 2010

By Steve Peoples, Randal edgar and Katherine gregg

Journal State House Bureau

Sen. Louis DiPalma, D-Tiverton, waits in the Senate chamber for the session to begin Tuesday.

>

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE — A flood of legislation moved through the General Assembly Tuesday, but the fate of many high-profile bills was unclear just 24 hours before lawmakers hope to adjourn for the year.

Casinos, a wind farm, ethics, marijuana, education funding, criminal records and taxes are a small sampling of the issues still confronting Rhode Island’s part-time legislators. Some may simply be left to die.

Very few were decided Tuesday, despite a chaotic pace.

When the afternoon began, 18 legislative committees were set to review and perhaps vote on 206 pieces of legislation. Dozens were passed and sent directly to the House or Senate floors where rank-and-file lawmakers were asked to act on laws that some hadn’t read. A computer failure in the Senate prevented specific votes on 40 bills from being recorded.

Noticeably absent from any agenda was an ethics bill that some say is all but dead.

Senate leaders have refused to allow a vote on a provision overwhelmingly approved by the House last week that would allow voters this fall to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s power to investigate and prosecute state legislators who use their positions to benefit themselves, their relatives or their business associates.

That power was stripped by a state Supreme Court ruling last year.

Roughly 40 protesters gathered in the State House rotunda earlier in the day to push for Senate action.

“Inaction will only leave a cloud over the Senate,” said Larry Valencia, president of the rally’s organizer, Operation Clean Government.

A handful of elected officials joined the protest, including Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts, Sen. Edward J. O’Neill, I-Lincoln, and Sen. Michael J. Pinga, D-West Warwick.

“I have little faith that it will be heard,” Pinga said of the bill. “If leadership doesn’t want to hear it, it’s not going to be heard … They want to police themselves. What a joke.”

When asked later in the afternoon whether she would allow a vote, Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed said, “No comment,” and added that it was not her immediate focus.

The fate of the bill, like dozens more pending before the legislature, won’t become clear until lawmakers formally recess for the year. That’s expected late Wednesday, but could stretch to later in the week.

The chaotic pace has become commonplace in an Assembly that gives final approval to just a handful of bills in the first five months of the year and regularly approves hundreds of new laws in its final days.

But there is one difference this year, according to John Marion, executive director of the government watchdog group Common Cause.

“There are probably more issues of greater substance left hanging,” he said. And “they’re leaving earlier than they usually do. We’re not bumping up against the Fourth of July here. It’s June 8. It doesn’t seem like there’s good reason to be rushing.”

Should the Assembly adjourn for the year Wednesday, as currently planned, it would be its earliest departure since 1988.

Other highlights Tuesday included:

Fireworks

A proposal, approved by the full House and full Senate, would allow the sale, possession and transportation of “non-aerial fireworks” for anyone at least 16 years old.

Specifically, the bill would legalize such things as “fountains, illuminating torches, wheels, ground spinners, flitter sparklers, sparklers” and “party poppers, snappers, toy smoke devices, snakes, glow worms, wire sparklers and dipped sticks.”

The new measure could become law in the coming days, long before the July 4 holiday.

Municipal tools

A committee Tuesday completely ignored legislation that would help cities and towns cut costs.

Despite recent declarations that relief was on the way, and despite another reduction in state aid to cities and towns, lawmakers as of Tuesday night had not passed any of the so-called municipal tools — such as a minimum health-insurance co-pay for municipal workers — that local officials wanted. And there was no indication that legislation will pass before the session ends.

“We’re not sure yet,” said House Speaker Gordon D. Fox. “There’s a lot of stuff still percolating.”

Estate tax

The same day Governor Carcieri signed into law an Assembly proposal that makes Rhode Island’s income-tax structure more competitive, the Senate approved a measure long considered a priority for conservatives that goes even further.

The act would raise the exemption of Rhode Island’s estate tax, sometimes referred to as the “death tax,” from the current level of $850,000 to $1.5 million beginning Jan. 1, 2012.

Approximately 271 tax filers would benefit from the change, and state government would lose estimated revenue of $2.78 million should the House approve the measure, according to the state Department of Revenue.

Expungement

A bill to allow many more convicted criminals to legally tell their prospective employers and landlords they have never been convicted of a crime cleared the House and Senate.

Rhode Island judges are already allowed to permanently seal the records of nonviolent crimes by first offenders 5 years after completion of their sentences for misdemeanors, 10 years after the completion of sentences for felonies. Headed to the governor, who vetoed a similar measure in 2008, the bill calls for the automatic sealing of the record of any crime for which an admitted criminal has been given a deferred sentence, regardless of the nature of the crime, as long as he or she stays out of trouble for that five-year period.

This would apply only to those who have plead guilty or no contest.

Others

•While the Senate passed a bill last week that would require all roll-call committee votes to be posted on the General Assembly Web site, the House Finance Committee had not as of Tuesday night scheduled a hearing on the proposal. Separate legislation that would force all legislative votes to be posted online in a user-friendly format was ignored.

•Lawmakers gave final approval and sent to the governor’s desk a bill that would require the police to record confessions to crimes that carry a potential penalty of life in prison. The bill, which applies to confessions made when a suspect is in police custody, allows for some exceptions, including cases where a defendant refuses to be recorded and cases where the accused makes a spontaneous statement.

•While the subject of much discussion this session, legislation that would decriminalize marijuana possession is likely dead for the year.

“There’s some ideas still floating around on how to resurrect it,” said its sponsor, Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Cranston.

With reports from

Philip Marcelo

redgar@projo.com

Bill flood misses some issues

2010-06-12T18:15:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

By Steve Peoples, Randal edgar and Katherine gregg

Journal State House Bureau

Sen. Louis DiPalma, D-Tiverton, waits in the Senate chamber for the session to begin Tuesday.

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE — A flood of legislation moved through the General Assembly Tuesday, but the fate of many high-profile bills was unclear just 24 hours before lawmakers hope to adjourn for the year.

Casinos, a wind farm, ethics, marijuana, education funding, criminal records and taxes are a small sampling of the issues still confronting Rhode Island’s part-time legislators. Some may simply be left to die.

Very few were decided Tuesday, despite a chaotic pace.

When the afternoon began, 18 legislative committees were set to review and perhaps vote on 206 pieces of legislation. Dozens were passed and sent directly to the House or Senate floors where rank-and-file lawmakers were asked to act on laws that some hadn’t read. A computer failure in the Senate prevented specific votes on 40 bills from being recorded.

Noticeably absent from any agenda was an ethics bill that some say is all but dead.

Senate leaders have refused to allow a vote on a provision overwhelmingly approved by the House last week that would allow voters this fall to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s power to investigate and prosecute state legislators who use their positions to benefit themselves, their relatives or their business associates.

That power was stripped by a state Supreme Court ruling last year.

Roughly 40 protesters gathered in the State House rotunda earlier in the day to push for Senate action.

“Inaction will only leave a cloud over the Senate,” said Larry Valencia, president of the rally’s organizer, Operation Clean Government.

A handful of elected officials joined the protest, including Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts, Sen. Edward J. O’Neill, I-Lincoln, and Sen. Michael J. Pinga, D-West Warwick.

“I have little faith that it will be heard,” Pinga said of the bill. “If leadership doesn’t want to hear it, it’s not going to be heard … They want to police themselves. What a joke.”

When asked later in the afternoon whether she would allow a vote, Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed said, “No comment,” and added that it was not her immediate focus.

The fate of the bill, like dozens more pending before the legislature, won’t become clear until lawmakers formally recess for the year. That’s expected late Wednesday, but could stretch to later in the week.

The chaotic pace has become commonplace in an Assembly that gives final approval to just a handful of bills in the first five months of the year and regularly approves hundreds of new laws in its final days.

But there is one difference this year, according to John Marion, executive director of the government watchdog group Common Cause.

“There are probably more issues of greater substance left hanging,” he said. And “they’re leaving earlier than they usually do. We’re not bumping up against the Fourth of July here. It’s June 8. It doesn’t seem like there’s good reason to be rushing.”

Should the Assembly adjourn for the year Wednesday, as currently planned, it would be its earliest departure since 1988.

Other highlights Tuesday included:

Fireworks

A proposal, approved by the full House and full Senate, would allow the sale, possession and transportation of “non-aerial fireworks” for anyone at least 16 years old.

Specifically, the bill would legalize such things as “fountains, illuminating torches, wheels, ground spinners, flitter sparklers, sparklers” and “party poppers, snappers, toy smoke devices, snakes, glow worms, wire sparklers and dipped sticks.”

The new measure could become law in the coming days, long before the July 4 holiday.

Municipal tools

A committee Tuesday completely ignored legislation that would help cities and towns cut costs.

Despite recent declarations that relief was on the way, and despite another reduction in state aid to cities and towns, lawmakers as of Tuesday night had not passed any of the so-called municipal tools — such as a minimum health-insurance co-pay for municipal workers — that local officials wanted. And there was no indication that legislation will pass before the session ends.

“We’re not sure yet,” said House Speaker Gordon D. Fox. “There’s a lot of stuff still percolating.”

Estate tax

The same day Governor Carcieri signed into law an Assembly proposal that makes Rhode Island’s income-tax structure more competitive, the Senate approved a measure long considered a priority for conservatives that goes even further.

The act would raise the exemption of Rhode Island’s estate tax, sometimes referred to as the “death tax,” from the current level of $850,000 to $1.5 million beginning Jan. 1, 2012.

Approximately 271 tax filers would benefit from the change, and state government would lose estimated revenue of $2.78 million should the House approve the measure, according to the state Department of Revenue.

Expungement

A bill to allow many more convicted criminals to legally tell their prospective employers and landlords they have never been convicted of a crime cleared the House and Senate.

Rhode Island judges are already allowed to permanently seal the records of nonviolent crimes by first offenders 5 years after completion of their sentences for misdemeanors, 10 years after the completion of sentences for felonies. Headed to the governor, who vetoed a similar measure in 2008, the bill calls for the automatic sealing of the record of any crime for which an admitted criminal has been given a deferred sentence, regardless of the nature of the crime, as long as he or she stays out of trouble for that five-year period.

This would apply only to those who have plead guilty or no contest.

Others

•While the Senate passed a bill last week that would require all roll-call committee votes to be posted on the General Assembly Web site, the House Finance Committee had not as of Tuesday night scheduled a hearing on the proposal. Separate legislation that would force all legislative votes to be posted online in a user-friendly format was ignored.

•Lawmakers gave final approval and sent to the governor’s desk a bill that would require the police to record confessions to crimes that carry a potential penalty of life in prison. The bill, which applies to confessions made when a suspect is in police custody, allows for some exceptions, including cases where a defendant refuses to be recorded and cases where the accused makes a spontaneous statement.

•While the subject of much discussion this session, legislation that would decriminalize marijuana possession is likely dead for the year.

“There’s some ideas still floating around on how to resurrect it,” said its sponsor, Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Cranston.

With reports from

Philip Marcelo

redgar@projo.com

Major issues left to last minute

2010-06-09T08:01:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

By Steve Peoples, Randal edgar and Katherine gregg

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — A flood of legislation moved through the General Assembly Tuesday, but the fate of many high-profile bills was unclear just 24 hours before lawmakers hope to adjourn for the year.

Casinos, a wind farm, ethics, marijuana, education funding, criminal records and taxes are a small sampling of the issues still confronting Rhode Island’s part-time legislators. Some may simply be left to die.

Very few were decided Tuesday, despite a chaotic pace.

When the afternoon began, 18 legislative committees were set to review and perhaps vote on 206 pieces of legislation. Dozens were passed and sent directly to the House or Senate floors where rank-and-file lawmakers were asked to act on laws that some hadn’t read. A computer failure in the Senate prevented specific votes on 40 bills from being recorded.

Noticeably absent from any agenda was an ethics bill that some say is all but dead.

Senate leaders have refused to allow a vote on a provision overwhelmingly approved by the House last week that would allow voters this fall to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s power to investigate and prosecute state legislators who use their positions to benefit themselves, their relatives or their business associates.

That power was stripped by a state Supreme Court ruling last year.

Roughly 40 protesters gathered in the State House rotunda earlier in the day to push for Senate action.

“Inaction will only leave a cloud over the Senate,” said Larry Valencia, president of the rally’s organizer, Operation Clean Government.

A handful of elected officials joined the protest, including Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts, Sen. Edward J. O’Neill, I-Lincoln, and Sen. Michael J. Pinga, D-West Warwick.

“I have little faith that it will be heard,” Pinga said of the bill. “If leadership doesn’t want to hear it, it’s not going to be heard … They want to police themselves. What a joke.”

When asked later in the afternoon whether she would allow a vote, Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed said, “No comment,” and added that it was not her immediate focus.

The fate of the bill, like dozens more pending before the legislature, won’t become clear until lawmakers formally recess for the year. That’s expected late Wednesday, but could stretch to later in the week.

The chaotic pace has become commonplace in an Assembly that gives final approval to just a handful of bills in the first five months of the year and regularly approves hundreds of new laws in its final days.

But there is one difference this year, according to John Marion, executive director of the government watchdog group Common Cause.

“There are probably more issues of greater substance left hanging,” he said. And “they’re leaving earlier than they usually do. We’re not bumping up against the Fourth of July here. It’s June 8. It doesn’t seem like there’s good reason to be rushing.”

Should the Assembly adjourn for the year Wednesday, as currently planned, it would be its earliest departure since 1988.

Other highlights Tuesday included:

Fireworks

A proposal, approved by the full House and full Senate, would allow the sale, possession and transportation of “non-aerial fireworks” for anyone at least 16 years old.

Specifically, the bill would legalize such things as “fountains, illuminating torches, wheels, ground spinners, flitter sparklers, sparklers” and “party poppers, snappers, toy smoke devices, snakes, glow worms, wire sparklers and dipped sticks.”

The new measure could become law in the coming days, long before the July 4 holiday.

Municipal tools

A committee Tuesday completely ignored legislation that would help cities and towns cut costs.

Despite recent declarations that relief was on the way, and despite another reduction in state aid to cities and towns, lawmakers as of Tuesday night had not passed any of the so-called municipal tools — such as a minimum health-insurance co-pay for municipal workers — that local officials wanted. And there was no indication that legislation will pass before the session ends.

“We’re not sure yet,” said House Speaker Gordon D. Fox. “There’s a lot of stuff still percolating.”

Estate tax

The same day Governor Carcieri signed into law an Assembly proposal that makes Rhode Island’s income-tax structure more competitive, the Senate approved a measure long considered a priority for conservatives that goes even further.

The act would raise the exemption of Rhode Island’s estate tax, sometimes referred to as the “death tax,” from the current level of $850,000 to $1.5 million beginning Jan. 1, 2012.

Approximately 271 tax filers would benefit from the change, and state government would lose estimated revenue of $2.78 million should the House approve the measure, according to the state Department of Revenue.

Expungement

A bill to allow many more convicted criminals to legally tell their prospective employers and landlords they have never been convicted of a crime cleared the House and Senate.

Rhode Island judges are already allowed to permanently seal the records of nonviolent crimes by first offenders 5 years after completion of their sentences for misdemeanors, 10 years after the completion of sentences for felonies. Headed to the governor, who vetoed a similar measure in 2008, the bill calls for the automatic sealing of the record of any crime for which an admitted criminal has been given a deferred sentence, regardless of the nature of the crime, as long as he or she stays out of trouble for that five-year period.

This would apply only to those who have plead guilty or no contest.

Others

•While the Senate passed a bill last week that would require all roll-call committee votes to be posted on the General Assembly Web site, the House Finance Committee had not as of Tuesday night scheduled a hearing on the proposal. Separate legislation that would force all legislative votes to be posted online in a user-friendly format was ignored.

•Lawmakers gave final approval and sent to the governor’s desk a bill that would require the police to record confessions to crimes that carry a potential penalty of life in prison. The bill, which applies to confessions made when a suspect is in police custody, allows for some exceptions, including cases where a defendant refuses to be recorded and cases where the accused makes a spontaneous statement.

•While the subject of much discussion this session, legislation that would decriminalize marijuana possession is likely dead for the year.

“There’s some ideas still floating around on how to resurrect it,” said its sponsor, Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Cranston.

With reports from

Philip Marcelo

Political Scene: Redrawing Rhode Island’s political map will cost $1.5 million

2010-06-07T19:26:00.000-07:00

Monday, June 7, 2010

By Katherine Gregg and By RANDAL EDGAR

Journal State House Bureau

Deep within the new $7.8-billion state budget is a reminder that the next General Assembly will have the once-a-decade job of redrawing Rhode Island’s political map.

The tax-and-spending plan that cleared the Assembly last week included $1.5 million for lawmakers to find and hire a consultant to help them determine how population changes over the last decade might change the state’s legislative and congressional districts.

House spokesman Larry Berman said the General Assembly intends to begin by issuing a request for proposals this summer.

The money helps account for the legislature’s own record-high new budget: a proposed $39,049,144, compared with the $37.4 million the lawmakers appropriated for themselves at this point last year.

But “given the fact that the software to draw districts is now free and available on the Internet, $1.5 million seems like a pretty steep price,” said John Marion, executive director of the citizens’ advocacy group Common Cause, when he learned of this budget set-aside.

Elaborating, he said: “The ground has shifted because of the changes in computing power and I believe the advocates (and in R.I. that means us) will be on a much more level playing field with those trying to gerrymander.”

Marion said Common Cause has “already begun to assemble the resources and expertise to launch a citizens model redistricting commission that will allow us to offer an alternative set of districts to those the legislature will draw. The commission will take public input to establish a set of criteria for redistricting and then we (probably Common Cause) will draw the districts to their specifications and make them public.

“We hope this will put sufficient pressure on those who make the official districts and they will then resist the temptation to gerrymander,” he said.

To hear Marion, it is not that hard “to program a computer to perform redistricting,” as long as you know computer-speak.

He explains: “Two professors, Micah Altman at Harvard University and Michael McDonald at George Mason University created an open-source program, in the R statistical programming language, that allows the computer to draw the districts.”And so it begins.

Special immunity for legislators shouldn't exist

2010-06-04T11:24:00.000-07:00

Warwick Beacon

by John Marion

Jun 03, 2010

As the end of the 2010 session of the Rhode Island General Assembly speeds to a quick and early conclusion, a number of important issues have been left waiting. One of those issues involves the jurisdiction (or lack thereof) of the state’s Ethics Commission over the General Assembly itself. Currently state legislators, and only state legislators, are immune from prosecution by the state’s ethics watchdog for their “core legislative acts.” This is a result of the Rhode Island Supreme Court’s 2009 decision in the case of William V. Irons vs. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission.

Common Cause sincerely believes that this special immunity for legislators should not exist and we, along with Operation Clean Government, have proposed an amendment to the Constitution to make sure it no longer does. Furthermore, we believe that when an overwhelming majority of voters in 1986 approved the Ethics Amendment to our Constitution—one that says “all elected and appointed officials . . . shall be subject to the code of ethics”—they meant the General Assembly too. The Supreme Court believes the voters did not make that clear 24 years ago, and that is why a ballot question is needed now. We are asking the General Assembly to put this issue on the November ballot before it is too late.

Unfortunately, the people of the state of Rhode Island may never get a chance to clarify what they meant back in 1986 because the Rhode Island Senate is denying them that opportunity. In the House, Speaker Gordon Fox has sponsored the resolution to put the question on the ballot. By contrast, in the Senate the resolution (sponsored by Senator J. Michael Lenihan of East Greenwich) only got a hearing when the sponsor specifically requested one. After that perfunctory hearing, the Senate resolution was “held for further study,” a designation that is a sort of legislative purgatory.

Why should they do this now? Since the June 2009 Supreme Court decision, there has been no mechanism for enforcing the state’s code of ethics for most of the official actions of our legislators. That means a legislator cannot be prosecuted by the Ethics Commission for voting on a bill that benefits them financially. If we do not put this on the ballot now, then this immunity will extend until at least 2012, and possibly forever.

Why is this important? Building public confidence in the legislative process is a critical ingredient to a successful democracy. People need to believe that their representatives are serving the public interest, and not their personal or special interests. Trust is the glue that binds voters to their representatives, and our amendment seeks to strengthen that bond.

Common Cause calls on the Rhode Island Senate to allow the people to decide this issue. The Senate has known about this problem since the first week in January, and yet five months later the problem persists. Their solution, a system of self-policing, is unwieldy and potentially costly. In the closing days of the session—before rushing out to campaign for re-election—the Senate needs to take up this issue and let the people decide.

John Marion is the executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island.

Update: RI House OKs ballot item to tighten ethics rules

2010-06-02T18:06:00.000-07:00

Wed, Jun 02, 2010

Katherine Gregg

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- One after another, Rhode Island's state lawmakers rose from their seats on the House floor to defend their right to speak without having an "unelected'' Ethics Commission peering over their shoulders.

Then, the House approved - and sent to the Senate - a bill that would give voters a chance, in November, to reinstate the state Ethics Commission's power to investigate and prosecute state legislators.

The vote was 67-5 in favor of the bill introduced by new House Speaker Gordon D. Fox, early in the 2010 election-year session when he was still the House majority leader, vying for the top leadership post in the House.

The vote marked a victory for Fox, who had to win votes from a phalanx of dubious colleagues.

Before the bill passed, the House members voted 37-33 to defeat an amendment that would have excluded all of their speech from Ethics Commission jurisdiction.

The measure now goes to the full Senate, where Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors has repeatedly questioned the need for any action, and said again recently: "If a member of the Assembly were doing something illegal, they could be prosecuted right now in the U.S. District Court by the U.S. Attorney and be subject to penalties for violating the law like any other citizen."

Fox's legislation was prompted by a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that dismissed ethics charges pending against former Senate President William V. Irons based on a novel reading of the "speech in debate clause" in the state Constitution.

The clause states: "For any speech in debate in either House, no member shall be questioned in any other place."

High profile lawmakers had argued for years that this clause placed them beyond the reach of the Ethics Commission or its predecessor, including former House Speakers Matthew J. Smith, when he was accused of personally benefiting from a bill he supported to allow state workers to buy state pension credit for private school teaching, and John B. Harwood, when he rebuffed a subpoena to testify in a case involving the dismissal of a former Lottery director.

In 1984, the Rhode Island Supreme Court said the clause does more than immunize legislators against civil lawsuits for their utterances on the Senate and House floors. Supporting the refusal of House leaders to answer allegations of gerrymandering, the court said the privilege protects behind-the-scenes legislative deliberations, whether they take place at the State House or elsewhere.

But the high court's ruling in the Irons' case blasted opened the current hole in state Ethics Code enforcement; following the ruling, the commission took the position that it was no longer even allowed to issue advisory opinions to lawmakers.

