Thanks for stopping by for my weekly column. As always, I welcome your tips and comments, and you can follow me through the week on the twitters. Here we go.
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The Public’s Radio will have ongoing coverage (here and here) of Friday’s demonstration in Providence.
1) The challenge facing any social movement is converting activism into change. So it will take time to assess the impact of the mass movement that formed in response to the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police almost two weeks ago. Yet the potential exists for some serious change to the status quo, as evidenced by the broad support for steps to oppose racism and reduce social inequity. “We got to come with an action plan,” Brother Gary Dantzler of the Black Lives Matter RI said during a Statehouse news conference Friday, hours before a demonstration organized by young activists. The presser revealed mutual appreciation between Dantzler and Gov. Gina Raimondo, who said they’ve been quietly working together for years. The governor called on white people to check themselves. “Even those of us who work to end racism,” she said, “our experience of racism is an observed experience, it’s not a lived experience.”
2) A worthwhile watch via Trevor Noah: “George Floyd and the Dominoes of Racial Injustice”
3) Gov. Raimondo talked repeatedly this week about the need for her to listen with humility. On Friday, she repeated that and said she’s counting on young activists “to hold us all accountable” in Rhode Island. “They’re impatient and God bless them for their impatience because we’re out of time, and it is time to take action.” In talking earlier this week with local members of BLM, “and they said to me, Governor, we need equal opportunity, we need equal access to housing and affordable housing, we need equal access to affordable healthcare, we need to end to the disparities between black and white in healthcare outcomes, we need our kids to be able to go to college and afford it and graduate, we need equal access to job, we need our wages to go up, we need our schools to deliver for our kids. And so that’s what I’m committed to, working with you to bring about real action, so we have equality in healthcare, education, wages, opportunity, housing, college, jobs, job training. That’s what we need to take action on.”
4) On the General Assembly front, Senate President Dominick Ruggerio has advised his members that he expects the full legislature to return the week of June 15-19. “We will be considering a revised supplemental budget and very limited business,” Ruggerio wrote in an email. “It is important that we enact a supplemental to address the serious budget gap in the current fiscal year, and that will give us flexibility to await clarity from the federal government on what additional assistance they may provide, and/or whether restrictions on current aid may be loosened. I firmly believe it would be extremely unfair to all Rhode Island residents and businesses to proceed on an FY2021 budget without additional clarity on federal aid. Any FY2021 budget bill enacted without this aid would be devastating.” (Ruggerio said the Senate is adding “additional safety precautions” due to COVID-19, to try to keep lawmakers safe.)
5) House spokesman Larry Berman emails reps regarding the supplemental budget: “Upon passage by the [Finance] committee, it will be brought to the House floor for consideration. Unlike the FY 2021 budget, this legislation does not require a seven-day review period before consideration by the full House. The House and Senate are working collaboratively with the Administration and the Department of Health to ensure that the appropriate precautions are being taken to safely hold our sessions. In the meantime, committees will continue to meet next week.”
6) The Law Enforcement Officers’ Bill of Rights has long been viewed as an obstacle to effective management of bad behavior by police. Back in 2015, Steve Frias, the RI GOP National Committeeman, offered this observation as part of an op-ed in the ProJo: “LEOBOR should be repealed. At a minimum, police officers charged with misconduct should not be paid and given benefits while suspended from their jobs. Suspension with pay is an incentive to pursue delay. Also, police officers should not be judged in secret by a panel made up of only fellow police officers. Only a few states with LEOBOR laws require disciplinary panels to be made up exclusively of police officers.” Now, state Rep. Anastasia Williams (D-Providence) has put LEOBOR back on the agenda, describing an overhaul of the measure as part of what is needed to reduce racism in the state. “Get it to my desk,” Gov. Raimondo said Friday, noting how changes would need to come through legislation. The wild card remains House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello, who remained non-committal when asked about this at Williams’ news conference, and Senate President Ruggerio.
7) Rep. Williams’ presser had all the feels: her dramatic call for change, boilerplate from Speaker Mattiello, and the simmering frustration of activists. At one point, Williams called for people of color to get more politically active. A man in the audience countered by saying the process hasn’t worked for African-Americans “for over 400 years.” Has the local political process been rigged against people of color? There’s the example of how redistricting 20 years ago led to Juan Pichardo being pit against Charles Walton, who lost his seat as the only African-American member of the Senate. But Williams is also correct to note how people of color (and many others) have long opted out of the political process.
8) With military vehicles downtown and barricades lining the Francis Street side of Providence Place, was the state overreacting on the morning of the big demonstration? Critics said: yes. The governor said the state needs to be prepared for the possibility of some bad behavior after downtown Providence was hit by disorder and vandalism late Monday into Tuesday.
