Because this great event has long-since outgrown Rhode Island’s ability to contain it, and sales tax is still cheaper in Massachusetts, the Follies will be held on Friday, February 24th at 7:00 PM just over the border at the Venus de Milo Restaurant , 75 Grand Army Highway (Route 6) in Swansea, MA.

This popular dinner and political satire show is attended by every politician, activist, and news media personality in Rhode Island’s political scene, for a total of about 1,250 people. Tickets are $65.00/person. A spectacular buffet dinner is included, and of course, the big show. RIRA has reserved two tables (20 seats), with the option of reserving more if there is additional demand.

Note: Since this is a union-held event, the audience does tend to skew somewhat Democratic / Leftist / Commie, so be forewarned! If you are a Republican and want to sit with us (for your own safety), please contact RIRA President Raymond McKay right away at president [at] ri-ra [dot] org or 401-487-2514. These tickets are definitely going fast, so do not wait, as this event always sells out.

Sen.Tassoni says Mr Dionne and I need to get our facts straight. I am up for that challenge.

Mr Dionne said the senator’s sponsorship and support of Binding Arbitration was based on his past relationship with labor unions. The senator’s  answer was that he’s no longer employed by a union. Correct. But that does not change the fact that he was in the past as Mr Dionne stated. Not to mention his newspaper’s (http://www.commongroundnews.net) advertisements are at least half for unions, affiliated organizations or businesses owned by fellow democrat politicians. While the senator is no longer a public union employee, he  is clearly in good standing with the public sector union political action committees. In the 2nd quarter of this non-election year he received over $2500 in public sector PAC donations. (http://www.ricampaignfinance.com/RIPublic/Filings.aspx)

Moving on to the Binding Arbitration Bill (S0794   http://www.rilin.state.ri.us//BillText11/SenateText11/S0794A.pdf )and the Senate votes on it on June 29th. (The Senate Journal http://www.rilin.state.ri.us/journals11/senatejournals11/SJournal6-28.pdf). Sen.Tassoni sponsored the bill. If it is a conflict to vote for a bill, how can it not be to sponsor it?

There were 7 votes related to the bill. 5 amendments,  a motion to move the final vote to June 30th and the actual vote on the bill. Sen.Tassoni recorded no vote on the first 6 votes and finally abstained on the 7th. Final total 6 walks, 1 abstention.

Is binding arbitration bad for Smithfield and North Smithfield? I am not an expert so I’ll defer to the elected municipal officials. Of the 21 elected municipal officials (Smithfield 5 council, 5 school committee; N. Smithfield 5 council, 5 school committee, 1 administrator), 15 are listed in opposition at the RI Coalition Against Binding Arbitration website (www.ricaba.org). The rest have not answered, yet. The opposed includes the 3 members of the democratic majority on the Smithfield School Committee.

Clearly the municipal officials in the 22nd senate district  think this idea is a bad one. From the national media it appears states are not enacting this idea right now. Most are running away from it. 

Yes, sometimes our General Assembly members should recuse themselves. Sen.Tassoni has sponsored hundreds of bills in his time in the RI Senate. He generally makes the top 5 in the number of senate bill filled every year. Researching how many time he has recused himself since his election is not an easy task. However, I would bet the number can be counted on 2 hands.

Recusing oneself from an issue should include not submitting bills on the subject, not voting on the subject and not advocating for the subject. About a third of the senator’s letter was singing the praises of the binding arbitration bill he submitted. Score 1 out of 3 on recusing.

Phil Hirons, Jr.

Chair, Smithfield Republican Town Committee

Vice President, RIRA

We want to encourage you to remember the 20 Senators who voted against your city, your right to elected representation, and of course, your wallet. If you live in their district, please consider running against them or helping those who will be.

The 20 have a “Y” between to their last name and district number and are highlighted in red below:

CALENDAR
ITEM 30 2011S 794 SUB A
McCAFFREY LABOR
School Teachers’ Arbitration
PASSAGE

YEAS – 20 NAYS – 17 NOT VOTING – 1

SENATOR VOTE DISTRICT CITY/TOWN

ALGIERE N
BATES N
CICCONE Y 7 PROVIDENCE/NORTH PROVIDENCE
COTE N
CROWLEY N
DaPONTE Y 14 EAST PROVIDENCE/PAWTUCKET
DeVALL Y 18 EAST PROVIDENCE
DiPALMA Y 12 LITTLE COMPTON/MIDDLETOWN/NEWPORT/TIVERTON
DOYLE Y 8 PAWTUCKET
FELAG N
FOGARTY N
GALLO Y 27 CRANSTON
GOODWIN Y 1 PROVIDENCE
HODGSON N
JABOUR Y 5 PROVIDENCE
KETTLE N
LANZI Y 26 CRANSTON
LOMBARDO N
LYNCH Y 31 WARWICK
MAHER N
McCAFFREY Y 29 WARWICK
METTS Y 6 PROVIDENCE
MILLER Y 28 CRANSTON/WARWICK
MOURA N
NESSELBUSH N
O’NEILL, E. N
OTTIANO N
PERRY Y 3 PROVIDENCE
PICARD N
PICHARDO Y 2 PROVIDENCE
PINGA N
RUGGERIO Y 4 PROVIDENCE/NORTH PROVIDENCE
SHEEHAN Y 36 NARRAGANSETT/NORTH KINGSTOWN
SHIBLEY N
SOSNOWSKI Y 37 NEW SHOREHAM/SOUTH KINGSTOWN
TASSONI NV 22 SMITHFIELD/NORTH SMITHFIELD
WALASKA Y 30 WARWICK
PAIVA WEED Y 13 NEWPORT/JAMESTOWN

Click here to view the embedded video.