Irons had been accused of using his public office to obtain financial gain for pharmacy giant CVS - a "business associate" - while collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance commissions from Blue Cross on a health-insurance policy for CVS employees in Rhode Island.

Irons' lawyer argued, and the Supreme Court agreed, that the "speech in debate clause" insulates lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny for any "core legislative act," including "proposing, passing or voting upon a particular piece of legislation."

In his dissent, Chief Justice Paul Suttell, a former member of the House of Representatives, cited the litany of scandals that led to the 1986 voter-mandated creation of the Ethics Commission, and said "a page of history is worth a volume of logic."

The Fox bill - and a matching Senate version sponsored by J. Michael Lenihan, D-East Greenwich - have an army of supporters.

A parade of candidates for high office joined the citizens' advocacy groups Common Cause, Operation Clean Government and the League of Women Voters in arguing that state lawmakers should be subject to the same Ethics Commission scrutiny that applies to every other elected official in Rhode Island, from the governor to the members of each local school board, zoning board and town council.

Common Cause Executive Director John Marion told the lawmakers the proposal is not aimed at giving the nine-member Ethics Commission any more power than it had during its first two decades. He said 37 other states allow ethics oversight of their legislators.

But the Fox bill faced opposition at every step along the way, with freshman Rep. Scott Pollard, D-Foster, declaring at the initial hearing in march: "There aren't any corrupt people in the building ... And if you do know them to be corrupt, then I suggest that you call the attorney general's office and seek [to have] them prosecuted."

Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, voiced concerns about giving the Ethics Commission "virtually limitless authority to decide what constitutes a conflict of interest or ethical misconduct when it comes to both legislators' votes and their participation in the legislative process."

He repeated those concerns during a recent hearing on the matching Senate bill, at which Sen. John Tassoni, D-Smithfield, deplored the way the Ethics Commission is currently constructed as "a judge, jury and executioner."

Here is how the House members voted:

Voting yes
Ajello, D-Providence
Almeida, D-Providence
Brien, D-Woonsocket
Caprio, D-Narragansett
Carnevale, D-Providence
Carter, D-North Kingstown
Coderre, D-Pawtucket
Corvese, D-North Providence
Costantino, D-Providence
DeSimone, D-Providence
Diaz, D-Providence
Driver, D-Richmond
Edwards, D-Tiverton
Ehrhardt, R-North Kingstown
Fellela, D-Johnston
Ferri, D-Warwick
Fierro, D-Woonsocket
Flaherty, D-Warwick
Fox, D-Providence
Gablinske, D-Bristol
Gallison, D-Bristol
Gemma, D-Warwick
Giannini, D-Providence
Guthrie, D-Coventry
Handy, D-Cranston
Hearn, D-Barrington
Jackson, D-Newport
Jacquard, D-Cranston
Kennedy, D-Hopkinton
Kilmartin, D-Pawtucket
Lally, D-South Kingstown
Loughlin, R-Tiverton
MacBeth, D-Cumberland
Malik, D-Warren
Marcello, D-Scituate
Martin, D-Newport
Mattiello, D-Cranston
McCauley, D-Providence
McNamara, D-Warwick
Melo, D-East Providence
Menard, D-Lincoln
Naughton, D-Warwick
O'Neill, D-Pawtucket
Pacheco, D-Burrillville
Palumbo, D-Cranston
Petrarca, D-Lincoln
A. Rice, D-Portsmouth
M. Rice, D-South Kingstown
Ruggiero, D-Jamestown
San Bento, D-Pawtucket
Savage, R-East Providence
Schadone, D-North Providence
Segal, D-Providence
Serpa, D-West Warwick
Shallcross Smith, D-Lincoln
Silva, D-Central Falls
Sullivan, D-Coventry
Trillo, R-Warwick
Ucci, D-Johnston
Vaudreuil, D-Cumberland
Walsh, D-Charlestown
Wasylyk, D-Providence
Williams, D-Providence
Williamson, D-Coventry
Winfield, D-Smithfield

Voting no
Baldelli-Hunt, D-Woonsocket
DaSilva, D-East Providence
Newberry, R-N. Smithfield
Pollard, D-Foster
Watson, R-East Greenwich

Did not vote
Azzinaro, D-Westerly
Lima, D-CranstonMurphy, D-West Warwick


SOURCE: House roll call
(The original version of this story was published at 5:35 pm. Wednesday.)

Judicial nominees list bill is back before R.I. General Assembly

2010-05-29T19:53:00.000-07:00

Sunday, May 30, 2010

By Katie Mulvaney

Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE — A bill that would let the governor choose judicial nominees from lists of finalists generated over the past five years is back again and working its way through the General Assembly.

The measure, sponsored by Sen. Leo R. Blais, R-Coventry, won the Senate’s backing last week and now awaits House Judiciary Committee review. If passed, it would extend to June 30, 2011, the governor’s ability to pick potential judges from lists created as far back as 2005.

First passed in 2007, the legislation was proposed this session at Governor Carcieri’s request as a way to save judicial candidates the inconvenience of going through the selection process before the Judicial Nominating Commission more than once.

“Simply because they are not chosen [the first time] does not diminish their qualifications,” said Amy Kempe, the governor’s spokeswoman. The pool of candidates has already been vetted as well-qualified, she said.

The bill, however, is perennially opposed by the government watchdog group Common Cause Rhode Island, which charges that it undermines core concepts of the judicial merit selection by reducing the transparency of the process. Allowing the governor to reach back and choose nominees from the lists created near the start of his term invites mischief and increases the politics involved, according to John Marion, Common Cause executive director.

Further, he said, it might violate the state Constitution, which specifies the governor should choose from “a list.” “This allows the governor to pick from multiple lists,” he said.

Lawyers interested in filling an open seat on the state bench must submit a lengthy application to the Judicial Nominating Commission. Members select which applicants to interview and hold a public hearing in which friends, family and colleagues speak to a candidate’s qualifications. The commission then forwards a list of three to five finalists to the governor.

Before the bill’s enactment, the governor had to select from only the list created by the Judicial Nominating Commission for a given position.

A hearing date before the House Judiciary Committee has not been set. A House version was held for further study last month. There are three Superior Court vacancies and two openings in District Court.

Placing ethics panel issue on ballot advances

2010-05-27T12:21:00.000-07:00

Providence Journal

Thursday, May 27, 2010

By Katherine Gregg

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — Voters would get their chance to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s power to investigate and prosecute state legislators under legislation that won the approval of a key House committee on Wednesday.

The bill, sponsored by House Speaker Gordon D. Fox early in the 2010 legislative session when he was still House majority leader, cleared the House Judiciary Committee without any audible dissent two months after a rocky March hearing at which several freshmen legislators voiced umbrage at the notion of having an “unelected body” looking over their shoulders.

“I’ve been here a year and a half now,” said freshman Rep. Scott Pollard, D-Foster, at that March 23 hearing. “There aren’t any corrupt people in the building … And if you do know them to be corrupt, then I suggest that you call the attorney general’s office and seek [to have] them prosecuted.”

Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, also voiced concerns about giving the Ethics Commission “virtually limitless authority to decide what constitutes a conflict of interest or ethical misconduct when it comes to both legislators’ votes and their participation in the legislative process.”

He repeated those concerns Wednesday during a hearing on a matching Senate version of the bill, at which Sen. John Tassoni, D-Smithfield, voiced his concern about the way the Ethics Commission is currently constructed as “a judge, jury and executioner.”

But a parade of candidates for high office have joined the citizens’ advocacy groups Common Cause, Operation Clean Government and the League of Women Voters to urge passage of the legislation. It would place legislators under the same Ethics Commission scrutiny that applies to every other elected official in Rhode Island, from the governor to the members of each local school board, zoning board and town council.

And Common Cause Executive Director John Marion told the lawmakers the proposal is not aimed at giving the nine-member Ethics Commission any more power than it had during its first two decades. He said 37 other states allow ethics oversight of their legislators.

The bill now goes to the full House for a vote, and then the Senate where Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors again Wednesday questioned the need for any action, and said: “If a member of the Assembly were doing something illegal, they could be prosecuted right now in the U.S. District Court by the U.S. Attorney and be subject to penalties for violating the law like any other citizen.”

And two of the House Judiciary Committee members who voted for the Fox bill said they did so with reservations, hoping House leaders will back an amendment to shore up the “speech-in-debate” protection that insulates legislators from being sued for what they say.

Fox’s legislation was prompted by a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that dismissed ethics charges pending against former Senate President William V. Irons based on a novel reading of the state’s “speech in debate clause.”

Irons had been accused of using his public office to obtain financial gain for pharmacy giant CVS — a “business associate” — while collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance commissions from Blue Cross on a health-insurance policy for CVS employees in Rhode Island.

Irons’ lawyer argued, and the Supreme Court agreed, that the “speech in debate clause” insulates lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny for any “core legislative act,” including “proposing, passing or voting upon a particular piece of legislation.”

In his dissent, Chief Justice Paul Suttell, a former member of the House of Representatives, cited the litany of scandals that led to the 1986 voter-mandated creation of the Ethics Commission, and said “a page of history is worth a volume of logic.”

On Wednesday, two Democratic candidates for attorney general added their voices to the chorus urging passage: state Rep. Peter Kilmartin, D-Pawtucket and Smithfield Councilman Stephen R. Archambault.

Archambault said: “Members of the General Assembly should be subject to the same Ethics Commission oversight as the rest of our state’s public officials. It is essential to rebuilding the public trust.”

Added Kilmartin: “Legislators working honestly on behalf of Rhode Islanders do not need a legal loophole to act as a shield. The proposed constitutional amendment will rightfully allow those who do not act honorably, ethically and legally to be prosecuted.”

The lawmakers are still filing their annual financial disclosure statements with the commission, so “there is still a significant measure of oversight that the Ethics Commission performs over the Assembly,” said Connors, hailing the filings as “the most important resource that the public has to sniff out any impure motives.”

Taxpayers deserve accountability for their $52,927

2010-05-25T12:13:00.000-07:00

Providence Journal

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

By Edward Fitzpatrick

You’ve heard of Joe the Plumber, right? Well, here in Rhode Island we have Joe the Constituent Liaison.

Attention is focusing on the fact that Joseph S. Burchfield, the former North Providence Town Council president, faces extortion and bribery charges, accused of joining two other councilmen in pocketing a $25,000 bribe. But it’s also worth noting that Burchfield has been working for the state Senate as a “constituent liaison.” While he’s on unpaid administrative leave now, he had been making $52,927 a year.

And that’s a figure worth keeping in mind as legislators decide whether to pass bills requiring that House and Senate floor votes, and committee votes, be posted on the legislature’s Web site in an easily accessible format.

At a time when elected officials and candidates bombard us with PR via Twitter and Facebook, there’s no excuse for not giving us a simple way to access vital information on how legislators voted on issues we care about. But you’ve already begun to hear the excuses taking shape on Smith Hill: It’s a tough year; we’d love to pass these bills but we’re not sure we can afford it; you understand, right?

Actually, no. Not when legislators are voting on crucial issues such as closing the state budget gap or closing the student achievement gap, enacting pension reform or an updated school-funding formula, deciding the future of a wind turbine project or the future of the bankrupt Twin River slot parlor.

And not when we’re spending $52,927 a year in taxpayer money for the likes of Joe the Constituent Liaison.

True constituent service would involve putting floor votes and committee votes into an easy-to-search format. While online House and Senate journals already include daily floor votes, curious citizens must know the date of the vote and scroll through a lengthy document. And about the only way to get a recent committee vote is go to the State House and track down a committee clerk.

Some state legislators want to follow Arizona’s example when it comes to cracking down on illegal immigration, but we’ll see if they also follow Arizona’s lead when it comes to public information. The Arizona legislature’s Web site not only gives you easy access to floor and committee votes on the controversial immigration bill, you can also see video of committee and floor discussions of the bill.

“We are so far behind in some respects,” said John M. Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island.

For example, Rhode Island is the only state that does not stream audio or video of legislative floor debates, Marion said. And we have the most cumbersome process for monitoring legislative votes online, he said, explaining that unlike other states, Rhode Island posts floor votes in PDF documents, which must be downloaded and cannot be quickly searched online.

Marion took note of one Byzantine twist to Senate journals: A “legislative day” can include multiple calendar days, so in February one of the Senate’s legislative days lasted two weeks, meaning it took 14 days for the Senate Journal to reflect votes from that legislative day.

Marion said the Assembly could post committee votes online without spending any money. “We’ll call that the Hyundai version,” he said.

And while the Assembly would have to spend some money to post floor votes in a more easily accessible format, Marion said, “For the price of one constituent liaison, you could likely have the Cadillac of legislative Web sites.”

Several bills require R.I. General Assembly votes to be posted online

2010-05-25T12:12:00.000-07:00

Providence Journal

By Randal Edgar

Journal State House Bureau

Their sessions are on cable TV, they have individual pages on the state Web site and the bills they sponsor can be found online. But a perceived lack of openness with regard to how state lawmakers actually vote is prompting a flurry of bills this year that would require the General Assembly to post those votes online.

No less than six bills have been submitted in recent weeks. Some, like a bill sponsored by Rep. David A. Segal, D-Providence, would require all floor votes to be posted on the Assembly Web site. Others, like a bill sponsored by Rep. Deborah Ruggiero, D-Jamestown, would require all roll-call committee votes to be posted on the Web site.

The idea has support from groups such as Common Cause Rhode Island, the Rhode Island League of Women Voters, Operation Open Government and the Rhode Island Tea Party.

“This is about easy access,” Greta L. Abbott, a lobbyist for the Rhode Island League of Women Voters, told the House Finance Committee on Tuesday. “Most important, this is about accountability.”

As Abbott and others noted, House and Senate floor votes can be found online, but only in PDF documents that summarize one or more days of House or Senate floor activity. For Rhode Islanders who want to see what their lawmakers are up to, it can be days and weeks before those votes show up online, said John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island. And when they do show up, it’s not in the most user-friendly format.

“Those journals aren’t easy to search through,” he said.

By contrast, more than a dozen states post roll-call votes to the Internet in real time, and others post them in a searchable format, Marion said, citing a 2008 study by the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Committee votes are a different issue. Unlike floor votes in the Rhode Island Assembly, committee votes are not posted online, though they are recorded by clerks and compiled at the state library.

Marion also noted that Rhode Island, according to the NCLS report, is the only state that does not broadcast live video or audio of House and Senate sessions over the Internet.

House Speaker Gordon D. Fox said Wednesday that he is looking at possible changes.

“We are reviewing the legislation and checking to see what the additional costs would be … to upgrade our legislative Web site,” he said in a statement.

There was no response from the Senate leadership, but Sen. Leonidas P. Raptakis, D-Coventry, sponsor of two Senate bills that call for votes to be posted online, said the costs would be minimal. He pointed to New Hampshire’s Web site, which allows viewers to select a lawmaker and view all of his or her votes for a given year.

“People should know how their state representative or state senator voted as quickly as possible,” he said.

In all, there are three bills before the House Finance Committee and three before the Senate Constitutional and Regulatory Issues Committee. All were held for further study last week.

Ruggiero told the House Finance Committee that her bill, which would require all roll-call committee votes to be posted online, is not perfect but would be a step in the right direction.

“Right now there is not a way for our constituents to see how committee votes are taken,” she said. “We want to make sure that we have good clean government and certainly transparency. That’s really the intent of this.”

Providence Journal editorial supports Maine fair elections sytem

2010-05-24T05:35:00.001-07:00

Editorial: Maine’s $5 election plan

01:00 AM EDT on Monday, May 24, 2010

It’s a bit cumbersome, especially at the start of someone’s campaign, but Maine’s “clean elections” law is making politics there more widely reflect the general will of the public, as opposed to that of special interests.

The system, described in a March 27 Boston Globe story “Maine blazes path in funding,” by Sasha Issenberg, involves having citizens wanting this or that candidate pay $5 to a state government fund set up for candidates.

Candidates for governor who reach a goal of $16,250, from 3,250 in individual contributions (cash, check or money order), can then ultimately, depending on their success in the primary elections, become eligible for from $400,000 to as much as $1.8 million in public funds. It’s a stepped process from primary to general election. Once candidates get those funds, they aren’t supposed to take money from other, private donors.

Ms. Issenberg reports that since it can be time-consuming and otherwise difficult to raise all those small individual amounts, candidates are allowed to finance those fund-raising campaigns by “collecting up to $200,000 in ‘seed money’ from contributions of $100 or less but have to shut down such accounts at the time they qualify for public money.”

Many of these contributions are raised at candidates’ speaking events, where they ask people to each pay $5 into the aforementioned account.

The system creates a sense of admirable civic engagement — it reminds people that anyone can be a “campaign contributor” and encourages candidates, if they reach the minimum of $16,250 to qualify, to spend more time on issues rather than on asking people for money. Other states should watch the Maine experience carefully.

R.I. Senate committee delays vote on wind-farm special exemption bill

2010-05-13T19:44:00.000-07:00

Providence Journal

01:00 AM EDT on Friday, May 14, 2010

By Alex Kuffner

Journal Staff Writer

A state Senate committee has again postponed voting on legislation that would benefit an offshore wind developer as the panel awaits amendments to the controversial bill.

The Senate Committee on Environment and Agriculture was set to vote Thursday on legislation that would allow Deepwater Wind LLC to enter into an agreement for the sale of electricity from its proposed eight-turbine wind farm near Block Island without first getting approval from the state Public Utilities Commission. It is the second delay for a decision on the bill after the cancellation of a vote Tuesday. No new date has been scheduled.

During the committee meeting Tuesday, its chairwoman, Sen. V. Susan Sosnowski, D-South Kingstown, said she was awaiting changes to the bill that were made after a hearing last week in which a host of individuals and groups questioned why the General Assembly would allow a private company to avoid review by the PUC and, instead, place consideration of a long-term power-purchase agreement in the hands of four other state agencies.

At another hearing before the House Committee on Environment and Natural Resources later on Tuesday, Governor Carcieri, a supporter of the legislation, said that possible amendments being discussed include the addition of an appeal process.

The legislation was proposed after the PUC voted in March to reject a 20-year contract between Deepwater and National Grid, the state’s main electricity utility, with the panel’s three members all concluding that the starting price of 24.4 cents per kilowatt-hour was not “commercially reasonable.” The current price for power from conventional sources is 9.2 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Deepwater did not appeal the decision — a potentially lengthy endeavor — because it needs a contract in place soon to place orders for its turbines and qualify for federal tax credits that will expire at the end of the year. Instead, the company is seeking to circumvent the PUC altogether.

Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch, a candidate to replace Carcieri in the governor’s office, has supported the PUC and objected to the legislation. So has the Conservation Law Foundation, which backs Deepwater’s wind farm but is against any change in the regulatory process to benefit a single company.

“[The legislation] provides no criteria for review of the contract between [National] Grid and Deepwater; no mechanism for translating realized cost savings into rates; no evidentiary hearings; no appeal; and creates only the appearance of process by suggesting that the contract would have to be approved by four administrative agency heads,” Tricia Jedele, director of CLF’s Rhode Island Advocacy Center, wrote in a May 12 letter to House and Senate members.

Also this week, government watchdogs Operation Clean Government and Common Cause Rhode Island came out in opposition to the bill.

“This bill is not a responsible reaction to an unfavorable decision of a regulatory agency,” Larry Valencia, president of Operation Clean Government said in a statement. “Creating public policy by subverting established processes is not healthy for democratic government.”

Vote on Deepwater-PUC bill is postponed

2010-05-13T19:42:00.000-07:00

Providence Business News

Published online May 13, 2010

energy

Vote on Deepwater-PUC bill is postponed

By Chris Barrett
PBN Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE – A Senate committee has called off a hearing originally scheduled for Thursday when it was expected the panel would vote on a bill that could kickstart development of a proposed offshore wind farm.

“The bill just isn’t ready,” Senate Environment and Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Sen. V. Susan Sosnowski, D-South Kingstown, told Providence Business News on Thursday afternoon. A new date for the hearing has not been scheduled yet, she said.

Sosnowski, who introduced the bill, said lawmakers and their staffers were still drafting amendments to the bill, which would allow four state agencies – instead of the R.I. Public Utilities Commission – to sign off on a power-purchase agreement between wind farm developer Deepwater Wind LLC and National Grid Plc.

The PUC rejected a draft contract between the two sides in March after commissioners decided the projected price of electricity from the project – 24.4 cents a kilowatt-hour – was too high.

The legislation to bypass the PUC has the backing of Gov. Donald L. Carcieri, who has testified before committees in both chambers of the General Assembly to express his support for the measure.

Not everyone supports the bill, however. Two good-government groups – Common Cause and Operation Clean Government – have come out against it, calling the bill an “unprecedented change in established process,” and R.I. Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch has repeatedly urged the General Assembly to reject the measure.

Despite the opposition, Sosnowski said the bill would “definitely” move forward in her committee.

Senate panel sets vote on Deepwater bill

2010-05-13T19:39:00.000-07:00

Providence Business News

Published online May 12, 2010

Senate panel sets vote on Deepwater bill

By Chris Barrett

PBN Staff Writer

DEEPWATER WIND wants to install up to eight wind turbines off Block Island by 2012, followed by a 106-turbine farm in Rhode Island Sound in 2015.

PROVIDENCE – A Senate committee is scheduled to vote Thursday on a bill that could jumpstart the offshore wind farm Deepwater Wind LLC wants to build off Block Island.

The bill would allow the heads of four state agencies to sign off on a power-purchase agreement between Deepwater and National Grid Plc. In March, the R.I. Public Utilities Commission rejected a proposed contract between the two, saying the projected wholesale price of the wind farm’s electricity, 24.4 cents per kilowatt-hour, was too high.

On Tuesday, the Senate Environment and Agriculture Committee voted to delay a hearing scheduled for that day in order to give legislative staffers more time to draft amendments requested by its chair, Sen. V. Susan Sosnowski, D-South Kingstown.

Sosnowski told Providence Business News on Wednesday that she wanted to amend her bill to clarify the process the four agency heads would take before approving the bill. She also wanted to add a cap on the price of electricity for Block Island customers, which was requested by the island’s top elected official, First Warden Kim Gaffett.

Currently, Block Island generates power from diesel generators and has no connection to the mainland electric grid. One component of the wind farm project would involve installing a transmission cable between the mainland and the island.

Sosnowski said her committee also wanted to see what happened at a House committee hearing on the bill Tuesday. Gov. Donald L. Carcieri emphasized his strong support of the bill at that hearing, just as he did last week before Sosnowski’s Senate committee.

“As I said last week, passage of this legislation in a timely manner is critically important to ensuring that Rhode Island will continue to be a leader in developing an offshore wind industry,” Carcieri said in prepared remarks. “We are poised on the brink of great opportunity and must act now to seize that opportunity.”

