The Rhode Island Department of Transportation announced on Wednesday plans to introduce a new traffic pattern to improve travel times over the Washington Bridge in Providence. State transportation officials say they plan to add one new eastbound and one new westbound lane in eight weeks. That will bring the total number of lanes from four […]
Olivia Ebertz
Olivia Ebertz comes to The Public’s Radio from WNYC, where she was a producer for Morning Edition. Prior to that, she spent two years reporting for KYUK in Bethel, Alaska, where she wrote a lot about how the warming climate is forcing local Indigenous communities to change their traditional lifeways.
Prior to her career as a journalist, Olivia worked in film. Her documentaries have screened at festivals worldwide.
Olivia likes to pursue stories inspired by questions from community members.
Ella habla español, lei parla italiano, и она говорит по-русски.
Posted inLocal, Metro Desk, Transportation
Here’s what bus riders think of RIPTA’s proposed service cuts
Eighteen-year-old Angela Sarmiento is a regular on RIPTA bus 18. She uses it to get from her home in Cranston to school, or to her job at a retirement home on the East Side of Providence. She says it’s pretty reliable. “It comes on time. It’s never late,” she said. But Sarmiento’s commute might get […]
Posted inLabor, Local, Metro Desk
ABC6 workers announce union campaign
Rhode Island and Southeast Massachusetts workers at local news station ABC6 are launching union organizing efforts, according to two employees with the unit’s organizing committee. The workers, who want to join the Communications Workers of America’s broadcast arm, The National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET), say they are calling for a union because […]
Posted inEducation, Local, Metro Desk
Brown RISD Hillel leaders say they received anonymous threats
An anonymous source sent violent threats to Brown-RISD Hillel leaders on Sunday morning via email, according to the organization’s executive director, Rabbi Josh Bolton. According to a campus police report, the emails were sent from a Swiss IP address. Brown University president Christina Paxson and RISD president Crystal Williams said campus police responded to the […]
Posted inArticle, Education, Local, Metro Desk, Politics
Student protestors from Brown University plead not guilty to trespassing charges
Half of the student protestors at Brown University arrested for occupying a building after hours pleaded not guilty to charges of willful trespassing on Monday, the latest development at a campus that’s been the site of increasing pro-Palestinian activism.
Posted inArticle, Education, Local, Metro Desk, Politics
Brown University students end hunger strike after confronting school board members
Seventeen Brown University students in the eighth day of a hunger strike broke their fast on Friday after coming face-to-face with the board members who have been the targets of their protest campaign. The students on hunger strike, along with hundreds of others, have been asking the Brown University Corporation Board of Fellows and Trustees, […]
Posted inEducation, Local, Metro Desk, Politics
Brown Board won’t vote on divestment amid student hunger strike
Nineteen students at Brown University were joined by dozens of supporters at a rally on the school’s main campus green on Monday, during their fourth day of a hunger strike meant to put pressure on the university to divest from “companies which profit from human rights abuses in Palestine.” The rally comes after Brown University’s […]
Posted inEducation, Local, Metro Desk, Politics
19 Brown students are on a hunger strike for divestment
Nineteen students at Brown University say they’ve begun a hunger strike, in the hopes that the board that oversees the school will agree to bring the issue of divestment to a vote. The news comes amid Brown’s Corporation Board’s winter meetings, which end on Feb. 10. The students say they will not end their hunger strike […]
Posted inLocal, Metro Desk, Politics, Transportation
Lessons from Rhode Island’s free ferry experiment
The Bristol-to-Providence free ferry was a short-lived experiment that started on Dec. 21 as an emergency response to the Washington Bridge closure. But it was dropped on Jan. 19 because of low ridership and steep costs. Does that mean commuter ferry service in the Ocean State is a lost cause, or could it play some […]
Posted inArts And Culture, Education, Local, Metro Desk
Rudolf Haffenreffer collected dozens of human remains. Now Brown University wants to give them back
The Haffenreffer Museum at Brown University expects to transfer its full collection from Bristol to Providence in the fall of 2025. But before it does, it wants to return the roughly 86 human remains in its collection to their rightful Tribes of origin. The repatriations are long overdue, as a federal law requiring them has […]