9) A dispatch from honorary Rhode Islander Devin “Short Pants” Driscoll, who led President Obama’s RI campaign in 2012, and now calls Minneapolis home: “For the past ten days, Katie and I have turned on the evening news and seen harrowing images of a nation gripped by anger and fear, sadness and frustration. The event that sparked the marches, the vigils, and the calls to action — the killing by police of George Floyd — happened in our community. The Minneapolis Police Third Precinct, which was burned to the ground on the third night of protests, is less than a mile away from the Church of St. Albert the Great, where we were married and our son, Jack, was baptized. At a press conference in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, Gov. Tim Walz listed rankings in which Minnesota sits near the top: best place to live, to raise a family, to find work. This is all true, he said, but only if you’re white. Many of our neighbors who are black, indigenous, and people of color live a life in the North Star State that would be unrecognizable to those of us who are able to live what Time Magazine once called ‘The Good Life in Minnesota.’ We have the worst achievement gap in educational outcomes in the nation. The Twin Cities are deeply segregated because of a long history of housing discrimination. And police violence is a regular feature of the lives of black Minnesotans. In 1968, the federal Kerner Commission acknowledged that white America created, maintained, and condoned ‘two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal.’ This warning went unheeded. For too long systems of oppression and injustice have poisoned the places we live in and love — the Twin Cities; Minnesota; Rhode Island; the United States. A reckoning is at hand. We must now seize this moment and work together to rebuild –without the systemic racism that pervades our lives. I don’t have the answers; but I will listen, I will learn, and I will try to do better.”
10) Maria Bucci, a Democratic candidate for mayor in Cranston, has staffed up with an roster of political talent, as I reported this week: Erich Haslehurst, Jamie Rhodes, George Zainyeh, Kate Coyne-McCoy and Wally Gernt. Her Democrat opponent, Steve Stycos responded by vowing to make Cranston a more just community.
11) It’s not every week that the Ethics Commission throws out a staff recommendation and potentially pave the way for a well-known lawmaker to win a nomination to the Rhode Island Supreme Court. Whether Sen. Erin Lynch Prata (D-Warwick), the departing chairwoman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, will actually get nominated remains unknown for now. (Gov. Raimondo, under pressure to name a person of color, vowed this week to pick the best candidate after getting a list from the Judicial Nominating Commission). Lynch previously made her case for why the revolving door should not apply to her. But from a PR perspective, the Ethics Commission is taking it on the chin. John Marion, executive director of Common Cause of RI, said the group was “sickened” by what happened with the 5-2 vote: “A majority of the Commission members ignored the staff’s sound legal interpretation of the Code of Ethics in order to give a pass through the revolving door to Senator Lynch Prata. In doing so the Commissioners ignored the plain meaning of the law and turned their back on both legal precedent, and a thirty year fight to end backroom deals and establish an independent judiciary for our state. Until the playing field is truly level, Rhode Island will never get the government and judiciary it deserves, one that is truly reflective of our great and diverse state.” And this from RI GOP Chairwoman Sue Cienki: “For the Ethics Commission to override its own staff, there must have been a great deal of behind the scenes pressure from the State House. The Ethics Commission sent a message today. Lynch is a cinch for the Supreme Court. Sitting judges should not seek the appointment. Qualified persons of color should not bother applying. Despite all the civil unrest in our country, Governor Raimondo will not even consider appointing a person of color to the Supreme Court. She has already made a deal to appoint a State House politician.”
12) GA talk: Rep. Mike Morin (D-Woonsocket) is signing off … Rep. Brian Newberry (R-North Smithfield) and Lauren Carson (D-Newport) have announced their seeking re-election …. Rep. Joe Almeida (D-Providence) is undecided about seeking another term …. Tim Rudd of the Pawtucket City Council is seen by some as having Senate leadership’s support for the seat being vacated by Sen. Donna Nesselbush, but Senate spokesman Greg Pare said no decision has been made on that. Councilor Meghan Kallman, a progressive, is also running for the seat …. Alana DiMario of Narragansett, who had a strong showing last time out, has joined the Democratic race for the seat being vacated by Sen. James Sheehan (D-North Kingstown).
13) Twin River, a major source of state revenue, is getting closer to reopening, on June 8.
14) Dylan Zelazo, director of administration in Pawtucket, is contemplating running for a citywide council position in Cranston. In a letter seeking the support of Democratic city ward committee chairs, he wrote in part: “The 2020 Election is about our future as a city. With two young sons, my wife and I are very focused on the future of our public schools. We want to see a greater priority placed on collaboration with the Cranston School Department to make our schools even better for the next generation. It’s time to invest in our future as a community, and that starts with education. Other priorities that are at the forefront of my conversations with neighbors throughout Cranston include infrastructure investment, economic development, and public safety. Our infrastructure is in real need of reinvestment so that our residents and businesses have what they need in order to have the best quality of life and business climate possible. From recreational facilities to roads to school buildings, our focus on improving our public assets must be smart and balance our taxpayers’ ability to pay with the quality facilities our residents deserve. The plan must be bold and strategic as we prioritize the best interests of all Cranston residents, and literally build the future of our city.”
15) The state unveiled a work share program this week aimed at shaving a few million dollars, or more, off the deficit.
16) The loneliness of the lieutenant governor, via Jim Hummel.
17) You know there’s other stuff dominating the news when renewed talks between Rhode Island’s two largest hospital groups get just fleeting attention.