Not everyone agrees. On Tuesday, two good-government groups – Common Cause and Operation Clean Government – came out against the bill, calling it an “unprecedented change in established process,” and R.I. Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch has repeatedly urged the General Assembly to reject it.

In a statement, Lynch, who is running for governor, described the wind farm as “a special deal for the developers that will be bad for Rhode Island consumers” and, referring to the PUC, called the bill “an end run around an unfavorable decision from an independent, impartial and apolitical tribunal.”

In a letter to Sosnowski released Tuesday, Lynch thanked her for postponing the Senate committee’s vote on the bill. He also proposed revising the guidelines for the PUC’s review process or, alternatively, having a different body such as the R.I. Energy Facility Siting Board review the project.

“One factor that I believe is key to creating a viable alternative to the existing PUC procedures … is an appeal process that would keep the underlying proceeding and decision open and fair,” Lynch wrote. “This could be accomplished by providing our traditional Administrative Procedures Act review or by allowing automatic review by Petition for Certiorari to the [R.I.] Supreme Court from the agency’s final decision.”

Why we are speaking out about the wind farm process

2010-05-12T18:17:00.000-07:00

I am writing you today to explain why Common Cause Rhode Island has decided to oppose the newly revised process for approving the small wind farm off of Block Island found in bills H 8083 and S 2819. As you know, Common Cause is neither an energy nor an environmental group. We do not take a position on whether the wind farm should be built--in fact many of our members likely believe that we need to move to alternative forms of energy. What we do stand for is good government, as reflected in good process, and this bill is anathema to that concept.

You all know that for 15 years Common Cause has been closely associated with the Separation of Powers movement here in Rhode Island. That movement culminated in a series of changes to the state Constitution in 2004 removing legislators from executive boards and commissions. The logic behind that most significant change was that legislators should create processes and policies, and executives should carry them out. We feel that the current attempt by the Governor and legislature to bypass the Public Utilities Commission undermines the 15 years of work by Common Cause and others on the issue of Separation of Powers.

This legislation represents an attempt to make a policy change, ex post facto, by circumventing a historically important independent regulatory body. It substitutes a process that is much less independent, and has limited opportunity for appeal. The legislatures' judgment is being substituted for that of the experts charged with evaluating the proposal. This is abhorrent to the concept of Separation of Powers.

Perhaps most troubling is the precedent this sets for the future. Instead of an appeal, or a reevaluation of the criteria by which projects such as these are judged, the response to an adverse outcome in this instance has been to circumvent the process altogether, but only for this particular project. Where, we ask, will this behavior on the part of our elected officials end? What outcomes will they respect?

Common Cause has been a voice on the process of government for four decades in Rhode Island. We will continue to point out, when appropriate, instances where our elected officials disrespect the correct processes.

A return to a status quo that served Rhode Island well

2010-05-01T10:47:00.000-07:00

Providence Journal

A return to a status quo that served Rhode Island well

Saturday, May 1, 2010

By JOHN MARION

As the debate about what to do in the wake of the Rhode Island Supreme Court’s June 2009 decision in William V. Irons v. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission begins in earnest in the General Assembly, some misperceptions (and mischaracterizations) have arisen. As the group that began the initiative to counter that decision, Common Cause would like to set the record straight.

In July 2009 we drafted, with input from Operation Clean Government, language that in our view would restore the General Assembly to the jurisdiction of the Rhode Island Ethics Commission for their “core legislative acts” such as voting.

In the majority’s opinion, the court suggested such an action could be taken, as long as it was, in the court’s words, “sufficiently explicit.” In February 2010, then-Majority Leader and now House Speaker Gordon Fox agreed to sponsor our language after we agreed to add four words to our proposal — “by the ethics commission” — to the sentence “For any speech in debate in either house, no member shall be questioned in any other place, except by the ethics commission as set forth in Article III, section 8 of this Constitution.”

We feel our language is both sufficiently explicit to achieve the desired purpose, but de minimusso as to limit any unintended consequences.

Nonetheless, foes of our proposal in the General Assembly have sought to mischaracterize it. Some have said that it would expand the power of the Ethics Commission. Others have said it would chill the speech of legislators. It has even been called a “radical” proposal. None of these statements are true.

It is not our desire to radically alter the role of the Ethics Commission. Common Cause has a simple goal: to restore the jurisdiction of the Rhode Island Ethics Commission to what it was in 1987-2008.

If our proposal passes the legislature and is approved by a majority of voters in November, then we’ll simply be turning back the clock two years. If you think the General Assembly was not able to function freely, and the commission’s prosecutions of John Celona and William Irons were misguided, then by all means do not support our proposal.

Some believe our proposal would let the Ethics Commission interfere too much with the legislative process. Solid safeguards are already in place to prevent overreaching by the Ethics Commission. The regulations enacted by the Ethics Commission are subject to the same judicial review as are the actions of any governmental body. And given the strict scrutiny applied to any policy that infringes on freedom of speech, surely any that might be enacted that conflict with the Bill of Rights would be overturned.

It’s important to step back and realize that under our proposal members of the General Assembly still enjoy protection against criminal and other civil prosecution for their “speech in debate.”

Furthermore, the commission itself will only be overseeing the “core legislative acts” of legislators for violations of the Code of Ethics. That code, originally written by the legislature, is almost exclusively concerned with financial conflicts of interest, largely found in Sections 5(a) and 5(d) of the Code of Ethics.

The Ethics Commission is not in the business of judging the content of speech.

Another mischaracterization is that our proposed amendment would limit the role of the judicial branch. We do not seek to prevent people from appealing the decisions of the Ethics Commission to the Superior Court.

If our language passes, that right will still exist for those subject to the Code of Ethics. Our language does seek to clarify that the Ethics Commission, like many quasi-legislative bodies, has the right to hear cases. This is a well-established principle under the public-rights doctrine recognized by state and federal courts.

We do not take umbrage with those who say that the Ethics Commission is a unique body. But its uniqueness is derived from the will of the majority of Rhode Islanders who ratified the proposal of the 1986 Constitutional Convention. The delegates and the people who supported their work wanted an independent body to govern the ethics of all public officials. The independent nature of our ethics watchdog makes Rhode Island a model for America.

Keep in mind that even in independence, elected officials make all the appointments to the commission, and set the level of fines the commission can dole out.

Our proposed amendment is about reinstating a very limited part of the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission as it applies to only 113 of the many hundreds of public officials in Rhode Island. Currently the 39 legislative bodies that govern our cities and towns are subject to the Code of Ethics, and it has had no chilling effect on the speech and debate in those bodies. Nor was there a chill when the commission had jurisdiction over the General Assembly for 21 years.

Our less-than-radical proposal is being supported by Governor Carcieri, Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts, Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis and General Treasurer Frank Caprio — two of whom (Roberts and Caprio) previously served in the General Assembly, and one of whom (Carcieri) has been fined (four times) by the Ethics Commission.

When you hear someone arguing that our proposal is a radical solution, we hope you consider some of what you’ve read here. Do not let opponents lead you down the garden path with their ideas about how this proposal does anything but return us to the status quo that existed in 1987-2008.

John Marion is executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island.

Common Cause RI is hiring!

2010-04-21T06:17:00.000-07:00

EMPLOYER: Common Cause
1133 19th Street N.W. 9th Floor
Washington, D.C. 20036
www.commoncause.org

DEPARTMENT: State Operations

POSITION AVAILABLE: Associate Director—Position located in Rhode Island

REPORTS TO: Executive Director

SUMMARY OF POSITION: The Associate Director works in collaboration with the Executive Director in a multi-faceted role. The primary responsibility is to develop, manage, and assure execution of all aspects of the Common Cause fundraising program: Major gifts, annual giving, membership, corporate and foundation relations, special events, and planned giving. Responsible for design, production/publication of written and electronic communications to membership and the RI community. Day to day administrative and office support duties required due to small nature of office, with minimal supervision or direction. Demonstrates consistent commitment to advancing organization’s mission and objectives.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS: Fundraising: Create fund development strategies with the Executive Director and Board to ensure long term viability and build sustained capacity over time; Design and implement an annual fundraising plan with agreed goals and objectives, and submit written progress reports regularly to the Development Committee and Board; Major donors: Support Board members in their relationships with major donors; cultivate new major donor prospects, and upgrade existing donors to major donor status; New donors, members and volunteers: Develop specific plans to cultivate new relationships, engaging and assisting Board members in this effort; Coordinate, with Board leadership, all aspects and details of plans for the Annual Meeting and other fundraising and educational events; Develop and track proposals and reports for all foundation and corporate fundraising; Maintain the fundraising database, gift acknowledgement, and other key aspects of stewardship and donor cultivation—correspondence, phone calls, reports, mailings, etc. Communications: Design a communication plan directed to multiple audiences, with different media preferences; Content development and publication of printed and electronic communications, including press releases, newsletters, promotional materials, and email/ website updates.

QUALIFICATIONS: Demonstrated leadership and organizing ability; excellent written and oral communications skills; strong fundraising skills; ability to work under pressure; familiarity with the state legislature and legislative process; strong interpersonal skills; commitment to the public interest; ability to work independently; willingness to travel; experience in public presentations, desktop publishing, volunteer management, database management and financial management desirable; Undergraduate degree required, advance degree a plus.

TO APPLY: Please submit resume, cover letter and salary requirements to Director of Human Resources at hr@commoncause.org and include Associate Director—Rhode Island in the subject line; or fax to 202-355-7546. No phone calls please. Applicants are encouraged to respond as soon as possible.

About Common Cause:
Common Cause is a nonpartisan nonprofit advocacy organization founded in 1970 by John Gardner as a vehicle for citizens to make their voices heard in the political process and to hold their elected leaders accountable to the public interest. Now with nearly 300,000 members and supporters and 36 state organizations, Common Cause remains committed to honest, open and accountable government, as well as encouraging citizen participation in democracy.

Rhode Island General Assembly: Leave our care alone

2010-04-20T09:53:00.000-07:00

05:00 PM EDT on Monday, April 19, 2010

State lawmakers once again spared their own free health-care packages — costing up to $18,061 annually — from last week’s round of state government, municipal aid and pension cuts.

Starting July 1, state employees will pay between 15 and 25 percent of the premiums for their own health, dental and vision-care packages. State lawmakers opted against voting to do the same, amid stated concerns by their Republican and Democratic leaders that voting on their own compensation packages might put them in violation of the state ethics code, a notion that has since been dispelled by the state Ethics Commission.

“Generally when a public body wants to change their own compensation structure, we tell them to go ahead and vote and implement it after the next election,” said Ethics Commission lawyer Jason Gramitt.

The issue came up in the early-morning hours of Wednesday, when the part-time lawmakers were still voting on a bill to close a projected $220-million deficit in the current budget year that ends June 30. Rep. Karen Macbeth, D-Cumberland, proposed an amendment that would have required the state’s lawmakers to pay 15 percent of the cost of their health benefits.

Many lawmakers voluntarily contribute something toward the cost of their coverage. Others do not. Here is a rundown, according to the legislative business office: In the House, those paying nothing include: Representatives Grace Diaz, Brian Kennedy, David Segal and Timothy Williamson.

Rep. Scott Pollard is paying 5 percent of the premium cost. Those paying 10 percent include: Representatives Edith Ajello, Joseph Almeida, Samuel Azzinaro, Jon Brien, Kenneth Carter, Elaine Coderre, Arthur Corvese, Steve Costantino, John DeSimone Laurence Ehrhardt, Robert Flaherty, Gordon Fox, Douglas Gablinske, Raymond Gallison, Alfred Gemma, Arthur Handy, J. Russell Jackson, Donald Lally, John Loughlin, Jan Malik, Peter Martin, Nicholas Mattiello, John McCauley, Joseph McNamara, William Murphy, Eileen Naughton, J. Patrick O’Neill, Edwin Pacheco, Peter Palumbo, Amy Rice, Deborah Ruggiero, William San Bento, John Savage, Gregory Schadone, Maryann Shallcross-Smith, Agostinho Silva, Scott Slater, Joseph Trillo, Donna Walsh, Peter Wasylyk, Robert Watson, Anastasia Williams. Sullivan has been paying 20 percent of the cost of his health insurance package since March.

Representatives David Caprio and Helio Melo are paying 15 percent, while Representatives Brian Newberry, Peter Petrarca, and Thomas Winfield are paying 20 percent.

Those accepting $2,002 waiver payments for not taking the coverage include: Representatives Lisa Baldelli-Hunt, John Carnevale, Rodney Driver, Deborah Fellella, Frank Ferri, Charlene Lima, Karen MacBeth, Mary Messier, Michael Rice, Stephen Ucci and Kenneth Vaudreuil. Those forgoing the waiver payments and coverage include: Roberto DaSilva, John Edwards, Christopher Fierro, Scott Guthrie, Joy Hearn, Robert Jacquard, Peter Kilmartin, Michael Marcello, Rene Menard and Patricia Serpa.

Rep. Joanne Giannini has asked the legislative business office to shave 10 percent off her waiver payment, MacBeth, 15 percent, and Lima 20 percent. A principal of the Leo A. Savoie School in Woonsocket, MacBeth says she donates her waiver payment to needy individuals and groups in her community.

In the Senate, four lawmakers pay nothing: Senators Leo Blais, James Doyle, John McBurney and Dominick Ruggerio.

Those paying 10 percent include Senators Frank Ciccone, Daniel Connors, Marc Cote, Elizabeth Crowley, Daniel DaPointe, Beatrice Lanzi, J. Michael Lenihan, Charles Levesque, Erin Lynch, Michael McCaffrey, Joshua Miller, M. Teresa Paiva Weed, Roger Picard, Rhode Perry, Juan Pichardo, V. Susan Sosnowski, John Tassoni and William Walaska. Those paying 20 percent include: Dennis Algiere, David Bates, Edward O’Neill, and Michael Pinga.

Senators accepting the $2,002 waiver payment include: Frank DeVall, Walter Felag, Hanna Gallo, Chrisopher Maselli, and Harold Metts. Those eschewing both the waiver payment and the coverage include: Louis DiPalma, Paul Fogarty, Maryellen Goodwin, Paul Jabour and James Sheehan. Sen. Leonidas Raptakis gave up his state health insurance on April 12, 2009, which entitles him to a pro-rated portion of the $2,002 waiver payment given legislators who forgo the coverage which, in his case, totaled $1,386 for last year.

Sen. Francis T. Maher Jr., R-Exeter, is not taking the health insurance or waiver payment.

Consequences alleged of term limits

Second thoughts anyone about term-limits?

This is what John Marion, executive director of the citizens’ advocacy group Common Cause, had to say about some of term-limited Governor Carcieri’s two Florida vacations in the last month while the state was still digging out of historic flooding and budget crises, and his creation of a nonpublic account to finance his radio ad campaigns.

“There are unintended consequences to any reform, and I think this is an example of an unintended consequence of term limits,” Marion said.

“I’m sure there were arguments at the time they were enacted that expanding the length of the term from two to four years had benefits (less campaigning, more governing).… [But] the term-limit movement that was so strong in the U.S. in the 1990s has clearly run its course, and perhaps this is an example why,” he said.

Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe confirmed on Friday that the Republican governor left the night before for a week in Florida. “The governor is spending the legislative break in Florida with his family,” she said. Carcieri took heat for overseeing the state’s flood-cleanup efforts from Florida this month. In the last year of his final four-year term, he is barred by term limits from running for reelection.

A former political science teacher, Marion noted that term limits have had mixed results in states that extended them to lawmakers, including “a loss of professionalization in the ranks of legislators, and the emergence of new, young leaders such as the thirty-something speaker of the House in Maine.… It also seems to lead to more competition for higher office as people term-limit out of their current office.”

Here in Rhode Island, Marion said he didn’t think “now [was] the time to revisit term limits,” and “we should avoid making systemic changes based on the behavior of a single individual.”

Tea Partiers become State House lobbyists

Taking further steps toward becoming entrenched political players, seven members of the Rhode Island Tea Party movement have become registered State House lobbyists.

They include talk radio regular Bruno “Buddy” Tassoni, who, when spotted wearing a purple lobbying badge at an outdoor State House rally last week, said: “The Tea Party is a force to be reckoned with.” (And yes — that’s the same Tassoni of the infamous Carcieri talk-radio comment — “Amen to you, Buddy.”) Added another of the Tea Party’s registered lobbyists, Diane McLaughlin: “We are trying to become a little more formalized so we can have a little more impact.”

Indeed, the outsider group’s latest move into the established political world follows the formation of a political action committee that allows the conservative organization to begin donating money to individual candidates and making endorsements.

In addition to Tassoni and McLaughlin, the full list of lobbyists registered with the group, “Rhode Island Tea Party, Inc.,” is as follows: Maureen Kearney, Richard Langseth, Judith Gallagher, William Perry, and Kenneth Page.

Walaska opts not to run for state treasurer

State Sen. William A. Walaska, D-Warwick, has decided not to run for state treasurer this year.

Walaska, a Warwick Democrat, had been considering a run for the job held by Gen. Treas. Frank T. Caprio, a Democrat now running for governor. He plans to seek reelection instead.

Gerald M. Carbone, a Warwick Democrat who was a Providence Journal reporter for 18 years, has filed a notice with the state Board of Elections and is considering challenging Walaska for the Senate seat.

redgar@projo.com

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story included incorrect information provided by the Joint Committee on Legislative Services on the health insurance status of Rep. Raymond Sullivan, D-Coventry, and Senators Leonidas Raptakis, D-Coventry, and and Francis T. Maher Jr., R-Exeter. Sullivan has been paying 20 percent of the cost of his health insurance package since March, not 10 percent, as the JCLS reported. Raptakis gave up his state health insurance on April 12, 2009, which entitles him to a pro-rated portion of the $2,002 waiver payment given legislators who forgo the coverage which, in his case, totaled $1,386 for last year. Maher is not taking the health insurance or waiver payment.

The complicated world of political ethics

2010-04-09T09:46:00.000-07:00

The complicated world of political ethics
on 04-04-2010

Politics as Usual by Jim Baron

There is a certain academic argument that could be made — I know because I sat (for hours) and listened to members of the House Judiciary Committee try to make it a couple of weeks ago — that there is a downside to giving the R.I. Ethics Commission the power to oversee the legislative acts of General Assembly members.

I enjoy a good academic argument as much as the next fellow, but I have to come down on the side of making lawmakers answerable to someone for actions that are unethical. Yes, I am familiar with the argument that they are answerable to voters every two years but 1) sometimes voters aren’t all that vigilant, and may not remember the headlines from an incident a year and a half before, and 2) in too many cases, General Assembly members don’t have an opponent, which leaves voters with no real recourse.
Yes, this power could be taken too far. The entire constitutional provision that creates the Ethics Commission is a minefield of opportunities for it to go too far. But while you can fault the Ethics Commission for many things since its creation in 1986, overzealousness is not one of them. To the contrary, if anything the panel has been too timid too often in dealing with public officials who have crossed the line, or danced perilously close to it.

While it is crystal clear that any vote legislators make that enrich themselves, their families (don’t forget nieces-in-law), their employers or business associates should be fair game for Ethics Commission action, I understand the problem lawmakers have with what they say and where making them liable to an ethics investigation or prosecution.

Yes, merely speaking about a matter in which one has a personal interest could be considered a transgression — if a legislator, particularly one in a leadership position or who is a committee chairman does not actually vote but (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) stands up and states their position before the vote that pretty well meets the definition of unethical.

But say a legislator is an electrician, and there is a bill before the assembly that somehow regulates the behavior of electricians. If that legislator is walking through the corridor of the Statehouse talking to a legislator buddy about how this is a stupid proposal that shows no knowledge of how electricians work (not out of the realm of possibility) is that legislator violating the ethics code? Should he or she have to spend thousands or tens of thousands of dollars on a lawyer (not out of the realm of possibility) to defend that comment before the ethics commission, with all the attendant bad press that would attract?

That is a closer call.

It not only compromises freedom of speech, but the whole idea of having citizen-legislators is so that there will be someone who knows about being an electrician when bills about electricians come up.

We have to be always vigilant for conflicts of interest, but there also has to be some factor for giving officials who were elected by the people in their districts the benefit of the doubt in some instances.

This is why who you vote for is so important.

If there is such pervasive mistrust of the people who are elected on the part of the people who elect them, the system is badly broken. The consent of the governed becomes hopelessly skewed.

The best answer is to elect people we can trust, because at some level you need to trust the people you elect.

Sometimes that trust is misplaced. That is why a vigorous free press is so important to our form of government and it is why we need an Ethics Commission. That is why Sen. Frank Ciccone’s proposal to have the Senate police the actions of its own members doesn’t pass the laugh test.

So House Speaker Gordon Fox’s proposed constitutional amendment bringing the legislative actions of legislators under the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission should go on the ballot and people should vote for it.

But we also have to be careful that the some future Ethics Commission doesn’t try to take its power too far and infringe on the real and important prerogatives that the representatives of the people should have.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Who will guard the guards themselves?

That is an important question when you give one unelected panel like the Ethics Commission the power to write laws, enforce and execute those laws, prosecute people for violating those laws, pass judgment on their guilt or innocence, and penalize them with fines or removal from office.

Lawrence Lessig to speak on campaign reform

2010-04-05T12:57:00.000-07:00

Over 100 people attended our discussion last Wednesday about the Citizens United decision we co-hosted with the Providence Athenaeum. It was a wonderful evening of civil discourse on a matter of tremendous importance for our democracy. Thank you to all who attended and participated.

This week, we are happy to announce that there will be a public lecture by Professor Lawrence Lessig of Harvard Law School and Fix Congress First! titled "Campaign Reform in the Digital Age." Professor Lessig's talk will examine the repercussions of the Citizens United decision, particularly the prospect for Fair Elections legislation. The talk and discussion will be an great extension of the conversation about the implications of the Supreme Court's decision for our democracy.

If you are able to attend, please RSVP by clicking here and filling out the appropriate information. This talk is being sponsored by the Brown University chapter of Democracy Matters.

Where: List Art Center, Room 120
62-64 Waterman Street
Brown University
Providence, RI 02912
(click here for a map)

When: Friday, April 9, 5:00pm

Free and open to the public! Please invite your friends!

Athenaeum Event a Success

2010-04-05T12:55:00.001-07:00

Thank you to everyone who attended and participated in the event on March 31st co-hosted with the Providence Athenaeum. We had a wonderful evening discussing the Citizens United decision and the future of our democracy.

R.I. ethics oversight debate resumes

2010-03-24T13:30:00.000-07:00

R.I. ethics oversight debate resumes
01:00 AM EDT on Wednesday, March 24, 2010
By Katherine Gregg

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — The governor, lieutenant governor and secretary of state have all sent letters urging the House Judiciary Committee to let voters decide, in November, whether they want to exempt state legislators from the Ethics Commission scrutiny that applies to every other public official in Rhode Island, from councilmen to cemetery commissioners.

In her letter, Lt. Gov. Elizabeth H. Roberts called ethics legislation introduced by new House Speaker Gordon D. Fox early in this year’s legislative session essential to restoring “the public’s faith and trust in government.”

State Treasurer Frank Caprio came to Tuesday night’s Judiciary Committee hearing on the bill in person to urge lawmakers to plug the so-called “Irons loophole” created by a dome-rattling Rhode Island Supreme Court decision last June.

The focus of their remarks was the Fox-sponsored bill to let voters amend the state Constitution, in November, to restore the Ethics Commission’s jurisdiction over the 113 General Assembly members.

But one after another, the lawmakers themselves raised concerns about having an “unelected body” looking over their shoulders.

“I’ve been here a year and a half now,” said freshman Rep. Scott Pollard, D-Foster. “There aren’t any corrupt people in the building … you smile, but I know them and you don’t, OK?

“And if you do know them to be corrupt then I suggest that you call the attorney general’s office and seek [to have] them prosecuted because the people who serve, at least in my chamber, are good and honorable people.

“And this steals away the vote and the expertise that people bring to the room,” Pollard told spokesmen for the Rhode Island Tea Party and the citizens’ advocacy group Operation Clean Government, who had come to the State House to lobby for the bill.

Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island Affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, also voiced concerns about giving the Ethics Commission “virtually limitless authority to decide what constitutes a ‘conflict of interest’ or ethical misconduct when it comes to both legislators’ votes and their participation in the legislative process.”

As an example, he cited Republican Governor Carcieri’s effort four years ago to make “it illegal for a lawyer-legislator who performs criminal defense work to vote on just about any criminal justice legislation. … In practical terms, legislators could be barred from discussing or debating any of the issues about which they have the most expertise.”

Fox’s legislation was prompted by a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that dismissed ethics charges pending against former Senate President William V. Irons based on a novel reading of the state’s “speech in debate clause.”

Irons had been accused of using his public office to obtain financial gain for pharmacy giant CVS — a “business associate” — while collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance commissions from Blue Cross on a health-insurance policy for CVS employees in Rhode Island.

Irons’ lawyer argued — and the Supreme Court agreed — that the “speech in debate clause” insulates lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny for any “core legislative act,” including “proposing, passing, or voting upon a particular piece of legislation.”

No vote was taken Tuesday on the fix-it legislation crafted by the citizens advocacy group Common Cause that Fox introduced on Feb. 4. Asked why he did not seek a vote, Fox said, through a spokesman: “I want to make sure that the language is correct before we ask voters to consider a Constitutional amendment. I want to review the testimony that will be offered tonight, both pro and con, and make sure we get it right.”

But some version of the ethics legislation appears headed for passage after more than a year in which the Ethics Commission has told lawmakers it can no longer give them even advisory opinions.

Most recently, Fox’s newly appointed House Labor Committee chairwoman Anastasia Williams asked the panel if her membership on the executive committee of the AFL-CIO and her chairmanship of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement posed a conflict.

On March 5, the Ethics Commission’s executive director Kent A. Willever wrote back: “Absent a Constitutional amendment to clarify the original intent of the 1986 Ethics Amendment, the Ethics Commission is without apparent authority to respond to your request for independent advice.”

Speaking for Common Cause, lawyer and onetime congressional candidate Kevin McAllister said the proposal is not aimed at giving the nine Ethics Commission members any more power than they “exercised from the period of 1986 to 2008.”

RI lawmakers debate giving ethics panel more power

2010-03-23T13:35:00.000-07:00

RI lawmakers debate giving ethics panel more power

By Eric Tucker Associated Press Writer / March 23, 2010

PROVIDENCE, R.I.—Rhode Island's Constitution should be amended to allow the Ethics Commission to prosecute lawmakers for their votes, elected officials and advocates for good government testified on Tuesday.

A resolution introduced by House Speaker Gordon Fox would authorize a constitutional amendment to strengthen the quasi-judicial ethics panel so that lawmakers could be prosecuted for their votes and other legislative acts. The amendment would be decided by voters in a ballot question and, if approved, take effect next January.

The House Judiciary Committee heard testimony on the resolution on Tuesday.

The state Supreme Court -- in a decision upholding the dismissal of an ethics complaint against former Senate President William Irons -- last year shielded lawmakers from being prosecuted when they propose, debate and vote on bills or otherwise do their legislative jobs. The opinion relied on a constitutional provision known as "speech in debate," which reads: "For any speech in debate in either house, no member shall be questioned in any other place."

The resolution proposes adding the words, "except by the ethics commission," to the provision.

Critics say the Supreme Court's ruling weakened the commission's ability to police legislative misconduct and to target lawmakers who illicitly vote to advance their own interests or those of a business client.

"There is a loophole that has been exploited and that should not be allowed to stand," General Treasurer Frank Caprio, a Democratic candidate for governor, told the committee.

Other elected officials, including Lieutenant Governor Elizabeth Roberts and Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis, released letters in support of restoring the commission's power.

But some lawmakers said they were concerned the amendment would give too much power to the Ethics Commission, an unelected, appointed body with power to prosecute public officials and hold trial-like hearings over alleged ethics violations.

"If a representative does something wrong, the strongest power against him is the ballot box," said Rep. Scott Pollard, a Coventry Democrat. "To turn over authority of your building to an unelected body that probably 98 percent of the public doesn't know by name, doesn't know by face -- I think it's a dangerous concept."

That criticism was echoed by the American Civil Liberties Union, which said the proposed amendment was too broad.

"It affects speech, it affects debate," said Steven Brown, executive director of the ACLU state affiliate. "It is not just the vote."

The Ethics Commission emerged from a 1986 constitutional convention and was an effort to tighten ethics oversight of elected officials. Lawyers for the commission and other supporters say they believe the amendment that created the panel created a narrow exception to the "speech in debate" clause by making all state lawmakers subject to the ethics code.

"If the intention of creating the Ethics Commission was to govern the ethics of all public officials, then certainly the legislature's a significant chunk of all public officials in this state," John Marion, executive director of Common Cause of Rhode Island, said in an interview before Tuesday's hearing.

The commission still has oversight of wrongdoing, like nepotism and financial disclosure violations. But leaving it unable to prosecute public officials for votes could have hampered some of its highest-profile cases, like the one against former Sen. John Celona, who in 2006 was fined a record $130,000 after admitting to ethics violations that partially involved his votes.

Poltical Scene: Ethics debate

2010-03-15T05:41:00.000-07:00

Political Scene:

07:18 AM EDT on Monday, March 15, 2010

By Katherine Gregg and Randal edgar

Journal State House Bureau

Ethics debate

Are Rhode Island’s lawmakers capable of policing themselves in the absence of oversight by the state Ethics Commission?

Sen. Frank A. Ciccone III, vice chairman of the Senate Committee on Government Oversight, thinks they are.

The Providence Democrat has sponsored two bills that would spell out conflicts of interest and improper use of office and give the Senate Rules Committee the power to “investigate and make recommendations” on possible violations that are outside the purview of the Ethics Commission.

Ciccone says the bills would allow senators to “police ourselves until such as time as the Ethics Commission can.” But they drew opposition at a Rules Committee hearing last week.

Robert Benson of Operation Clean Government said, “Ethics oversight of a body by a body doesn’t work.”

John Marion, executive director of Common Cause, questioned how “the Senate could go about doing this in an evenhanded manner” without an independent body handling the investigations.

The debate stems from a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that effectively removed Rhode Island lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny.

In a case involving former Senate President William V. Irons, the court said the “speech-in-debate” clause in the state Constitution gives legislators immunity from prosecution by the Ethics Commission for “core legislative functions” such as voting and speaking.

Rules Committee members voted to hold Ciccone’s bills for further study, meaning they are going nowhere unless Ciccone asks for further consideration, said committee Chairman John Maselli, D-Johnston.

Maselli said the next step is to see what happens with a bill sponsored by Sen. J. Michael Lenihan, D-East Greenwich, that would give voters a chance to close the hole in state ethics law. House Speaker Fox has introduced a similar bill.

Maselli said it seems likely that if the change goes to voters they would approve it. But that still leaves the question of whether something should be done in the short term.

“We have a whole legislative session that’s going to go by,” he said.

2010-03-10T12:47:00.000-08:00

RIP to Granny D. (1910-2010), long-time advocate of campaign finance reform and relative of Common Cause Rhode Island Governing Board member Tory M.

Why the Senate shouldn't regulate its own ethics

2010-03-03T07:10:00.000-08:00

by John Marion and Larry Valencia

Mar 02, 2010

There is a plan that has been introduced to the Rules Committee of the Rhode Island Senate that would allow that body to police its own ethics. Our groups, Common Cause Rhode Island and Operation Clean Government, will oppose that measure, and we’d like to take this opportunity to explain why.

This effort began with the Rhode Island Supreme Court’s decision in June of 2009 in the case of William V. Irons vs. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission. In that decision, the Court majority found that members of the Rhode Island General Assembly are immune from prosecution by the Rhode Island Ethics Commission for any “core legislative act.” The reasoning for their opinion rests on the idea that when the voters approved a constitutional amendment in 1986 creating the Ethics Commission, they did not simultaneously repeal the “speech in debate clause” of the Constitution that protects legislators from prosecution for these “core legislative acts.” Surely when the voters overwhelmingly passed that amendment that read in part “all public officials shall be subject to the code of ethics” they meant to include the General Assembly. While we side with the dissenting justice, Chief Justice Suttell, we have to recognize the import of the Court’s ruling: members of the General Assembly are not subject to the Code of Ethics when they are engaged in their core legislative functions. We need to remedy this, once and for all.

Immediately our groups mobilized to push for a constitutional amendment for the 2010 ballot that would allow the voters to correct what we feel was an oversight in the 1986 Ethics Amendment. Our proposed amendment would return the Ethics Commission to the status quo that existed between 1986 and 2008. That resolution is now before the General Assembly, and we hope they will pass it and let the voters decide.

In the meantime, the Rhode Island Senate appears poised to adopt a plan to avoid coming under the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission by allowing the Senate Rules Committee (chaired by Senator Christopher Maselli of Johnston) to decide whether members of the Senate have violated the Code of Ethics. This would be done under the auspices of the discipline clause (Article VI Section 7) of the Rhode Island Constitution that allows each chamber to determine how to punish its own members. In the history of the Rhode Island General Assembly, this would be the first attempt to create such a structure.

Why do we feel this is a bad idea? To answer that question we think it is important to go back to the creation of the Ethics Commission in 1986. The Ethics Commission is one of only two bodies, besides the legislature itself, enumerated in the Rhode Island Constitution. Article III where the Commission resides in our Constitution, reads in part (from Section 7), “The people of the state of Rhode Island believe that public officials and employees must adhere to the highest standards of ethical conduct..” It goes on to say in Section 8, “The general assembly shall establish an independent non-partisan ethics commission … All elected and appointed officials and employees of state and local government … shall be subject to the code of ethics.”

This language that was passed overwhelmingly by the voters of the state calls for an independent body to enforce ethics for all public officials. The Senate proposal calls for internal oversight. This is a concept fraught with complications. How are members of the Rhode Island Senate expected to judge their peers? The term “peer pressure” exists for a reason. All legislatures are governed by rules that require comity in order to perform their business. That is why every day the Senate hears bills on a consent calendar. All members must consent to doing that day’s business. Independent ethics oversight is designed to prevent that comity from interfering with the enforcement of the Code of Ethics.

And what if a member of the leadership is accused of violating the Code of Ethics? Would a member of the rank and file, who owes their place on a committee, or their legislative grant, to the leadership be willing to find the a member of the leadership guilty of violating the Code? Would the minority party find it a useful tactic to file endless ethics complaints to sully the reputation of the majority? There are a seemingly endless number of complications with putting real ethics oversight inside the institution.

A second good reason the Senate should not adopt this role is because it duplicates what already exists in the Ethics Commission. The Ethics Commission has a staff of 12, including three full time investigators, and five attorneys. Their annual budget appropriation is over $1 million. Does the Senate intend to hire professional investigators and attorneys who don’t owe their jobs to the very Senators they’re charged with investigating and prosecuting?

While the Rhode Island Senate may feel it is the prerogative of the body to police itself, we believe there are a whole host of reasons why this is inferior to the system that was in place for 22 years in the State of Rhode Island. All our groups are asking is that the people of the state be allowed to determine what they meant by “all public officials” back in 1986.

John Marion is the executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island, and Larry Valencia is the president of Operation Clean Government.

Political Scene: With Fox in power, the shuffle of chairmanships begins

2010-02-15T19:03:00.000-08:00

By Steve Peoples, Randal Edgar and Katherine Gregg

Journal State House Bureau

Rep. Anastasia P. Williams offered an eloquent endorsement of Gordon Fox to the House chamber last week.

By the end of the night, Fox was the speaker and Williams had been named chairwoman of the House Committee on Labor.

A Providence Democrat, Williams later acknowledged that her philosophy differs substantially from the more conservative former chairman Arthur J. Corvese, D-North Providence.

She also acknowledged that she has been a longtime member of the executive committee of the Rhode Island AFL-CIO, the largest coalition of labor unions in the state.

Her page on the legislature’s Web site lists various associations and memberships, but excludes the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, for which she serves as the chairwoman.

We confirmed Williams’ unpaid service as an AFL-CIO board member in the organization’s most recent tax filing.

The House Labor Committee reviews legislation that affects workplace issues, including binding arbitration and the state’s minimum wage.

“I have no idea if it is a conflict,” Williams said of her AFL-CIO connection, adding that she would seek the guidance of the state Ethics Commission.

“If it is in any way shape a conflict, I will certainly remove myself [from the AFL-CIO board] immediately.”

Malik loses out

Rep. Jan Malik has been stripped of his role as chairman of the House Committee of Environment and Natural Resources, apparently for backing the losing candidate in the House speaker’s race.

Malik, a Warren Democrat and liquor store owner, held the chairmanship for more than two years. But he backed Rep. Gregory J. Schadone, the losing candidate in the speaker’s race, and even seconded his nomination on the House floor Thursday evening.

“I understand that this is how the political game is played,” Malik told Political Scene.

Still, he conceded that he’s not happy.

“He’s got his chance now. Prove me wrong,” he said of Fox. “Not putting stuff in for Common Cause and looking like a knight in shining armor for one day, and then all of the sudden he gets rid of people, not just me, who don’t support him. People are tired of that kind of leadership. Why should anyone up there get punished for voicing their opinion?”

While Fox repeatedly urged cooperation in his first speech to the House chamber as speaker, his spokesman Larry Berman later declined to respond to Malik’s criticism.

Malik’s replacement will be Rep. Arthur Handy, D-Cranston, who voted for Fox.

“I think that’s maybe why I was picked. But I had already decided to support Gordon before this was discussed with me. It wasn’t something I had to do on my end. It wasn’t a trade for me,” Handy said.

He continued: “Rep. Malik chose not to support Leader Fox, even after he knew what the conclusion was. ... It’s the way it’s always been done. In business, you certainly wouldn’t put somebody in charge of something you didn’t trust.”

Another Caprio

Also voting for Gordon Fox was the lawmaker who is the son of Providence Municipal Court Judge Frank Caprio and the younger brother of state Treasurer Frank Caprio.

State Rep. David Caprio, D-Narragansett, claims both those titles, and as of last week, he also has a new title.

Fox chose him to be chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, a post that had been held by fellow South County Democrat Donald Lally.

First elected to the House in a 1999 special election, David Caprio, 42, is a first-term member of the House Finance Committee and has also held seats on the House Corporations, Labor and Judiciary Committees.

He said he told Fox, who is currently the House majority leader, that he “would be happy to serve him in whatever capacity I could serve him best.”

While he works with his second-cousin Anthony Caprio out of the Caprio family law offices just beyond the arch at the gateway to Federal Hill, Caprio said he would actually describe himself as a sole practitioner with a general practice that includes a lot of family law.

Lally, who voted for Fox, also received a promotion of sorts, becoming the deputy majority whip.

Mayors’ PR

Mayors and town managers, not generally shy about communicating their feelings about the governor’s plan to cut local aid, have begun an organized effort to speak with a unified voice.

A group of about 15 mayors and managers has taken to issuing its own collective news releases, with the help of True North, a Providence-based communications firm led by longtime PR man Bill Fischer.

The mayors and managers –– from places ranging from Cumberland to Providence to Westerly –– have dubbed themselves the Coalition of Communities Improving Rhode Island.

While trying to absorb budget cuts, the local officials are willing to pay True North about $200 per press release, said Cumberland Mayor Daniel J. McKee, who stressed that the company is not being paid on a retainer basis but only for each job.

The most recent release, issued Feb. 3, highlighted a new report that calls for Rhode Island to adopt a school funding policy that is “child-centered, equitable and accountable.”

Trillo’s fame

State Rep. Joe Trillo has made national news.

Sort of.

The outspoken Warwick Republican was among a handful of conservatives interviewed for a special report that aired last week on Comedy Central’s “Daily Show” with Jon Stewart.

The segment was hardly complimentary of the Republican National Committee’s decision to host its winter meeting in Hawaii.

“This is not a vacation, this is a working meeting, it’s our working meeting, we’re here to do the business of the party,” RNC chairman Michael Steele says, wearing a Hawaiian shirt with a red lei around his neck.

Roughly two minutes into the segment, the Daily Show reporter is shown outside the Hawaiian hotel alongside a penguin. “This is a party with their finger on the pulse of Main Street,” he says.

It’s a few seconds later that Trillo appears on camera: “They’re out of touch, they’re totally out of touch,” Trillo says of Democrats.

Trillo, the Rhode Island Republican Party’s national committeeman, defended the location when contacted by Political Scene, saying the annual meetings are held in different spots each year — preferably in states with Republican governors.

Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle, a Republican, spoke at the recent event and “delivered an excellent talk,” said Trillo, who noted that the national Republican party held its Northeast regional meeting in Newport last fall.

Trillo said he paid all his expenses for the Hawaii meeting, including travel and accommodations.

“Not one penny did I spend of my campaign money or get money from the party,” he said.

GOP primaries

Members of the Republican party’s State Central Committee succeeded last week in keeping alive their goal of closing the party’s primaries, but should they be closed, it won’t happen this year, says party Chairman Giovanni Cicione.

True, Cicione allowed supporters of closed primaries to read a motion to that effect at last week’s central committee meeting, but he said the soonest the issue could be discussed would be at the next central committee meeting, in April. That would be too late to allow a rule change this year, he said.

Cicione, who faced a movement to oust him as party chairman over this very issue, said he does not oppose the change, per se, but does oppose the push to do it during an election year, when “individual candidates” can try to influence the decision.

“I don’t think it’s fair to candidates or people who are thinking of being candidates to change the rules at this late stage,” he said.

He pointed to a rules change during 2006 that allowed the party to support then U.S. Sen. Lincoln Chafee in his primary campaign against Cranston Mayor Stephen P. Laffey.

“It allowed a national committee to fund Chafee’s campaign prior to the primary, rather than allowing voters to decide who … to put up,” he said.

Laffey, viewed as a potential candidate for governor in 2010, is one of the Republicans who supports the move to close the primaries, which would block non-registered Republicans from voting.

Republican boost

The state Republican party is getting some much-needed help in paying its full-time staff of one.

State Central Committee members learned at last week’s meeting that the national Republican party has agreed to pay for a staff member in each of the 50 states.

The move comes at a good time for Rhode Island Republicans, who had about $2,000 in the bank as of Friday, said party Chairman Giovanni Cicione.

The low figure is not unusual, Cicione said.

“Our fundraising programs are probably not as consistent as the Democrats’ are,” he said.

The party does not plan to let its account go to zero. Cicione said a mailing that seeks donations is in the works.

Fox is House speaker

2010-02-12T19:07:00.000-08:00

By Katherine Gregg and Steve Peoples

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE –– Gordon D. Fox became the state’s first black and openly gay House speaker after West Warwick Democrat William J. Murphy relinquished the helm on Thursday.

A lawyer, former nightclub owner and state lawmaker since 1993, Fox, 48, trounced his more conservative opponent Gregory Schadone, D-North Providence, on a 51-to-14 vote with another 5 votes going to the token candidacy of House Minority Leader Robert Watson, R-East Greenwich.

In his first speech as House speaker, Fox said “Change is absolutely necessary. We cannot continue [to conduct] business as usual. We must think anew and act anew.”

With the state facing a massive deficit and one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, he promised his highest priorities would be to “get Rhode Islanders back to work,” by exploring tax credits for small businesses that create jobs. He pledged action on a “fair and equitable” education-funding formula this year.

“Bolstering our economy, creating jobs … and enacting a responsible and balanced budget will be our priorities for this session,” he said. But “we must be mindful that it is important to restore the public trust in this institution, and indeed, the public trust in their elected officials,” said Fox, urging quick action on legislation he introduced in recent days to “allow the voters to restore the authority and power of the Rhode Island Ethics Commission this November.”

As majority leader since 2003, Fox, D-Providence, was Murphy’s top deputy and chosen successor, and his election marked a victory over at least two competing Democrats in the House aligned with the party’s more-conservative flank.

Fox brushed aside criticism that he is too liberal, a charge leveled at him by Rep. Arthur Corvese, D-North Providence, in a letter explaining his reasons for resigning as chairman of the House Labor Committee.

“A Fox speakership will invariably include, but not be limited to, an increase in the state income tax, a lack of constitutionally sound state limitations on illegal immigration, an economic development policy overly influenced by environmental extremists, and of course ... gay marriage,” wrote Corvese, who has been replaced by Rep. Anastasia Williams, an unpaid member of the AFL-CIO board of directors. “I believe your philosophical stance on major issues is too far to the left for the good of the citizens of the State of Rhode Island.”

Fox refused to rule out tax increases. And he has been a passionate advocate for same-sex marriage, but said on Thursday: “It’s always a priority, but I wouldn’t call it a priority this year. I think this year’s going to be jobs and economic development.”

Fox’s partner of 12 years, Marcus LaFond, was at his side Thursday night at the State House, holding the Bible on which Fox placed his hand to take the oath of office. “When I get married, I would like to do it in my home state,” he once said.

Only the timing of Murphy’s resignation and Fox’s ascension was in doubt. Murphy served notice in late September that he might step aside as speaker before the year was out.

Unlike his own predecessor, John B. Harwood, Murphy leaves the top job untainted by scandal, insisting he never intended to remain as House speaker for more than eight years, has no new job lined up, and just wants to practice law and spend more time with his family.

But Murphy, who intends to remain in the House through this year’s session as a rank-and-file lawmaker, had the misfortune to preside during a time of huge upheaval that exacerbated the state’s growing budget crisis, and left him at the vortex of growing public anger at the state of Rhode Island’s economy, with one of the highest foreclosure and unemployment rates in the country.

In his last moments as speaker, Murphy rattled off a list of accomplishments, led by the fact that the legislature hasn’t raised broad-based sales or income taxes over the last eight years. “In this day and age, when we are getting criticized because of the national financial problem, which is also the state financial problem, I think all of you have something to go home and be proud of.”

Fox has been guarded about where he stands on some of the more volatile issues the 2010 legislature is likely to face, including a proposed referendum to turn the Twin River and Newport Grand slot parlors into full-scale casinos.

Though, at one point, he had to pay the state Ethics Commission a $10,000 fine stemming from his then-law firm’s work for GTECH, he won kudos from citizens-advocacy groups in recent weeks by introducing a bill to give voters a chance to place the legislature back under the jurisdiction of the state Ethics Commission after a late-June decision by the Supreme Court left the commission’s powers in question.

Fox becomes the 222nd House speaker since Rhode Island became a colony more than three centuries ago.

The last major changing of the guard at the State House — including the ascension of the Murphy-Fox team in 2002 — played out first in open caucuses of House and Senate Democrats.

Thursday’s vote for a new speaker was preceded by a closed-door caucus of House Democrats from which the media were barred. “It shouldn’t be like electing a pope where we wait to see the smoke coming out and what color it is,” said John Marion, executive director of the citizens-advocacy group Common Cause.

Fox is the son of an Irish father and a Cape Verdean mother, who grew up in the Mount Hope area that forms part of his East Side district. “I’m the first person of color to hold the office, first openly gay person to hold the office,” Fox said in an interview after he addressed the chamber. “I hope that somebody watching out there, listening to this, seeing me, can draw energy and strength from that. Some young person can say, you know what, that’s not now something I can’t aspire to, because someone else like me is there and has done it.”

Chimed Rep. Joseph Almeida, a former chairman of the Black and Latino Caucus said: “It’s great to know that Gordon will be taking over as speaker, not because he’s black, because he’s a qualified black man. It’ll be good for this state to finally move forward in the 21st century regarding leadership of color.”

Is Governor Carcieri breaking the law?

2010-02-07T19:14:00.000-08:00

Woonsocket Call

Politics as Usual by Jim Baron

Is Gov. Donald Carcieri flagrantly violating state law by not sending the cities and towns the third quarter car tax reimbursements that were due a week ago today?

His spokeswoman, Amy Kempe won’t say.
Really.
I asked last Friday and Kempe refused to say whether the governor’s actions constituted a violation of law.
All she would say is that the administration believes that withholding the $30-some million in payments from the cash-starved municipalities is “the right course of action” and “in the best interest of the state.”
But as for whether it is legal, Kempe would say only “that is a determination for the courts to make.” I guess that is true, to a point. When a guy with a mask and a pistol holds up a bank, whether that is illegal or not is technically a determination for the court to make, but I think we all know pretty much how that is going to turn out.
But it looks like the court is going to have to make a decision on this one. Woonsocket Mayor Leo Fontaine filed suit in Superior Court on Friday to force the governor to pony up the money and the RI League of Cities and Towns will probably say “Amen” with a court action of its own this week.
The first thing I noticed in my phone conversation with the press secretary was that I didn’t get an answer of “Of course the governor didn’t think it was illegal or he wouldn’t have done it.” I even fished for that answer and didn’t get it. I asked Kempe “well if the governor thought it was illegal, he wouldn’t have done it would he?” She still didn’t budge and would only say that the administration thought it was “the best course of action.” She must have used that phrase 10 times in a seven minute conversation.
Back in the Lincoln Almond administration, the General Assembly took away the governor’s power to not spend money that was appropriated for a particular purpose.
Fontaine’s lawsuit — which he signed in red ink because “That's all anyone of us will have left if things are allowed to continue”; the man understands political theater — says that the governor therefore has a duty to carry out the budget as passed by the legislature.
Kempe said the governor is hoping to work with the legislature to get it to decide as quickly as possible whether it is going to pass the supplemental budget that contains the cuts.
Good luck with that. The General Assembly has a vacation coming next week and has no intention of voting on a supplemental budget before that. That means it will be Feb. 23 before even a committee vote is taken on the supplemental budget. So for all intents and purposes it will be March before cities and towns know for sure whether they are going to lose $67 million from a budget that expires June 30.
The legislature has only been in session for six weeks in the midst of the most severe budget crisis this state has seen since the credit union crisis, has passed zero legislation of any significance, and now needs to take a week off for vacation before making a decision of make-or-break importance to all 30 cities and towns? That is beyond chutzpah; it is off-the-scale arrogance.

Amendment may be coming
It looks like we are going to get a Bill Irons Amendment to the RI Constitution
Such an amendment was called for in this space more than a year ago, when Irons was still wrangling with the Ethics Commission over the Constitution’s speech in debate clause. I renewed that call after Irons prevailed in the state Supreme Court last year and now it looks like it may be happening.
The amendment — which would bring the behavior of General Assembly members under the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission, the speech in debate clause notwithstanding — was drafted by Common Cause and Operation Clean Government (OCG). They gave it to House Majority Leader Gordon Fox to introduce. The legislation to put the proposed amendment on the ballot may have to be amended itself, because it does not specify the exact language of the referendum question to be put before voters for them to accept or reject. But that is a housekeeping detail that can be left for another time.
Fox is at once a natural and a curious choice to submit this particular amendment. Natural because he is the powerful Majority Leader of the House who, as soon as this week, could get nominated for Speaker by the Democratic caucus if Speaker William Murphy makes an abrupt exit. If anyone has the oomph to get such a provision on the ballot, it is Fox.
It seems lately that every time there is a new Speaker of the House, there is a major step forward in government reform. When Murphy succeeded John Harwood, a separation of powers amendment was finally put before voters after a decade of reformers’ efforts to do so. Now, with Fox apparently preparing to succeed Murphy, General Assembly members will once again be subject to being called on the carpet by the Ethics Commission.
That, too, was predicted right here. In the July 6, 2009 Politics as Usual it said:
“House Speaker William Murphy has been saying for years that he would likely serve eight years as speaker, then move on. If he holds to that — and yes, that is a BIG if — that means next year would be his last. When politicians see the end of their term coming, they tend to look for a legacy.
Closing the ethics loophole would be a good legacy for Murphy. Murphy took the speakership in 2003 and soon after the long-stalled separation of powers amendment finally made it to the ballot. If Murphy goes out by closing the Irons loophole, he can go down in Rhode Island history as Mr. Ethics.”
OK, Mr. Ethics might have been a bit carried away, but I’m claiming the prediction nonetheless. By the way, Murphy had earlier told me he would stay on as Speaker “at least through the budget,” but now he may be bailing in the second week of February. The general laws say that if a General Assembly seat becomes vacant after the first Monday in February of an election year, there is no special election to replace him or her, the seat stays empty. It’s not clear whether Murphy would remain in the House after stepping down as Speaker, but that almost never works — it is too awkward for everyone involved.
Fox is a curious choice because at one time he had been the recipient of the biggest fine ever meted out by the Ethics Commission — before Sen. John Celona came along and really rang the bell — on a complaint filed by OCG, in fact.
So much for the House, but a bill to put the amendment on the ballot would also have to pass the Senate (the governor has no say in this; the constitution does not give him a veto over proposed amendments because the people get to vote on them). That could be another story altogether.
Sen. J. Michael Lenihan will be introducing an identical measure in the Senate. That could be a good and a bad thing. Good because Lenihan is a reliable reformer. If he sponsors a bill, you can trust there is a good government reason behind it.
It could be a bad thing because, possibly for the very reasons cited above, not everything Lenihan puts his name on passes, or even comes up for a vote. So be prepared for this to not see the light of day in the Senate.
One idea put forward is for the Senate to — don’t laugh, now — form a committee to police the ethics of its own members. I said don’t laugh! But I guess you couldn’t resist. I still give a sardonic chuckle at the thought myself.
But with Fox pushing for the amendment in the House, that might give it the boost it needs to clear the Senate as well.
If the amendment does get on the ballot, I will be surprised — and disappointed — if it doesn’t get approved by at least 85 percent of the voters. For the life of me, I can’t think of more than 113 people who might vote against it.

Bill would allow R.I. voters to close ethics loophole

2010-02-05T19:16:00.000-08:00

By Katherine Gregg

Journal State House Bureau
PROVIDENCE — House Majority Leader Gordon D. Fox has introduced a bill to give voters a chance to close a newly carved hole in state ethics law that insulates state lawmakers from scrutiny and prosecution by the Rhode Island Ethics Commission.

Fox said he introduced the bill because he believes it was “the clear intent of voters when they approved the creation of the Ethics Commission to give the commission power over all government officials in the state, without an exception for legislators.”

The current gap stems from a June 2009 decision by the state Supreme Court that effectively removed lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny.

In a case involving former Senate President William V. Irons, the court said the “speech-in-debate” clause in the Rhode Island Constitution gives legislators immunity from prosecution by the Ethics Commission for “core legislative functions” such as voting and speaking.

Fox, who has had his own tangles with the Ethics Commission, said: “This legislation will allow voters to reaffirm that they mean for the Ethics Commission to have the same jurisdiction over members of the legislature that they have over all other public officials, and I’m confident that they’ll approve it and set the record straight.”

Sen. J. Michael Lenihan, D-East Greenwich, has promised to introduce comparable legislation in the Senate.

Fox is the chosen successor to House Speaker William J. Murphy, who has signaled plans to step down from the podium before the year is out, and perhaps sooner.

Fox’s most visible challenger for the job — Rep. Gregory Schadone, D-North Providence — has questioned Fox’s judgment in light of reports in The Sunday Journal about Fox’s business partnership with a nightclub owner, while Fox sat on the Providence licensing board. “People who care about ethics and good government do not put themselves in a position where they have a financial relationship with people they are regulating,” Schadone said in a statement.

But the attention of the citizens advocacy groups Common Cause and Operation Clean Government were focused Thursday on Fox’s introduction of the ethics legislation they helped to craft.

“Common Cause is very pleased that Majority Leader Fox has agreed to sponsor our legislation restoring the General Assembly to the full jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission. In 2004, Common Cause worked closely with Leader Fox to strengthen lobbying disclosure laws, and we are happy to again be partnering with him on another important piece of ethics legislation,” said Common Cause Executive Director John Marion.

“It is our hope that, with his leadership, the General Assembly will pass this legislation, putting on the ballot, this November, the question whether legislators should have partial immunity from the state’s ethics laws,” he said.

Republican Governor Carcieri also commended Democrat Fox, D-Providence, for submitting the proposed November 2010 ballot measure.

Carcieri issued a statement that said: “Restoring the Ethics Commission jurisdiction over the General Assembly will help to regain confidence and trust of the people of Rhode Island. The intention of the voters was always to hold all elected officials, including members of the House and Senate, to the same high level of ethical standards.

“I strongly urge the General Assembly to act immediately and pass this important resolution, giving voters the opportunity to set the record straight,” said Carcieri, adding that he is “confident they will approve this ballot measure and insist that all elected officials be accountable for their actions.”

Court ruling upheld the Constitution

2010-01-24T19:09:00.000-08:00

Politics as Usual by Jim Baron

There is a lot of crying over the U.S. Supreme Court decision last week in Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission but 1) it should have come as a surprise to no one and 2) it was correctly decided.

It should have come as no surprise because the high court took the unusual step of inviting the dispute about whether corporations and unions should be able to spend money directly from their treasuries to advocate for or against a candidate or issue during an election. The case started as a dispute about whether an anti-Hillary Clinton documentary called “Hillary: The Movie” should be allowed to be offered in an on-demand format on a cable television service immediately before the 2008 primaries in some cities.
But when it went to the Supreme Court, the justices asked for argument on the larger issues of corporations and unions spending money directly on electioneering. You could almost see the conservative justices licking their chops over the prospect of ruling on that matter.
But the fact is, they ruled correctly. They upheld the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Yes, the decision is troublesome and it will exacerbate the problem of money skewing the election process. And, yes, it will benefit Big Oil and Big Pharma and Big Banking, not to mention the Republican Party those entities seem to favor, but that can’t be helped. As constitutional scholar Bill Belichick, might say, the First Amendment is what it is.
And it says that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press. No law means, well, no law. Not even a well-meaning one intended to reduce the influence of money in politics.
You can’t have the government deciding what can and can’t be said during an election campaign, at what point it can or can’t be said or who can or can’t say it. Government decisions are made by people who run in elections.
Of course the incumbents, who are the ones making the rules, are going to try to stifle any voices that may try to oppose them. That’s why laws like this that limit political speech during an election period get passed. It’s always easier to play a game when you are the house, and you wrote the rulebook.
I understand the problem: Big, bad corporations, and perhaps even those evil unions, can spend millions to buy an election for the candidate they support. Or perhaps they could put those millions toward a challenger of some incumbent who won’t do their bidding.
They could even wield the mere threat of using those millions to help a challenger in order to bring a recalcitrant pol to heel, thus getting their way and keeping their millions. All of this already happens now, of course, but the Supreme Court’s ruling last week will up the ante by a couple of orders of magnitude.
We can not let that be used as a pretense for censoring political speech that we might not like. The antidote to that is more speech. Granted, good government groups and others who might want to counter the messages from corporations and unions don’t always have millions to drop on counter-ad campaigns, but they have ways to get their message out. That’s one of the services the media generally provides free of charge.
What the Supreme Court’s decision didn’t do, and I have seen this confused in some media reports, is that it does not allow corporations and unions to contribute directly to candidates’ campaigns. That is still illegal, although Common Cause of R.I. executive director John Marion issued a press release worrying that this would start us sliding down a slippery slope in that direction. As he cautioned, we should remain vigilant against attempts to undermine that prohibition.
But as long as the law is going to consider corporations (I don’t want to keep being redundant over and over again, so when I say corporations, understand it to mean “and unions,” as well; it will save space) as having most of the same rights as persons, then you can’t restrict their freedom to speak and put forth their ideas and opinions, even — no, make that especially — during an election campaign. Yeah, I’m squeamish about giving corporate entities the same rights as citizens, but one fight at a time.
What Justice Anthony Kennedy’s decision means is more work — more work for you, and more work for me and my colleagues in the media.
The work for you is to pay attention and give some thought to the things you are seeing in newspaper ads and hearing in TV and radio commercials. You will have to read or listen to the message and think about what the motive of the person saying it might be, what is in it for them, or whose ox are they trying to gore and why. You can’t allow yourself to be swayed by the clever public relations and propaganda tricks they are going to employ. It would help to background yourself with facts from newspaper stories so you can apply those facts to the assertions being made in the ads.
For me and my colleagues in the media it is going to mean more work because we are going to have to dig to find out, who is actually behind the ads you are seeing in the paper and on TV. They are not going to say “this ad on behalf of the senator who has been a shill for the banks and financial institutions is brought to you by Morgan Stanley and AIG.” No, they are going to be presented by “Concerned Citizens for Liberty, Mom and Apple Pie.” It’s going to be up to us to find out, and tell you, just who those concerned citizens are, how much money they are laying out and what their agenda is. (Full disclosure: this is also going to mean more work for me and my colleagues in the media because the companies we work for are going to be rolling in dough from those millions the corporations and unions will be spending on advertising.)
The dire warnings that this decision is going to turn the United States, and the individual states, into even more of a corporatocracy than they already are can only come true if you don’t pay attention and think critically about who you are going to vote for and why and instead allow yourself to be buffaloed by some slick ad campaign.
Self-government takes some work. If you allow yourself to get suckered, don’t blame the Supreme Court or the First Amendment.

Senate panel weighs ethics rules

2010-01-21T19:11:00.000-08:00

By Katherine Gregg

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — After 20 years at the Rhode Island State House, Sen. J. Michael Lenihan has his doubts about putting lawmakers in charge of policing the conduct of other lawmakers.

“I’ve seen opportunities for the Senate to police itself and it hasn’t,” said Lenihan, D-East Greenwich, on Wednesday, a few hours before a key Senate committee resumed its debate over ethics enforcement on Smith Hill, in the wake of a recent Rhode Island Supreme Court decision neutering the state Ethics Commission.

To illustrate his point, Lenihan recalled a closed-door meeting in early 2004 in the office of then-Senate President Joseph A. Montalbano that was “attended by virtually the entire Democratic Senate.” The subject: what to do about then-Sen. John. A. Celona, a North Providence Democrat who was ultimately convicted of selling the power and influence of his position at the State House to the state’s major health-care companies for personal gain.

With new revelations about Celona’s conduct coming to light on an almost daily basis, Lenihan said: “Six or seven of us called for his resignation,” but “frankly, those of us coming out against Senator Celona were given a hard time.”

“I don’t put that up to anything that is nefarious,” Lenihan said Wednesday. “But it serves to me as a practical example of that kind of reluctance — or unwillingness — to act against people [with whom] you have developed a personal relationship … [and] I’ve seen too many practical examples.”

But Lenihan never had to wage the battle he anticipated when the Senate Rules Committee met later in the day.

In the week since the panel last met, Senate leaders had retooled an earlier proposal to let the Senate adopt and enforce its own conflict-of-interest rules. “If that is what the U.S. Senate does, and it is adequate for them, why isn’t it adequate for the Rhode Island Senate?” said Sen. Christopher Maselli, the Johnston Democrat who chairs the committee.

By Wednesday, both Maselli and Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors were saying the Senate never intended to end-run the Ethics Commission, but rather to create an interim-mechanism for overseeing — and if necessary, regulating — the conduct of its members until November, when voters will presumably get a chance to reinstate the power of the Ethics Commission over legislators.

The current gap stems from a June decision by the Supreme Court that effectively removed lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny.

In a case involving former Senate President William V. Irons, the court said the “speech-in-debate” clause in the Rhode Island Constitution gives legislators immunity from prosecution by the Ethics Commission for “core legislative functions” such as voting and speaking.

Both Lenihan and House Majority Leader Gordon Fox have promised to introduce legislation giving voters a chance to reinstate the Ethics Commission’s jurisdiction. The Rules Committee made public two new proposals drafted by the Senate parliamentarian, former Sen. John Roney, to govern what happens between now and then.

One would allow the Rules Committee “to investigate and make recommendations to the Senate concerning … violations of the code of ethics not within the jurisdiction of the Rhode Island Ethics Commission.” The other would add to the Senate rules the same basic conflict-of-interest prohibitions that exist within the state ethics code.

With Maselli promising an opportunity for public comment at a later meeting, there was no vote. But John Marion, executive director of Common Cause, said he remains concerned.

While he had no objection to the Senate adopting “internal ethics rules,” he said: “we don’t want them to have an excuse for not putting it before the voters.” He said “they should take that issue up first, and gain the faith of the voters, and then get their own house in order.”

Selection of magistrates overhaul sought

2010-01-19T19:20:00.000-08:00

By Katie Mulvaney

Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — For nearly a decade, Rep. Donna M. Walsh has sponsored a bill that would hold court magistrates to the same selection process as state judges.

Her goal, she says, is to ensure that magistrates are chosen based on their skills and qualifications, not their connections to Rhode Island’s political establishment.

Her refrain: magistrates earn virtually the same $100,000-plus salaries and perform many of the same duties as judges and therefore should be subject to a merit-based selection process voters created for judges in 1994.

“They really are judges,” said Walsh, a Charlestown Democrat. “It’s a political-patronage system. Judges can use it to award their people.”

Walsh first took aim at magistrate selection as a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2000, sponsoring legislation to change the confirmation process after seeing a flood of magistrates. It wasn’t politically popular at the time, she says, because then-House Speaker John Harwood’s wife, Patricia Lynch Harwood, had just been appointed Superior Court magistrate. It remains unpopular today.

“I’m beginning to think I am the only one concerned with this issue,” Walsh said last Wednesday, a day after again submitting the bill.

The number of magistrates has swelled from 2 in 1990 to 20 today. The posts, often stepping stones to judgeships, come with a $131,866-base salary, 10-year life, and many of the same powers as judges, such as presiding over arraignments, motions and sentencing in uncontested cases. They do not hear trials, and their ranks have grown to include the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman’s sister and staff members of key state lawmakers.

Walsh’s bill would take the appointing authority for magistrates away from the Superior Court presiding justice, Family Court and District Court chief judges and the Supreme Court chief justice. Magistrates, instead, would be selected in the same manner as judges.

As the process stands now, an opening is posted. The head of the respective court then selects a candidate to fill the vacancy without disclosing who is in the running. The Senate votes on whether to approve the selection.

Rhode Islanders voted to revamp the judicial nominating system in 1994 after the resignation of two chief justices amid scandal. The changes included the creation of an independent, nonpartisan Judicial Nominating Commission to ensure judicial selections based on merit, not politics. The commission vets candidates and forwards a list of finalists to the governor. The governor has 21 days to submit a nominee to the state Senate for approval.

Critics say the current magistrate selection process bucks the merit-based selection voters backed more than 15 years ago.

“It undermines confidence in the integrity of the bench, and that’s really all the bench has,” said Michael J. Yelnosky, a professor at the Roger Williams School of Law.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Paul A. Suttell, who took the helm in July, is supportive of merit-based selection, but sees no great problems with the existing system, court spokesman Craig N. Berke said. The JNC, if able to take on magistrate selection as well, may be the appropriate body for the task, he said.

Suttell said he believes careful consideration should be given to the ultimate appointing authority for magistrates — whether it is the governor or the chief judges of the various courts, Berke said. At a minimum, Suttell wants the chief judges to participate in the selection process because they are the most familiar with the specific needs that magistrates fulfill, such as drug court or the truancy and child-support calendars, he said.

JNC Chairman Dr. Herbert J. Brennan declined to comment on the magistrate selection process. But, he said, “I am confident that the commission could ramp up to carry out the added responsibilities of vetting magistrates.”

Common Cause Rhode Island and Operation Clean Government, both longtime backers of similar efforts, support the measure. But even supporters recognize the challenges ahead. It will take, Yelnosky said, a scandal to embarrass or motivate lawmakers to change the system.

Some RI lawmakers want to police their own ethics

2010-01-15T19:23:00.000-08:00

Katherine Gregg

Providence Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Forget the Ethics Commission.

The Senate Rules Committee is considering a proposal to let the state Senate adopt its own conflict-of-interest rules, and police the behavior of its own members.

"If that is what the U.S. Senate does, and it is adequate for them, why isn't it adequate for the Rhode Island Senate?'' asks Sen. Christopher Maselli, the Johnston Democrat who chairs the committee.

Not everyone is enthralled with the idea.

"Common Cause opposes any plan to have the Rhode Island Senate police itself,'' says John Marion, executive director of the citizens' advocacy group. "Historically efforts by legislatures to monitor their behavior internally have been unsuccessful. One need look no further than the U.S. Senate, whose Ethics Committee has fallen into a partisan stalemate,'' Marion said.

The proposal was aired for the first time last week at a sparsely attended meeting of the Senate Rules Committee, which is taking its cues from the Senate's $53,019 a year parliamentarian, John Roney, the former senator who authored the "Roney amendment'' allowing the Ethics Commission to impose $5,000 fines on anyone who files a "frivolous'' complaint against a politician. It never has.

As a senator in the mid-1990's, Roney told colleagues: "These complaints are all too easily filed...They trigger immense investigations, and they do tremendous damage against whom they are filed." As a lawyer, Roney has also represented numerous clients before the commission, including Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis, who was fined $3,000 in December 2006 for soliciting contributions from town employees when he was still mayor of North Providence.

Maselli said there is no written proposal yet, but Sen. Frank Ciccone, D-Providence, is working on one, and Roney has advised the panel that Rhode Island is the only New England state where lawmakers do not have their own internal conflict-of-interest rules, and lots of states - and Congress - have taken it upon themselves to make sure their members comply.

The discussion stems from a June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court that effectively removed Rhode Island lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny.

In a case involving former Senate President William V. Irons, the court said the "speech-in-debate" clause in the Rhode Island Constitution gives legislators immunity from prosecution by the Ethics Commission for "core legislative functions" such as voting and speaking. The decision marked a huge victory for Irons, who had been accused of voting on legislation in a way beneficial to a big client.

Other lawmakers - including House Majority Leader Gordon Fox - have promised to introduce legislation addressing the current gap. But Maselli said Roney told the Rules Committee he does not believe the Ethics Commission can, at this point, even consider a complaint against a legislator.

Maselli said his mind remains open to the alternative Common Cause is proposing: giving voters a chance in November to reinstate the Ethics Commission's authority over lawmakers, but that's months away.

Between now and then, "what does somebody do? Should we, at the very least, put something into effect [for] the interim?'' The debate will resume when Senate Rules meets again on Wednesday.

R.I. Assembly faces deficit, taxes as session begins

2010-01-04T08:34:00.000-08:00

By Katherine Gregg, Steve Peoples and Randal Edgar

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — Governor Carcieri’s attempt to slash $125 million in local aid in mid-budget year has set the stage for a fierce election-year battle at the State House over taxes, spending and how Rhode Island’s 39 cities and towns provide services with less state money to help them.

In many ways, the 2010 General Assembly session that opens Tuesday begins where the last one ended, with a massive budget hole, one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation and polls showing voters none too pleased with their political leaders.

Hearings will be called, and debates will resume over same-sex marriage, the dangers of talking on cell phones while driving, the modest steps a state legislature can take to blunt the impact of the national foreclosure crisis, the court-granted exemption of the lawmakers from Ethics Commission scrutiny and, of course, gambling.

But this is not the typical election-year session that begins with the promise of no new taxes.

Lawmakers are already debating what kinds of tax increases would be the least painful. Property tax hikes? A rejiggering of corporate taxes? A rollback in the tax breaks offered to the wealthiest taxpayers in recent years in the hope of spurring new jobs?

Republican Carcieri argues no tax increases are necessary if the lawmakers give municipalities the “tools” they need to reduce spending.

But key lawmakers are unconvinced. Their local leaders are crying foul. Organized labor and the advocacy groups are primed for battle. Even Carcieri felt compelled to offer the communities an escape route: the legal authority to impose “supplemental” taxes mid-year.

“I don’t see anything but probably the most difficult session we’ve ever had coming up,” said AFL-CIO President George Nee.

And all this will play out in a supercharged political atmosphere. The term-limited governor is barred from running again, but all 113 lawmakers have to run for reelection, and House Speaker William J. Murphy’s announcement that he will relinquish the post this session has sparked a leadership fight within the House.

From the outside looking in, there is anger in some quarters.

“I don’t know of too many people who think Rhode Island is thriving and are happy with the way the legislature is dealing with the problem, or should I say not dealing with the problem,” said Colleen Conley, president of the Rhode Island Tea Party.

Murphy acknowledges “the public is upset,” and that will complicate the Assembly’s efforts to tackle the budget crisis because “squeamish” lawmakers will be looking over their shoulders. “As the old saying goes, there’s no interest like self interest, and you know, members who are running for reelection want to make sure that they are going to be victorious,” Murphy said in an interview last week.

He also acknowledged that he will step down before the session ends to allow his chosen successor –– House Majority Leader Gordon Fox –– to take over. Fox is competing for the job against Rep. Gregory Schadone, D-North Providence.

Asked when he will step aside, Murphy said: “I am starting the session on the rostrum and I will continue to get through the budget.” As speaker? “I will not answer that question.” Why not be more specific? “Because if I do decide that I am stepping down early, it would be my membership who I would tell first.”

THE HOUSE OPENS at 2 p.m. Tuesday, the Senate at 4 p.m., with veto override votes likely before the 2010 session officially starts. Among the vetoed bills slated for likely rescue is a measure to allow partners in same-sex relationships to make funeral decisions for each other. The session opens under the cloud of unrelenting deficits –– $219 million this year, more than $400 million in the budget year that begins July 1 –– that have made it harder and harder for the state to pay for basic services, from snowplowing to keeping motor vehicle registries open.

Demands for government help — such as state-subsidized medical care — have surged at the same time revenues have plummeted.

As an interim solution, Carcieri is proposing to cut as much as $125 million in education and municipal aid over the next six months, eliminate guaranteed cost-of-living increases for thousands of future retirees, and plug more than a quarter of the current shortfall with one-time fixes such as sales of state property.

The lawmakers are hoping for other options, including a possible new round of federal stimulus dollars. “Over several of our budgets, it seems that we’ve been able to pull a rabbit out of a hat. I don’t know if there’s any rabbit left, but if there’s one left down there, we’ll come through,” Murphy said. The governor’s tax overhaul may provide another rabbit.

While a final plan has yet to emerge, Carcieri has had preliminary discussions with legislative leaders about creating a new tax on business — a “net receipts tax”— while eliminating at least one other tax, such as the state’s corporate income tax, the sales tax or the personal income tax.

The governor wants such a plan to be “revenue neutral” — meaning that any new taxes would be completely offset by tax cuts elsewhere — but the Assembly will have the final say. Minor tweaks in Carcieri’s plan could produce tens of millions of dollars.

Until a rabbit emerges, however, the budget debate will be dominated by Carcieri’s reliance on local aid cuts to close the budget hole.

Some frustrated local officials have already promised the midyear cuts will lead to increased property taxes.

“The only thing I’ve heard as a statewide solution is raise taxes, and I just don’t accept that,” Carcieri responds. But his recent budget proposal outlines a step-by-step process by which communities can raise their taxes in midyear to offset the state aid cuts.

Said Senate Majority Leader Daniel Connors in a recent interview: “I don’t think Rhode Island taxpayers are going to make a distinction between whether the tax is coming out of their right pocket or is coming out of their left pocket. And to suggest that [Carcieri’s] corrective action plan does not result in a tax increase is not honest.”

ORGANIZED LABOR –– which represents thousands of teachers and municipal workers –– will form an unlikely coalition with mayors and town managers to fight the local aid cuts.

But the groups will fight each other on the governor’s proposed “tools” that he says will help them survive the cuts.

Carcieri has asked lawmakers again to prohibit minimum-manning requirements in future labor contracts, require municipal employees to pay the same, generally higher, co-share toward their health insurance as state workers, and lay the groundwork for a “statewide purchasing system.”

House and Senate leaders indicated a willingness to provide some relief from state mandates, but reject changes in contractual minimum-manning requirements and health-care costs.

“To suggest that [minimum manning] specifically is a mandate … jumps out at me as being part of the spin,” said Connors. “A legislature is not allowed under the Constitution to impair the obligation of a contract. It’s unconstitutional.”

The clash leaves Assembly leaders with few other obvious budget-cutting alternatives — especially in the middle of a fiscal year.

While he opposes raising property taxes, Peter Asen, executive director of the advocacy group Ocean State Action, said the state needs to look at “all possible options and other ways to raise revenue.”

The group has pushed lawmakers to eliminate the flat tax alternative, a tax break for high earners adopted under Murphy’s leadership. In a recent interview, Murphy said he could not guarantee the flat tax could be preserved in this fiscal environment.

David Carlin, lobbyist for the Chamber of Commerce Coalition, said the assembly needs to fix the budget without “raising taxes or creating new taxes.”

“We vehemently disagree … that new taxes might be necessary to solve the budget problem,” Carlin said. “We believe that any time you increase taxes or create new business taxes you are putting a major roadblock on the way to recovery.”

ANY DISCUSSION about the state’s financial plight leads to an inevitable debate over state-sponsored gambling and the threat to the state’s third-largest revenue source if Massachusetts allows casinos and slots at its racetracks.

The Twin River track-and-slot parlor in Lincoln has about 4,750 video-slot machines placed there by the state Lottery; the state keeps roughly 61 cents out of every lost dollar. During the year that ended on June 30, that produced $242.3 million for the state.

With Twin River in bankruptcy, lawmakers face a series of decisions. Twin River’s owners want to be freed from a state law requiring them to offer at least 125 days of greyhound racing to stay open. Their U.S. bankruptcy court filing would also require the state to pay up to $11 million in “annual support,” including a new management fee of up to $1.4 million.

Murphy favors — and Carcieri has said he would not oppose — a referendum to allow full-fledged casino gambling at Twin River and Newport Grand.

“All but for table games, they are almost casinos now,” Murphy said. “With Massachusetts breathing down our necks … I say we go forward.”

But Connors, whose district includes a portion of Lincoln, notes that state law requires the host community to initiate a casino referendum, and doubts that will happen. He also questions the notion that “casinos are a panacea to all of our problems.”

ADVOCATES OF same-sex marriage are pushing for an opening-day override of Carcieri’s veto of a bill that would let “domestic partners” make funeral arrangements for their loved ones. They will also resume their drive to legalize same-sex marriage.

“I don’t think that something incremental like civil unions is something we want, we want full marriage equality,” said Susan Heroux, a member of Queer Action of Rhode Island.

The Rhode Island chapter of the National Organization for Marriage will oppose such moves, said chapter director Christopher Plante.

“Thirty of 31 states that have had a chance to vote on this have rejected homosexual marriage,” he said. “It’s clear that America doesn’t want this.”

The lawmakers themselves are at the center of a major ethics issue that demands swift action, according to citizens advocacy groups such as Common Cause and Operation Clean Government.

A June decision by the Rhode Island Supreme Court essentially exempted legislators from prosecution by the state Ethics Commission for their official acts even if they are accused, for example, of selling their votes.

The ruling — in a case involving former Senate President William V. Irons — was based on an unprecedented reading of a speech-in-debate clause that has, for centuries, protected lawmakers in many states from civil suit or prosecution for their public utterances.

Senate leaders are not convinced legislative remedy is needed.

“If any legislator in this building commits any illegal act, there is no loophole which would prohibit their prosecution by the U.S. Attorney and the U.S. District Court and [conviction] of a federal crime,” says Connors.

But Common Cause is urging lawmakers to give voters a chance in November to amend the state’s Constitution to make it clear “that the Ethics Commission has jurisdiction to hear and decide all potential violations of the Code of Ethics notwithstanding the protections of the Speech in Debate Clause.” And Fox has pledged to introduce a measure to address the issue.

“Obviously, nobody is going to say that they do not think legislators’ actions should be under some sort of Ethics Commission authority. That’s what the people want. That’s what the people demanded,” Fox said.

For Carcieri, the 2010 session will be his last as governor.

When asked about Carcieri’s lame-duck status, Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed said: “Does it change anything?” Then, she said: “I’m hoping it will make him willing to work with us.”

But the governor said his status will not affect what he does, and he hopes the election year will not dissuade lawmakers from making tough decisions.

“I’ve learned in life that if you do the right thing and you explain to people why you’re doing it, I think that people understand.”

Larry Valencia and John Marion: We need a ‘holistic’ approach to R.I. ethics problems

2009-12-05T01:00:00.000-08:00

01:00 AM EST on Saturday, December 5, 2009
By LARRY VALENCIA JOHN MARION

In his Nov. 14 Commentary piece (“New ethics laws key to fighting Rhode Island corruption”), Robert Cushman discusses a number of important issues regarding separation of powers, ethics, and conflicts of interest in Rhode Island. We believe that those issues merit a response from the “government watchdog groups” he mentions.

We take exception with his statement that, because of a recent Supreme Court decision, the Rhode Island Ethics Commission has become “a toothless body lacking the tools needed to fight corrupt public officials.” There is no doubt that the June 29 decision in “William V. Irons vs. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission” made it more difficult for that body to enforce the code of ethics. However, it removed from the commission’s jurisdiction only one body (the General Assembly), and only specific acts of members of that body — “core legislative acts,” which the court enumerated as “proposing, passing, or voting upon a particular piece of legislation.”

It’s very important to note that the commission still has the ability to prosecute all other elected officials for violations of the code. And furthermore, the commission has the ability to prosecute members of the Assembly for a wide variety of actions not protected as “core legislative acts,” including in the court’s words, “speeches delivered outside of the legislature; political activities of legislators; undertakings for constituents; assistance in securing government contracts; republication of defamatory material in press releases and newsletters; solicitation and acceptance of bribes; and criminal activities, even those committed to further legislative activity.”

That said, our groups still believe that when the voters passed the Ethics Amendment in 1986 that created the Ethics Commission and saw in that amendment the language “All elected and appointed officials and employees of state and local government, of boards, commissions and agencies, shall be subject to the code of ethics,” they never would have perceived that members of the General Assembly would have even a limited immunity from that code due to “the speech in debate” clause in the Rhode Island Constitution. That is why we will be pushing legislation in the 2010 session of the General Assembly to put an amendment on the ballot that would let the voters decide whether legislators should enjoy immunity that no other public officials receive.

Mr. Cushman goes on to suggest that the real solution to the state’s problems lies with the “class exception” that exists in the code of ethics. We sometimes refer to it by the section number in the code: 7(b). We couldn’t agree more that the “class exception” is a problem. That is why we have long pushed the Ethics Commission to close this and other loopholes in the code. This is not an easy prospect, however, and the commission has shown reluctance to overturn the “class exception” in one singular act.

However, the commission has taken preliminary steps toward this goal by moving toward elimination of one particular loophole in the code. The commission is poised to change its longstanding policy of providing an exception for union members who are also elected officials. Currently public officials who are members of a union in a different city or town are allowed to negotiate contracts with different local affiliates of the same parent union. We support this change in position by the commission in what clearly is a conflict of interest.

However, we must note that the commission is making this change in a way that we think is less than ideal.

First, it is not making a change to the code itself, but rather in a “General Commission Advisory,” which is a document to provide guidance to those who might be seeking the commission’s advice. Second, the opinion of the commission is based on the “business associate” section of the code, and not the “conflict of interest” section. We feel this is a mistake because this situation is clearly not in keeping with either section. A member of a union is clearly a business associate of other local affiliates of that union. This relationship is particularly strong when the parent union sends professional negotiators into multiple jurisdictions. However, it is also a conflict of interest for a public official to negotiate with an organization of which they are a member.

What the commission is doing, however backward its approach, is to begin closing the loophole that allows people to self-deal. That is what the “class exception” is all about. Our groups did not push the commission to begin closing this loophole by targeting union members. We feel it is equally important that anyone serving as a public official should not be allowed to use his or her official capacity to provide benefits to members of the profession he or she is a part of, no matter what that profession is, and no matter if everyone in that profession benefits equally.

Shutting down the “class exception” is only one part of the puzzle that we need to solve in order to create a more ethical climate in Rhode Island. It’s important to remember that we have an ethics system that consists of institutions (the Ethics Commission, the Board of Elections), and processes (the code of ethics, our campaign-finance law) that need to be tended to in order to work properly. We can’t run around seeking to make changes without considering the health of the system as a whole. That is why ethics, separation of powers and campaign finance are all related.

Our organizations will continue to insist that appointments are made, and they’re in keeping with separation of powers, that the institutions are fully staffed and funded, and attempts to limit their authority are rejected when appropriate. We need to take a holistic approach to cultivating this system.

Larry Valencia is president of Operation Clean Government. John Marion is executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island.

Q&A with John M. Marion, executive director, Common Cause Rhode

2009-11-30T07:44:00.000-08:00

Subject: Q&A with John M. Marion, executive director, Common Cause Rhode Island

Pub: Rhode Island Lawyers Weekly

Author: Jack Dew

Issue Date: 11/30/2009

Q&A with John M. Marion, executive director, Common Cause Rhode Island
by Jack Dew

PROVIDENCE, RI -- Age: 37

Graduated: State University of New York at Binghamton (1994), graduate work at Indiana University

Job: Executive director, Common Cause Rhode Island

Practice area: Common Cause is a non-partisan government reform advocacy organization.
Rhode Island adopted its merit-based judicial selection system in 1994, thanks in part to heavy pressure from Common Cause. Fifteen years later, the process is still evolving, and Common Cause has been advocating for changes that would increase the independence of the Judicial Nominating Commission. Common Cause Executive Director John M. Marion spoke with Lawyers Weekly’s Jack Dew about how far the judicial nominating process has come and where it’s going.

Q. It has been 15 years since the reforms. Have they been an improvement?

A. Yes, I think it has improved some things. Now, the first prerequisite for trying to become a judge in Rhode Island isn’t political connections, and that is the whole key to merit selection. Like any kid in the class, a lawyer can raise their hand and say, “I want to be a judge.” Prior to 1994, you couldn’t do that; you had to call the speaker of the House or the governor or someone close to them.

Q. What isn’t working?

A. The other parts of the system, the other actors, have not been fulfilling their role properly. The Assembly leaders and the governor are responsible for putting people on the commission, and they haven’t been doing that in a timely manner. At one point they reappointed someone even though the statute says there would be no reappointments. The governor currently has a list [of nominees for judgeships] that is five months old even though he is supposed to act within 21 days from the time the JNC sends him the list.

Q. Have there been any attempts to circumvent the system?

A. There have been a couple of attempts to circumvent the system. A law has been in place for three years that lets anyone who makes the list for a certain court but doesn’t get picked to remain eligible for any opening in that court for five years. That goes against the idea that a fresh list of the best qualified people is being given to the governor. Also, at the time the JNC was created, there were one or two magistrates in the court system. Now there are 21, and they don’t go through the merit selection process, so a whole body of judicial officers has been created outside of the system.

Q. How can the JNC be strengthened?

A. They need to indicate in some way that they expect to be treated like a mature institution, and, at the same time, they need to show their independence to the public. There was a proposal a number of years ago to ban ex parte communications between commissioners. We believe that those sorts of measures need to be taken up by the commission.

Q. If you could make a single change to the process, what would it be?

A. I would change the public perception of the process. No one has ever believed that they need to commit the necessary time and resources and attention to this process, so [the JNC] has never received a real budget, a real staff. The commissioners have overstayed their terms, the appointments have been made late, and no one has ever said that we should give this process the best chance we can for it to work as well as it can.

John Marion: Connecting the dots on Smith Hill

2009-11-29T07:47:00.000-08:00

The Rhode Island General Assembly returned for a brief two-day session in late October to finish up business it had left in its June recess. The week before its advertised return, Common Cause Rhode Island sent an e-mail, followed by a letter, to every member of the General Assembly asking them to reinstate their operating rules for conducting business. The legislature failed to do so, and instead, both the House and the Senate broke several of their own rules. Only now, weeks after the Assembly’s short session, are we seeing strong evidence that their failure to reinstate the rules means our government business is being conducted behind closed doors.

The rules of the House and Senate are created to govern the behavior of the respective chambers. They specify everything from whether members can smoke, drink and talk on cell phones on the floor of the chambers (they cannot) to when a member may speak during a debate. Some of the most important provisions involve notice to both members and the public of committee hearings, floor votes, and access to bills.

It’s typical for the Senate and House to suspend those rules on public notice during in the final days of June as they rush to adjourn, finishing up all of the substantive work left over after the budget has passed. This year was no different. Both chambers suspended a large number of those rules governing public access and notice with one notable exception. This year the Assembly didn’t adjourn in June; rather it came back in October. And when it returned it didn’t put those rules back into force.

So, for example, the rules of the House prohibit the chamber from passing more than 50 bills in one day. On Oct. 29, the House passed over 70 bills. Does anyone believe that legislating that fast is the best way to act as a deliberative body? Yes, the vast majority of what they voted on were “duplicates,” bills that had passed both chambers already and now had to “cross over” and be voted on again. But it is asking a lot to expect legislators to remember each of the hundreds of votes they cast in June. It was an almost impossible task.

Common Cause called for reinstating the rules, in part so that the process would slow down and mistakes would be avoided. As we know from The Journal’s Nov. 4 article “Without notice expungements almost expanded,” it was only a simple miscommunication in the final hours that led to an error that derailed significant legislation. Common Cause takes no position on the issue of expungement of criminal records itself, but it is concerned that with bills like this the process is so rushed and confused that no one even knows what is happening.

The expungement bill has been around for a while, and the public has had a chance to weigh in on it at various points in the legislative process. The real concern about not having all of the rules in place is that new issues, never subject to the scrutiny of the public or even the members of the legislature itself, would emerge. And now we have strong evidence that this is exactly what happened. As the Oct. 30 article “R.I. lawmakers plow through heavy agenda to the end” points out, a new bill was introduced late in the evening, S 1060, “that would divert hundreds of thousands of dollars in gambling revenue from the state’s coffers to the Town of Lincoln,” and was immediately passed. No notice to the public, no notice to the members, no hearing in committee, no deliberation of members concerning this legislation took place in public. There was no democracy.

Did the language exist in another bill, under another bill number that had been heard many months earlier? Yes. But that could only be determined post hoc. The people, and the members, deserve to know what they’re voting on in advance of those votes. The public has the right to weigh in on issues that affect it. There is a reason rules exist, and that is to keep government open. This is clearly a case of closed government. But interestingly, it’s not the end of the story.

And now here is where the story gets interesting, and where we begin to understand why government without deliberation is government conducted not by all of our elected representatives. On Nov. 3, the Rhode Island Lottery Commission director moved to expand casino gambling at Twin River in Lincoln to 24 hours a day on weekdays (“24/7 slots coming to Twin River”).

Even the least cynical person can see that the legislature was effectuating an apparent quid pro quo with Lincoln in passing a new bill, late in the evening, during a rushed session, when no one was looking and apparently with the collaboration of the Carcieri administration, which includes the Lottery Commission.

Conducting an inquiry into how our government works is a necessary if not fun exercise. Why? Because it shows us that unless the rules are in place, all we can do as citizens is watch while decisions are made about our lives by our government without our input.

Common Cause will be there as long as is necessary to ensure that our government works for the people that elected it. Please join us in that fight.

John Marion is executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island.

Columnist Fitzpatrick says R.I. judicial selction process needs transparency

2009-11-17T07:52:00.000-08:00

Roger Williams University law Professor Michael J. Yelnosk said he heard a lot of great stories as he was organizing a Nov. 13 symposium on how Rhode Island picks state judges.

But some people swore him to secrecy and others said “if they told me the truth they’d have to kill me,” he said, drawing laughs at the outset of the event. He said Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed (who’ll be a Roger Williams University adjunct professor in the spring) didn’t respond to his invitation to take part in the symposium. “And she wasn’t the only legislator who would not do so,” he said. “So my one regret is we have no representation from the General Assembly today.”

Also, a commission refused to grant continuing legal-education credits for lawyers attending the event, although lawyers received credits for listening to actor Richard Dreyfuss talk about civics education, Yelnosky said. (A spokesman said the event would have qualified for half a credit if it included 10 more minutes on relevant law.)

“You get the sense that some people would rather not hear about what’s happening in judicial selection,” Yelnosky said, calling the 50 people who did attend “the few, the brave, the retired, the tenured and the residing outside the jurisdiction.”

While no Assembly members participated, some panelists echoed the tired, predictable arguments you hear from those in power: That judicial selection should be more secretive, that critics (such as Common Cause) are elitist, and that political involvement and ties shouldn’t disqualify judicial candidates.

That last argument precisely misses the point, which is that you shouldn’t have to know a guy at the State House to become a judge. Panelist Alan S. Flink, a Common Cause board member and former Bar Association president, gets it. “Should people involved in politics be excluded? No,” he said. “Should everyone else be excluded? No.”

Panelist Stephen J. Carlotti, former chairman of the Judicial Nominating Commission, does not get it. Last year, he tried to keep The Journal from seeing letters sent regarding finalists. On Friday, he reiterated that releasing letters might “discourage people who might write us with derogatory comments about applicants, being afraid that those comments would be made public and then they’d have to pay the price.”

But the attorney general said Carlotti’s interpretation of the law was wrong, and the letters he released contained no negative comments. Carlotti talked about the “cost to transparency,” ignoring the cost of secrecy, which erodes public confidence.

Carlotti said he wonders “if the system we have created is, in fact, the right system.” He said he’d prefer a system that gives the governor greater “flexibility” to choose judges who share his philosophy. The governor would pick finalists and a commission would analyze them — “not in public, by the way” — before releasing ratings, he said.

Whatever the merits of the system favored by Carlotti, stewards of the current process (favored by 69.9 percentage of voters in 1994) should recognize the value of openness — an openness born of scandal and disgust with how those in power exercised their flexibility.

The process does need improvement. The JNC needs its own staff, better office space and funding. As Carlotti said, “This is, in fact, a neglected institution.” And as Common Cause executive director John M. Marion said, officials need to stop undermining and attacking the process. “We have the skeleton of a good system in place,” he said. “And now we have to put some muscle behind it.”

Twin River seeks to hire former R.I. Lottery lawyer

2009-11-06T07:56:00.000-08:00

By Paul Grimaldi

Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — The lenders in control of the Twin River greyhound track and slot parlor have asked a federal judge for permission to hire the former legal counsel for the Rhode Island Lottery as a government-relations consultant, according to a court filing.

Robert M. Silva was the Lottery’s lawyer for 16 years, before retiring in May 2008, according to the Nov. 4 filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Providence. During that time, “Silva was intimately involved in a number of transactions between the [Rhode Island] Lottery and [the slot parlor], including the transfer of the [slot parlor’s] video lottery terminal license from its prior holder” in 2005.

The company that operates Twin River, UTGR Inc., filed for federal bankruptcy protection in June. It appears Silva’s hiring would be consistent with the state’s code of ethics, which generally prevents state employees from representing themselves or others before their former departments for one year after their state employment ends.

As the Lottery’s lawyer, Silva would not have been required to file financial disclosure statements with the state ethics commission, according to Jason Gramitt, staff lawyer with the Ethics Commission. There appear to be no rulings involving Silva on record.

The executive director of the government watchdog group Common Cause Rhode Island, John M. Marion, said Silva “satisfied the revolving door [prohibition]. He’s been out a year. He can make the jump.”

UTGR is a subsidiary of BLB Investors, a holding company made up of Kerzner International, Starwood Capital Group and Waterford Group LLC.

UTGR owed nearly $568 million to banks and other creditors, but had only $56.6 million in assets, when it filed for bankruptcy protection. Merrill Lynch Capital Corp., Wells Fargo & Co. and JPMorgan Chase Bank are among the lenders to whom it owes money.

Twin River’s lenders will pay Silva $5,000 month, plus expenses, to lobby state officials on the slot parlor’s behalf.

Lottery Director Gerald Aubin said yesterday that he last met with Silva sometime in late summer when the two men had lunch together.

Silva gave him no indication at that time that he was under consideration for a job associated with Twin River.

What’s unclear at this point is what legal spadework Silva may have done that could lead Twin River to become more profitable after he left his job.

“What did he do to position Twin River that now they can try to hire him?” Marion asked.

The request goes before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Arthur N. Votolato on Nov. 17.

Suggested gift for the courts: A new judge

2009-11-05T08:00:00.000-08:00

By Edward Fitzpatrick

Nearly a year has passed since District Court Chief Judge Albert E. DeRobbio Sr. died, yet Governor Carcieri has not nominated a replacement.

The Judicial Nominating Commission selected five finalists for the vacancy on June 3. Carcieri began interviewing at least some of the candidates before the commission had even picked those finalists (in careless disregard for the merit-selection process approved by voters in 1994). At the time, the governor’s spokeswoman explained that Carcieri had jumped the gun “out of an economy of time” so he could pick a nominee before the end of the legislative session. Yet here we are in November, and the governor has not chosen a nominee.

No doubt, the governor is facing a ballooning budget deficit and a deflating state economy, and he has made some fine picks to head the Supreme Court and Superior Court.

But state law says, “The governor shall fill any vacancy within 21 days of the public submission by the commission.” And while you might cut him slack for blowing the deadline once, Carcieri has made it a routine, leaving one Superior Court seat vacant for more than a year.

So why hasn’t the governor filled the top spot on the District Court — a busy venue that DeRobbio proudly called “the people’s court”? Why hasn’t he picked from a list that includes four District Court judges?

Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe said, “The governor made a flurry of judicial appointments in the last few weeks of the General Assembly session, and he is continuing the vetting process. The chief judge of the District Court is a very important position of a very busy court system, and the governor wants to make sure he has the opportunity to meet with all the candidates and appoint the best person for the job.”

Common Cause Rhode Island executive director John M. Marion said governors originally had seven days to pick from lists of finalists. That deadline was extended to 21 days, but now Carcieri is “wholesale ignoring it” and, with no penalty for missing it, he “feels free to disregard it,” he said.

Yet appointing judges “is one of the core responsibilities of the executive. It should be a priority rather than an afterthought,” Marion said. “By not having a full complement of judges, we are not going to exercise the proper measure of justice. And it’s not just about justice. It’s about the legitimacy of government. If elected leaders don’t follow the law themselves, people lose faith.”

Rhode Island Bar Association President Victoria M. Almeida said, “While we would like appointments to be expeditious, it is more important to me and the bar that they be wise appointments.” She said the District Court “is not in paralysis,” acting Chief Judge Michael A. Higgins “has a long distinguished judicial career, and we have some of the best judges anywhere in that court.”

Almeida said, “Our democratic process, while imperfect, is more perfect than most, and it requires that judicial appointments receive the advice and consent of the Senate. Sometimes political consensus is necessary and is a challenge even in the most robust times.”

Still, if DeRobbio were alive, I bet he’d be urging the governor to act. In a January interview, Carcieri recalled that DeRobbio used to tell him, “Governor, I need [judges], I need them, get them to me, will you?” And as soon as he’d appoint one judge, DeRobbio would say, “Get the next one to me.”

So Carcieri need not wonder what to get the District Court for the holidays: a chief judge.

Newspapering the hard way

2009-11-04T07:57:00.000-08:00

By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | November 4, 2009

Tom Heslin, executive editor of the Providence Journal, does not say much in public about the broadsheet. And little surprise. The ProJo, which demands transparency elsewhere, has issued a long string of “no comments” about its own affairs.

So Heslin’s keynote address at the annual meeting of Common Cause Rhode Island last week arrived with an air of anticipation. What sort of vision would he lay out for the state’s paper of record? What kind of strategy would he outline for an industry in freefall?

Heslin started his speech with an amusing anecdote from his first reporting job at the York County Coast Star in Maine — a tale of a harbor master who told him a bit too much about a spill during a telephone interview, believing he was from the York County Coast Guard.

Then he turned to a small inscription that appeared in the paper: THWTB, an abbreviation for “The Hard Way’s the Best” — a motto, Heslin suggested, that has guided his ca-reer in journalism. Make the extra phone call, the credo demands. Dig a little deeper. Do it the hard way.

It is an admonition from another era — a muscular charge that the ProJo aims to bring into the digital age, Heslin said.

But putting the executive editor’s vision into practice will be no small task. Doing it the hard way in an era of diminished resources is, well, hard. And placing an emphasis on the instantaneous, on-line update — a central project of Heslin’s ProJo — means less time for the rigorous reportage of the past.

That’s not to say anyone has a better idea for how to operate in an uncertain era.

The steady migration of advertising from print to the web, heavy layoffs, and the primacy of the 24-hour news cycle have papers across the country going shorter and shallower in their coverage, even as they try to keep up some semblance of the depth and perspective that separates the broadsheet from other media.

But the formula, however ubiquitous, does not appear to be working. Average weekday circulation at American newspapers for the six months ending September 30 was down 10.6 percent from last year, according to recently released data from the Audit Bureau of Circulations. At the ProJo, the drop was nearly 19 percent.

And the paper’s parent company, Dallas-based A.H Belo, just reported that it lost $5.8 million for the third quarter — better than last year’s losses, but losses nonetheless. In-deed, the “hard way” is an apt description of the path forward for a newspaper industry in dire financial condition.

But Heslin seems remarkably upbeat about the future of the ProJo. In his speech at Common Cause, and in a question-and-answer period afterward, he had few answers to ques-tions about the long-term survival of the newspaper.

But he voiced confidence that the “journalism of verification” — the straight-news kind — would find a market, just as the “journalism of assertion” would. That an industry in crisis would find some equilibrium.

Here’s hoping.

Annual Meeting a Success!

2009-11-03T12:00:00.000-08:00

On October 29th over 140 people interested in good government gathered at Rhodes on the Pawtuxet to celebrate past victories and look toward the future at the Common Cause Annual Meeting. We awarded the Distinguished Service Award to Warren Galkin and the Excellence in Public Service Award to Thomas Bender. Thomas Heslin, Executive Editor of the Providence Journal, spoke about the future of newspapers and answered questions from the audience.

In Johnston, appealing a zoning decision costs $2,000

2009-11-03T08:06:00.000-08:00

By By Mark Reynolds

Journal Staff Writer
JOHNSTON — John Jalowy wonders if the local building official has made a bad call, but contesting the inspector’s zoning decision will cost $2,000.

The fee for that type of appeal ranges from $125 to $300 in five nearby communities. In Cranston, the appeal costs $500.

Not seeing anything remarkable about Johnston’s zoning process, Jalowy would like to know why it costs $2,000 in his town.

The answer is that Johnston officials boosted zoning fees in 2004 to bring more revenue to the town. Now, more than five years later, critics say the charge for zoning appeals simply discourages people from exercising their rights.

In the current economic climate, government officials should keep such consequences in mind if they are tempted to offset declining tax revenues by raising various types of fees, said John Marion, executive director of Rhode Island’s Common Cause chapter.

Charging residents $2,000 to appeal the local zoning officer is like charging speeders $2,000 to appear in traffic court and contest a speeding ticket, Marion said.

“People should have the ability to appeal the decisions of government that affect their lives,” he said.

The fee is so exorbitant that it might violate Jalowy’s due process rights under the state Constitution, according to his lawyer.

“If a fee is determined to be excessive, arbitrary and capricious, it would constitute a violation of one’s substantive due process rights,” said the lawyer, Terence Fracassa of Warwick.

Jalowy, acting through a lawyer, recently alleged that some people might be living in an accessory dwelling unit on a neighbor’s property, in violation of zoning laws, and he asked the town’s building official to investigate. On Oct. 20, the official, Bernard J. Nascenzi, ruled that the habitation is legal because the occupants are related to the neighbor.

When the council raised various zoning fees in 2004, George Corrente, who directed Johnston’s Building Department at the time and has since retired, argued that increasing the fees would capture an extra $150,000 to $160,000 in revenue each year.

Since then, the steeper fee schedule has helped the town collect greater revenue from zoning activities, such as issuing building permits.

But the appeals business isn’t booming. Nascenzi is proud to say he’s only seen one appeal since he started working for Johnston in 2005.

That appeal was filed by CapLease, a company and local taxpayer that recently listed $1.6 billion in property assets on its balance sheet and reported more than $89 million in revenues during the first six months of 2009.

CapLease, the owner of FM Global’s former headquarters building, contested a building permit for the construction of FM Global’s new headquarters.

Jalowy, of 737 Central Ave., lives a few miles up the road from CapLease’s building.

He lacks the same resources for dealing with unfavorable zoning actions.

“The fee that he would have to pay to make such an appeal,” said Fracassa, “may make it very difficult, if not impossible, for him to pursue what he thinks is a right that is legitimate.”

Johnston’s zoning ordinance says that fees for various zoning permits, requests and appeals are “not to exceed actual costs incurred for mailing, legal advertising and professional services…”

It isn’t clear how town officials reconciled that language with the appeal fee when they set it at $2,000.

Nascenzi said the fee schedule was established before he started working for the town.

If someone can identify and document “a factual basis” for the $2,000 fee, it might not violate the state Constitution, Fracassa said. If officials studied the fee before they established it, there might be a report that contains such documentation, he said.

“I’m not sure if that has been done,” he added.

Johnston’s zoning ordinance also says that the local Planning Board shall review local zoning rules at reasonable intervals, no less than every five years, and also whenever changes are made to the town’s comprehensive plan.

More than five years have passed since the fee schedule changed and, this past July, at the request of the town’s planner, the Planning Board adopted a new comprehensive plan.

Mayor Joseph M. Polisena, who has been in office for almost three years, did not respond to a request for comment on the situation.

When Fracassa recently asked the Johnston Town Council to review the fee schedule, Polisena likened the excessive fee to other problems he inherited from his predecessor almost three years ago.

“I say this tongue in cheek,” Polisena told the council.

The council has agreed to have town lawyers review the fee and make a recommendation.

Said the Zoning Board’s lawyer, Joseph Ballirano:

“We’re here to serve the people, and help them, not to hurt them with excessive fees.”

Columnist Ed Fitzpatrick: Who should be redrawing districts after 2010 census?

2009-11-03T08:04:00.000-08:00

At the Common Cause Rhode Island annual meeting, executive director John M. Marion pointed out an object looming on the political horizon: the once-a-decade process of redrawing political maps.

The Oct. 29 event drew about 140 people to Rhodes on the Pawtuxet. A flier noted that during its 39-year history, the “citizens’ lobby” has fought for an independent Ethics Commission, a merit-selection process for picking state judges and the “separation of powers” amendment to the state Constitution.

The flier also outlined the group’s “vision for tomorrow,” saying in part: “As we begin the next federal census in 2010, we will push for reforms that will make the goals of redistricting serve our citizens, and not the politicians. District boundaries should reflect communities, not incumbency protection.”

Marion said, “One of the leading problems in Rhode Island is that elections are not competitive. So we are going to try hard to make this the fairest redistricting it can be.”

I covered the last legislative redistricting process (in 2001 and 2002), and it was quite a ride, literally. I followed the redistricting commission from Woonsocket to Newport for public hearings. I wrote about the lawsuits and the charges of gerrymandering. I thought about compactness and contiguity. (And haven’t thought about them since.)

Back then, the process was especially complex and fraught with political peril because the General Assembly wasn’t just redistricting to reflect new census figures; it was also downsizing the House from 100 to 75 members and the Senate from 50 to 38 members to reflect a 1994 voter mandate.

Still, the next redistricting (based on 2010 census data) is bound to be intriguing. As Marion noted, “people are rewarded and punished politically with districts,” and with a battle under way to be the next House speaker, “the districts could reflect who supported the winners and who supported the losers.”

The process will also involve redrawing the congressional districts, and Marion warned that “somewhere down the road” Rhode Island could lose a district because it has some of the country’s least-populated congressional districts.

Redistricting is an intensely political process. But Marion noted that in 2008, California voters approved Proposition 11, which shifted the power to redraw many political maps from the state legislature to a 14-member Citizens Redistricting Commission. Also, he noted, the Ohio secretary of state is hosting a redistricting competition put on by groups such as Common Cause Ohio. The legislature will still redraw districts in 2011, but the contest will show what districts might look like based on criteria other than protecting incumbents.

Marion said Common Cause will push for a Rhode Island redistricting commission that does not include legislators or their representatives. A similar effort failed last time. But this time Common Cause also might create a “model redistricting commission” that would “show citizens what the maps could look like if politics was removed,” he said. (The idea comes from Yale Law School Prof. Heather Gerken.)

“Ultimately, I think the goal is to have something like California or Iowa, which is held up as a model, to have redistricting that isn’t done at the behest of the legislature,” Marion said. “The question is who should draw the districts — the people who have the most to gain by drawing districts that protect incumbents, or the voters who inhabit those districts?”

Journal editor underscores market for accurate news, suggests fee for online service

2009-11-03T08:02:00.000-08:00

by John Howell

Nov 03, 2009

The day could soon come when the Providence Journal Company will charge readers for its online news.

Thomas E. Heslin, senior vice president and executive editor of the daily newspaper, suggested that possibility as he addressed the annual meeting of Common Cause Thursday at Rhodes-on-the-Pawtuxet.

Heslin’s touched on the cost of providing accurate, timely and dependable information on the Internet during a presentation where he outlined recent changes in the newspaper and the Journal’s commitment to covering local Rhode Island news.

“We’re at a birth of a new era,” Heslin said emphasizing that the Journal is “holding on to values of accuracy, fairness and balance” in its 24-hour coverage on its Web site. Yet, he added, “the financial landscape of the news industry is very complex” and the company is looking at ways “to effectively and fairly charge for news content on the Web.”

And in a question-and-answer session following his prepared remarks he was asked directly if the Journal would charge for news on the Web.

Heslin said he is confident the business will transform itself and the Journal as well as newspapers across the country will find a way of providing content on the Kindle and e-readers.

“We want to be a multi-platform organization,” he said “We’ve just started. It hasn’t been invented yet.”

Heslin did not elaborate on how or when the Journal might start charging for content on its Web site.

Yet in his talk Heslin underscored the importance of the Web and how Journal reporters are reporting breaking news minutes after it has happened and with updates thereafter. He said standards of accuracy are in place and that “there is a market for verification.” As for the newspaper he used last Wednesday’s edition to illustrate the reach of the Journal’s 80 reporters and photographers in providing Rhode Islanders a picture of the community. In particular he cited coverage of the General Assembly and developments concerning the H1N1 or swine flu pandemic.

Of the company he said, “We aspire to be the news organization to set the agenda…this is the mirror…this is the big picture.”

In response to a question from Peter Von Stein, Heslin defended A.H. Belo, the parent company of the Journal, as “a pretty good newspaper publisher.”

Von Stein expressed concern over the Journal’s future, observing that the newspaper’s circulation dropped by 19 percent in the past year; that Belo has trimmed Journal operations and that Belo faces its own financial problems.

“How do you plan for a future in Rhode Island with absentee ownership,” asked Von Stein. “I’m troubled with people that have no interest in Rhode Island.”

“Most big complex media problems are not as simple as they seem on the face,” Heslin responded.

He said the Journal “run independently” and it is the “stewardship” of the newspaper that is important.

Heslin didn’t have an answer for the man who lamented the Journal’s reduction in local news coverage and his question who would be keeping an eye on municipal officials. But when former Representative Nick Gorham surmised people are more disenchanted with the General Assembly than ever Heslin said, “we are committed to covering the General Assembly.” He noted that in addition to coverage through the Journal’s Web site readers are able to biographies of legislators and votes on particular bills.

That was of interest to John Marion, executive director of Common Cause of Rhode Island. Marion would like to see a listing of all votes taken by legislators accessible on line.

Marion highlighted the organization’s mission “to hold our leaders accountable” adding “and that’s what we’re going to do.”

He said that Common Cause is “trying to rein in the money that taints our politics” and is moving forward with its agenda to see that when redistricting occurs, which will happen following the 2010 Census, that those districts are more representative of the community rather than designed to keep the incumbent in power.

Common Cause recognized Warren Galkin with the excellence in public service award and attorney Thomas Bender with the distinguished service award.

A longtime supporter of Common Cause, Galkin served as a member of the organization’s executive director and assistant director search committee.

In comments after receipt of the award from Common Cause President Kevin McAllister, Galkin spoke about the importance of good government adding, “for a state that’s in dire need of good government.”

As for the award Galkin said, “in this stage of life I’m not going to turn anything down and it doesn’t come much better than this.”

A member of the Common Cause Governing Board, Bender was recognized for his pro bono work and in particular two recent briefs filed with the Rhode Island Supreme Court in the cases of Irons v. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission, and In re Request for Advisory Opinion from the House of Representatives (Coastal Resources Management Council).

In the Irons case, Bender argued that members of the General Assembly are not immune from the State Ethics Code while engaged in their legislative activities, and are not entitled to a jury trial when “probable cause” allegations of Ethics Code violations were found to exist. The Advisory Opinion sought by the Rhode Island House of Representatives sought the opinion of the Rhode Island Supreme Court on four issues involving the 2004 Separation of Powers Amendments to the Rhode Island Constitution, including whether those amendments were self-executing.

In his acceptance, Bender said it was a “privilege to do this kind of work.”

Rhode Island panel eyes conflicts of elected officials with union ties

2009-10-31T08:11:00.000-07:00

By Steve Peoples

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE –– The state Ethics Commission is moving forward with a plan that would reverse a long-held position that largely guides the behavior of labor union members who are also elected officials.

Critics have long contended that organized labor wields tremendous influence in state and local affairs, at least, in part, because union members serve in the General Assembly and in local town councils and school committees. The Ethics Commission has consistently ruled that such officials may vote on union issues, and even participate in contract negotiations, so long as they don’t belong to the specific local union involved.

That may be about to change.

While a final vote is at least a month away, the commission has drafted a proposal that would prohibit elected officials from participating in any union business that affects not only their specific local union, but also the umbrella organization — such as the National Education Association — to which they may belong.

The issue arises most often, according to a commission analysis, with teachers elected to serve on school committees outside the district where they work. They have traditionally been allowed to vote on union issues, even though the NEA may represent teachers in both districts.

“After conducting research and receiving public input on this specific issue, the commission has concluded that the prior analysis applied to this issue is no longer valid,” reads the proposal discussed at the commission’s Tuesday meeting. The first of at least two required votes was scheduled for its next meeting, Oct. 20.

“I think it’s a major shift,” said commission Vice Chairman Ross E. Cheit, noting that the board welcomes public input. “If they don’t think this makes sense, I want to fully understand why.”

Organized labor has strongly opposed such a shift. In an interview Tuesday afternoon, AFL-CIO President George Nee warned of legal action should it become final.

“Instead of encouraging people to participate in the political process, they seem to be putting up more roadblocks and hurdles. They should listen to logic more than talk radio,” Nee said of the commissioners. “Obviously, we will be checking those issues with our attorney. If it can be the subject of legal action, I’m sure it will be.”

It’s unclear, however, whether the change would be subject to a court challenge.

The commission voted 5 to 2 Tuesday morning to address the matter by issuing a “general commission advisory,” as opposed to changing a specific rule related to the state code of ethics.

“I don’t think you can take an advisory opinion to court,” Cheit said. “It’s just advice.”

The policy shift –– which is backed by government watchdogs Common Cause and Operation Clean Government –– centers on the commission’s interpretation of the term, “business association,” as set in the state Code of Ethics. Traditionally, rank-and-file members have not been viewed as business associates of labor umbrella organizations such as the NEA or AFL-CIO, which consist of various local unions and receive a portion of each member’s dues.

The complicated issue has been visited 31 times since 1995, according to an analysis by commission staff attorney Esme DeVault. Almost half of those cases involved school committee members who were also members of teachers’ unions.

Valerie Zuercher serves as a recent example.

Elected to the Exeter-West Greenwich School Committee last November, she is also a social worker in the South Kingstown school district and therefore a member of that local teachers union and the larger umbrella organization, the National Education Association. The NEA also represents teachers in Exeter-West Greenwich.

In asking for an advisory opinion earlier in the year, Zuercher noted that the same NEA negotiator that represents her interests in South Kingstown also represents teachers in Exeter-West Greenwich.

The commission ruled there was no conflict.

But such advisories could go the other way should the new policy take effect, effectively barring Zuercher and others in her position from voting on teachers’ contracts or other issues involving locals represented by the NEA.

R.I. lawmakers close year’s business with a flurry

2009-10-31T08:07:00.000-07:00

By Steve Peoples

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE — Nine hours after Thursday night’s action began, state lawmakers filed out of the House and Senate chambers for what would probably be the last time this year.

They recessed shortly after 12:30 a.m. Friday, ending a rare October gathering of the part-time legislature after approving a slew of high-profile bills that outlaw text messaging behind the wheel, require $7 saltwater fishing licenses, force lenders to help homeowners avoid foreclosure, and tighten the state’s drunken-driving laws on land and water.

As his colleagues swapped goodbyes around him, an exhausted Senate Majority Leader Daniel P. Connors defended the Assembly’s work early Friday amid Republican criticism that Democrats had largely wasted their time this week.

“I think we accomplished a lot of important things,” Connors said, noting that in addition to adopting a bevy of new laws, several study commissions have been convened to address economic issues and structural budget problems.

Overall, the Assembly approved virtually everything on its crowded calendars — and a few items that hadn’t been listed on the calendars — racing to pass legislation left in limbo after lawmakers abruptly recessed for the summer in the early-morning hours of June 27. This week’s action also includes the passage of laws to outlaw indoor prostitution, re-open the Westerly branch of the Division of Motor Vehicles, and require the police to record interrogations of suspects in serious crimes.

Attention now turns to Governor Carcieri, who could wipe away much of the Assembly’ recent work with the stroke of his veto pen.

“Some bills were transmitted very, very late,” Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe said Friday, declining to specify when veto decisions might be made. “The team is expected to start the review process today with the governor.”

While there are enough Democrats to overturn the Republican governor’s vetoes, Assembly leaders don’t plan to reconvene their full membership until Jan. 5, according to Larry Berman, spokesman for House Speaker William J. Murphy. Lawmakers could overturn vetoes that day.

There is little question that the governor will exercise his veto power, as he has at the end of every legislative session.

While the Assembly resisted organized labor’s push to implement binding arbitration for teachers unions, they approved a controversial measure to increase the number of apprentices and other union workers on some construction projects.

Blasted as a handout to labor, AFL-CIO President George Nee later praised the move, which narrowly cleared the House before being passed overwhelmingly in the Senate.

“That’s a very important issue to the whole labor movement,” Nee said, noting that labor officials would lobby the governor’s office over the coming days against a veto.

The narrow passage of the apprentice bill, and legislative leaders’ unwillingness to approve binding arbitration, was cause for celebration for at least one labor critic.

“The public employee unions are on life support in that building,” said Rep. Douglas W. Gablinske, D-Bristol. “After decades of controlling the public policy agenda, there is a shift under way.”

Nee didn’t see it that way: “It’s not an easy place to do business when times are tough,” he said. “But we’ve been around a long time and we’ll be around a lot longer.”

Meanwhile, while the full Assembly likely won’t take any more formal votes this year, its business isn’t quite complete.

House Democrats will gather next week to discuss new legislative priorities and the state’s dire economic situation, according to Berman. The Senate, meanwhile, has convened four study commissions to examine budget and economic issues, according to Senate spokesman Greg Pare.

And both chambers will convene separate “economic summits” in early December.

This week, meanwhile, there were few items on the legislative calendars that weren’t ultimately approved.

But after the House passed a proposal that would wipe away criminal records of offenders with deferred sentences, the Senate failed to address the measure. It’s now considered dead, for this year at least.

The pace of this week’s action drew criticism from one government watchdog group.

Between Tuesday afternoon and the wee hours of Friday morning, lawmakers reviewed or voted on more than 200 proposals. Many were debated publicly in recent months, although some were changed in recent days.

“It was somewhat unbelievable to me how quickly it was moving. Sitting in the House gallery, I think I saw them do 23 bills in 20 minutes,” said John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island. “People lose faith in the democratic process when they think it’s being sped up for the convenience of their elected representatives.”

ASSEMBLY SCORECARDPASSED

Prostitution

Criminalizes indoor prostitution

Saltwater fishing

License required effective Jan. 1; $7 fee

State name

Voters to decide on removing “Plantations”

Texting

Text-messaging while driving is banned

U.S. Senate vacancies

To be filled by special election, not gubernatorial appointment

Gambling revenues

Lincoln to get larger share from Twin River’s receipts

Drunken driving

Police can get warrant for blood alcohol test

Same-sex rights

Partners gain right to make funeral arrangements

Boating safety

Tougher penalties for minors

operating while intoxicated

Foreclosure prevention

New requirements for lenders to work with borrowers

Westerly DMV

To be reopened one day a week

N.E. Patriots plate

Portion of fees to support R.I. charities

Mixed martial arts

Competitions allowed

Interrogations

Police must record

in capital cases

Bar closings

Extra hour on weekends

with no alcohol sales

FAILED

Criminal records

Automatic erasure in 5 years

after deferred sentence

POSTPONED

Binding arbitration

To settle teacher contract disputes

Congratulations Rep. Driver

2009-10-27T12:00:00.000-07:00

The House Judiciary Committee is voting now on a bill that the representatives had never seen. Congratulations Representative Driver for bringing that to everyone’s attention. The rules of the House are currently suspended and the House has no intention of obeying them.

R.I. General Assembly to reconvene over long list of issues

2009-10-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

By Steve Peoples

Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The General Assembly returns to Smith Hill this week after a four-month hiatus that left uncertain the fate of scores of bills touching everything from taxes, cell phones, license plates and fishing to even the state’s official name.

Related links

Your Turn: What issues do you want the R.I. Assembly to prioritize?
There will be little time for warming up.

Legislative leaders have scheduled hearings or floor votes for 196 individual proposals between Tuesday afternoon and Thursday night. And that number is expected to grow.

What was initially planned to be a narrowly focused two-day gathering may become a likely clearinghouse for legislation that has, in some cases, lingered in political limbo for years.

The coming days may be dominated by news of lawmakers’ attempts to outlaw indoor prostitution, but they may also ban text messaging by drivers, require saltwater fishing licenses of Ocean State residents, allow mixed martial arts fighting and ask voters to decide whether to eliminate the word “Plantations” from the state name.

Other proposals, also expected to pass, include the creation of a New England Patriots license plate, the re-shaping the state’s Economic Development Corporation, the re-opening of the Westerly branch of the Division of Motor Vehicles and a measure stripping from Governor Carcieri the power to appoint a replacement in the case of an unexpected vacancy in the U.S. Senate.

“They’re still fine-tuning some of the legislation, but this is the bulk of it,” Larry Berman, spokesman for House Speaker William J. Murphy, said of the 128 bills posted on House calendars for public hearings or votes before Friday. The Senate listed another 68 as of Monday evening.

State Republican Chairman Giovanni Cicione said that Democratic lawmakers, who dominate the Assembly, are wasting taxpayers’ time.

“Nothing good can come of this,” he said. “They should not be coming back to tinker. If they’re coming back, they should be doing something substantial to address the economic disaster facing this state.”

This week’s gathering comes three months later than Murphy intended when he abruptly left the rostrum in the early morning hours of June 27. Suggesting that circumstances required Rhode Island’s part-time lawmakers to become a full-time Assembly, the speaker said he would schedule a July session.

That never happened. And subsequent efforts to reconvene ultimately failed. Until now.

The public first learned of the specific plan for the week when legislative leaders began to post committee agendas Friday afternoon. Most of this week’s plans, however, were posted throughout the day Monday.

The scope of the agenda apparently surprised several political observers.

“I thought it was going to be more targeted,” said John Marion, executive director of the government watchdog group Common Cause. “It seems like they’re going to try to finish the bulk of what was left on the table the morning of June 27.”

He said that most proposals have been debated already, but suggested the narrow timeframe may complicate efforts to properly review changes or new legislation that may surface.

“There’s been a lot of rhetoric that they consider themselves a full-time legislature,” Marion said. “There’s no need to rush through this in two days.”

The bills posted on the agendas enjoy the support of the House and Senate leadership and are likely to pass both chambers by the end of the week, according to Berman. Once the same version of a bill passes the House and Senate, it becomes law absent a gubernatorial veto.

“You can never predict for sure,” Berman said of the likely passage of this week’s agenda. “Nothing is 100 percent.”

Legislative leaders have suspended the rules, which normally require 48-hour notice of all committee and floor action. That means committee hearings can now be held with a few minutes notice in unusual places, such as State House balconies and hallways, just as has happened in the final days of recent Assembly sessions.

“We’re trying to abide by the rules as much as possible, but we may need some leeway,” Berman said.

Among the high-profile bills excluded from the agenda is a proposal to allow binding arbitration for teacher’s unions.

The contentious issue pitted taxpayer groups against organized labor in a special House labor committee hearing last week. It has also become a battle on the radio and television airwaves in recent days.

The state’s largest taxpayer group, the Rhode Island Statewide Coalition, budgeted $4,000 for a “public education campaign” consisting of 30-second radio advertisement warning that, “An unelected person could get the final say, locking your town into contracts it can’t afford.”

The National Education Association, meanwhile, refused to disclose how much it spent on a separate radio and television advertising campaign that described binding arbitration a different way: “Your homework assignment is to call your legislators and ask for their support in binding arbitration for teacher contracts,” says Jodi Olivo, a fifth grade Pawtucket teacher in one of two television advertisements, adding that binding arbitration would end teacher strikes, “work to rule,” and excessive legal fees.

NEA executive director Robert A. Walsh said he was “concerned, but not panicked” that the binding arbitration bill wasn’t posted on any agendas.

“You never know what’s going to come up at the very last minute,” he said.

The legislature also plans to address legislation that would:

•Allow police to force chemical tests on drivers involved in serious accidents

•Reduce the minimum sentences for some drug offenses

•Destroy the record of any crime for which an admitted criminal has been given a “deferred” sentence, regardless of the nature of the crime, as long as the offender stays out of trouble for five years

Common Cause Rhode Island Annual Meeting

2009-10-25T12:00:00.000-07:00

Join us at the Annual Meeting of Common Cause Rhode Island, on Thursday, October 29th at Rhodes on the Pawtuxet. We will be having a presentation and discussion about the changing role of the media with Providence Journal Senior Vice President and Executive Editor, Thomas Heslin. Common Cause will also be honoring Thomas Bender with the Excellence in Public Service Award, and Warren Galkin with the Distinguished Service Award.

If you would like to receive information, or purchase tickets, please contact MaryBeth Marshall at (401) 861-2322 or email contact@commoncauseri.org.

Date:

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Time:

4:30 p.m. Business Meeting
5:00 p.m Cocktails/Registration
6:00 p.m. Dinner
7:00 p.m. Awards, Discussion and Questions

Location:

Rhodes on the Pawtuxet
60 Rhodes Place
Cranston, RI

Let’s All Obey the Rules

2009-10-21T11:57:00.000-07:00

By: John Marion

On Wednesday, October 28th, the Rhode Island House and Senate are scheduled to return from recess. Common Cause Rhode Island asks that upon their return both chambers reinstate their rules.

In the closing days of the General Assembly session in June both the House and Senate suspended significant portions of their rules. These allowed them to meet late into the night (and in one case the next morning) and hold hearings without advance notice. Without the rules in place, members can even be asked to vote on bills that they haven’t seen in advance.

On October 19th Common Cause sent letters to the leadership in the House and Senate (click here to read the House letter and here to read the Senate letter) asking them to reinstate the rules upon their return. We followed that with letters to all members of both chambers.

We believe government should be open and accountable. The General Assembly faces no statutory deadline for finishing their work. We feel the people deserve a legislative process that is open and deliberative.

Newsmakers: Government Watchdogs.

2009-09-18T15:07:00.000-07:00

Operation Clean Gov't, Common Cause guests

Updated: Sunday, 06 Sep 2009, 3:07 PM EDT
Published : Sunday, 06 Sep 2009, 3:07 PM EDT

EAST PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - This week on Newsmakers: What to do with the Ethics Commission? Following a Supreme Court decision this year that protects state legislators from much of the Ethics Commission bite, there is a move to change the state Constitution. Executive Director of Common Cause John Marion along with the President of Operation Clean Government Larry Valencia outline their plan to put the Ethics Commission back on the General Assembly map.

Then a march to promote less government is planned on Washington DC for September 12th. Local organizer Doreen Costa talks about the mission.

Common Cause urges AG to keep letters public

2009-09-15T12:00:00.000-07:00

On Friday, August 15, the Providence Journal printed an article entitled,
“Common Cause weighs in on letters,” written by Ed Fitzpatrick. The article highlights a letter sent by Common Cause RI to Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch about letters submitted on behalf of candidates for judicial office.

Click here to read the full Providence Journal article

Click here to read the August 13, letter sent to Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch

Commission to Choose Candidates for Superior Court Chief

2009-09-10T01:00:00.000-07:00

By Katie Mulvaney

Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE — After a two-month break, the Judicial Nominating Commission will be back this week to begin selecting possible candidates to be the next presiding justice of Superior Court.

The nine-member commission Tuesday will chose who it will interview to succeed Presiding Justice Joseph F. Rodgers Jr. following his retirement Aug. 28. The deadline to apply is Friday.

The commission also expects next week to begin advertising for applications for the state Supreme Court seat left open by Justice Paul A. Suttell’s elevation to chief justice, said Stephen J. Carlotti, commission chairman.

The commission in June completed a whirlwind round of interviews and public hearings for state bench vacancies, including the chief justice seat. Since the start of the year, the commission forwarded lists of finalists for five judgeships to Governor Carcieri.

Carcieri in May nominated Suttell, a former Republican lawmaker with six years on the high court, as chief justice. The General Assembly unanimously approved the nomination. In July, Suttell was sworn in with great fanfare after winning sweeping approval and wide praise from legislators.

In June, the governor selected Kristin E. Rodgers, a past partner with the Providence firm of Blish & Cavanagh, to fill the seat vacated by Superior Court Judge Vincent A. Ragosta’s retirement in May 2008. Rodgers’ nomination came the same day her father, Presiding Justice Rodgers, announced he would retire. She took her oath the day after Suttell.

Carcieri has yet to make nominations to the legislature for the five other judicial openings, including a District Court seat that’s been vacant since March 2008, the chief judge position on that court, a Superior Court seat and two on the Family Court. That number will rise to six with Rodgers’ retirement and possibly seven, if President Obama names Superior Court Judge O. Rogeriee Thompson to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seat vacated by Senior Circuit Judge Bruce M. Selya. Senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse have recommended her.

By law, the governor “shall” select a nominee within 21 days of receiving the commission’s list of finalists. The governor has said he considers that deadline advisory.

State lawmakers agreed last session to extend to June 2010 a law that allows the governor to select nominees from lists of finalists submitted by the Judicial Nominating Commission over the previous five years.

First passed in 2007, the legislation was backed by Governor Carcieri and opposed by the government watchdog group Common Cause Rhode Island. Before its enactment, the governor could choose nominees only from a list of three to five finalists selected by the Judicial Nominating Commission for a particular judicial vacancy.

Under the law, the governor can choose from any finalist list generated by the commission for various court seats over the previous five years. The law does not pertain to chief judge positions or to the Supreme Court.

kmulvane@projo.com

Let’s Amend the Constitution

2009-09-08T12:00:00.000-07:00

Common Cause proposes allowing the people to decide whether to the Constitution of the State of Rhode Island in response to the Rhode Island Supreme Court’s recent decision in William V. Irons vs. The Rhode Island Ethics Commission. We are asking the General Assembly to put the following language (additions in bold) on the ballot in 2010:

ARTICLE III

OF QUALIFICATION FOR OFFICE

Section 8. Ethics Commission – Code of Ethics – Jurisdiction. The general assembly shall establish an independent non-partisan ethics commission which shall adopt a code of ethics including, but not limited to, provisions on conflict of interest, confidential information, use of position, contracts with government agencies and financial disclosure. All elected and appointed officials of state and local government, of boards, commissions and agencies, shall be subject to the code of ethics and the jurisdiction of the ethics commission. The ethics commission shall have the jurisdiction and authority to investigate and adjudicate alleged violations of the code of ethics, including all acts otherwise protected by Article VI, Section 5, and to impose penalties, as provided by law; and the commission shall have the power to remove from office officials who are not subject to impeachment.

ARTICLE VI

OF THE LEGISLATIVE POWER

Section 5. Immunities of General Assembly members. The persons of all members of the general assembly shall be exempt from arrest and their estates from attachment in any civil action, during the session of the general assembly, and two days before the commencement and two days after the termination thereof, and all process served contrary hereto shall be void. For any speech in debate in either house, no member shall be questioned in any other place, except as set forth in Article III, section 8 of this Constitution.

Common Cause leader: Get Money Out of Politics

2009-09-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

by Russell J. Moore

Perhaps the biggest myth surrounding the ongoing fight in Congress to overhaul the nation’s health care system is that politicians and their bureaucrats are crafting a bill opposed by the health care industry, and in particular, the insurance industry.

A report by Common Cause, a non-partisan national organization with a chapter in Rhode Island that seeks to make government more open and accountable, seeks to debunk the myth. The report, titled “Legislating Unger The Influence”, details that from 2000 to 2008, health insurance companies have spent $83,695,546.

In 2008 alone, the health insurance industry spent over $20 million in campaign contributions to Congressional candidates.

This year, with the health care debate raging in Congress and across the country, the health care lobby, including health care professionals, pharmaceutical companies and health insurance companies, are spending an average of $1.4 million per day, says Common Cause.

“Every issue that Congress has to address today is tainted by the current system of campaign contributions and money in politics,” said Bob Edgar, Common Cause national president.

Edgar should know. He spent 12 years as a Democrat member of the House of Representatives, and left politics after losing a Senatorial bid to Philadelphia Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA), who was then a Republican.

The loss, in which Edgar claims to have been outspent by the Specter campaign, emboldened him to work for campaign finance reform. After a stint Edgar took with the National Council of Churches, he joined Common Cause. Edgar was in Rhode Island for a fundraiser, and took time to sit down with local reporters late last week.

The health care debate, Edgar said, while a vitally important issue, is merely a microcosm for how things work in Washington. The result, he said, is politicians caring more about placating special interest groups instead of their own constituents.

“If I’m a congressional candidate in Rhode Island, I don’t really have to raise any money from my own constituents. I can rely solely on special interest groups to fund my campaign,” said Edgar.

Common Cause’s Rhode Island chapter supports a relatively diverse group of interests, some of which would appeal to conservatives, and others to liberals.

For instance, Common Cause supports the removal of the so-called “master lever,” which allows a voter to check off one box and vote for all candidates belonging to a particular political party.

On the other hand, Common Cause supports public financing for elections, a position that is supported by progressives but conservatives take issue with given the fact that it spends taxpayer money.

Edgar seemed to gloss over the fact that Obama broke his pledge to accept public financing for his presidential bid last year. The president did so with the realization that accepting public financing would neutralize what was to be his significant fundraising advantage.

In any event, Edgar said he was hopeful that Congress would overhaul campaign financing. That, he said, would prevent the influence of special interest groups in serious debates like health care.

“We’re not anti-lobbyists. We’re anti-money in the system. We’re lobbyists ourselves, but we’re sort of like the Don Quixote of lobbyists,” said Edgar.

John Marion, the group’s Rhode Island executive director, said that the part-time legislature often relies on lobbyists for information—not an ideal situation.

“I had a Representative once ask me who I was a lobbyist for and when I told him he said, ‘oh you’re the guys with the good information,’” said Marion.

That’s the case, Marion said, largely because the group lobbies only for good government.

Common Cause also advocates for more participation in politics, and would like to see universal voting.

“The best system is an educated public,” said Edgar.

Edgar also joked that as a Congressman, he felt he was more likely to be corrupted by his friend in Congress, as opposed to his foes.

“Your friends are more likely to corrupt you. Your enemies only want to defeat you, but your friends will try to corrupt you,” said Edgar.

Heard us on WRNI?

2009-09-01T11:59:00.000-07:00

Hi, and welcome to Common Cause Rhode Island.

You’ve probably found yourself here because you heard about us on WRNI. We’re excited to be reaching out to potential new supporters through public radio. While you’re here we invite you to look around our website on some of the issues we’re working on. Perhaps you can join us for an educational forum on the future of the Ethics Commission on September 16th, or to hear about the future of newspapers at our Annual Meeting on October 29th. Or you can sign up to receive our email alerts. Common Cause, and our meetings and events, are open to anyone and we encourage you to take part.

If you have any questions about or organization, or would like more information about getting involved, feel free to contact us at contact@commoncauseri.org or call (401) 861-2322. And thank you for visiting.

Sincerely,

John Marion
Executive Director