Gov. Christie on Twitter – http://twitter.com/GovChristie

Gov. Christie on Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/GovChrisChristie

Source: Breitbart.tv and The Blaze

Superintendent Melinda Thies has received an official complaint by Bristol Rep. Doug Gablinske who claims that Pat Crowley of the statewide National Education Association (NEA) delivered political remarks and went so far as to urge teachers in attendance for an official orientation session to vote against Gablinske in the approaching September 14th Primary. Gablinske has been a supporter of reforms to public employees’ pensions and other elements of their contract compensation packages as well as a supporter of the state’s new Education Aid Formula.

“It’s outrageous, it’s inappropriate and RISC is demanding to know if, in fact, there was illegal political campaign activity conducted by the local teachers’ union and statewide NEA during an official teachers’ orientation, on public school grounds, during a professional teachers’ forum,” blasts RISC President Jim Beale. Beale notes that several hundred teachers and other school staff assembled for the orientation are paid for such out-of-classroom orientation days by the school district as part of the duties associated with their professional contract.

“A teachers’ orientation session, held in school facilities should not be used for the local Teacher’s union and the statewide NEA political lobbyists to tell public school teachers how to vote in the upcoming Primary election. Representative Gablinske has called for sensible- – and affordable- – union contracts and pension packages and so the unions are going after him in this Primary.”

RISC is also calling on the Superintendent to publicly offer full disclosure of the emails in question. The head of the local teachers’ union, Bristol-Warren Education Association (BWEA) President Jennifer Saarinen is alleged to have used the official school district email system on August 19th not only to send a message to teachers to vote against Rep. Gablinske and vote for his primary opponent—but also allegedly to urge teachers to take part in a campaign canvassing activity for the opponent scheduled a few days later.

“It is also outrageous that a school district’s official email system is being hijacked with campaign messages and having the local teachers’ union President telling teachers how to vote in district wide email,” Beale concludes. “The taxpayers pay for that system and it is inappropriate- -and a violation of school policies -that it be used for purposes of free political advertising for the opponent of Rep. Gablinske.”

Press Release: Rhode Island Statewide Coalition

EPTA Seeks Auditor General Review of Impact of Teachers’ Contract on School Deficit and Taxpayers before Council Approval of New Pact

The East Providence Taxpayers Association (EPTA) today wrote to Acting Auditor General Dennis Hoyle expressing its concerns that ratification of the newly proposed teachers’ contract by City Council would result in additional unlawful school department deficit spending unless a viable deficit elimination plan approved by the Auditor General is adopted first. The East Providence City Council is set to consider approval of the new teachers’ contract at its meeting Tuesday evening at 7:30 PM at City Hall.

The School Department announced in April that it had an anticipated school budget deficit of $2.5 million in the current fiscal year. State law requires the School Department to develop a corrective action plan to eliminate the deficit and to transmit the plan to the City Council within five days of the discovery of an anticipated budget gap. The plan must also be approved by the Auditor General. The School Department has not yet produced a deficit corrective action plan approved by the Auditor General.

The EPTA letter asked the Auditor General to communicate to the City Council before the close of business Tuesday his views about the advisability of the Council ratifying the teachers’ contract before a corrective action plan for eliminating the current year’s school budget deficit was approved. The letter also asked the Auditor General to communicate to both the City Council and the School Committee his opinion about whether or not the East Providence School Department is currently in compliance with the state laws requiring development and approval of a deficit elimination plan. The EPTA also asked the City Council in a separate letter to defer approval of the contract until a deficit plan was approved.

EPTA spokesperson Bill Murphy said, “We do not believe it is advisable for the City Council to ratify the proposed teachers’ contract until there is a deficit elimination plan in place that has been carefully reviewed and approved by the Auditor General. This is all the more true given that the contract does not include cost-savings proposals like a temporary 3% reduction in pay, and replacement of seven (7) paid sick days with unpaid ones that School Committee legal counsel had previously stated in an April 21st letter to the teachers’ union were required by law to eliminate the budget deficit in the current fiscal year. In addition, the proposed contract contains increases in longevity and base pay as well as sick day buy backs. The agreement also does not include the provision for reopening negotiation of salary and health insurance costs in the last year of the contract that had been included in an earlier April 27th proposal. The School Department has said it is working on plans to eliminate the deficit by achieving savings in other areas, and we hope this will be possible.”

Murphy continued, “The bottom line, though, is that we simply cannot afford the risk of signing a contract that could lead to further deficit spending at a time when the city and its taxpayers can least afford it. We can’t risk a mistake that will lead to more deficit spending that could jeopardize the future financial stability of the city or our ability to borrow at the most competitive interest rates possible. The best insurance against these risks is for the Council to wait to approve the teachers’ contract until the Auditor General has approved a deficit elimination plan for this year that takes the financial impact of the new contract into account.”

Murphy finished his statement by noting, “It is vitally important that this situation be handled carefully in order to ensure the ultimate ratification of the new teachers’ contract without the unlawful accumulation of additional debt. This contract is a watershed accomplishment in that it includes agreement between the School Committee and the teachers’ union on education reforms including a longer school year and school day, common planning time and improved professional development for teachers, and the institution of a performance-based compensation system while at the same time eliminating many of the unreasonable and excessively costly pay and benefits provisions of the old contract. We are confident that careful attention to the deficit spending problem will enable us to win passage of a teachers’ contract that moves our School Department forward while at the same time ensures that we are complying with the laws against deficit spending.”

Press Release: East Providence Taxpayers Association

“Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members’ money down the toilet on a pointless exercise,” the official said. “If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November.”

Lincoln relied heavily both on Obama’s endorsement, which she advertised relentlessly on radio and in the mail, and on the backing of former President Bill Clinton, who backed her to the hilt.

Lincoln foe Bill Halter had the unstinting support of the AFL-CIO, SEIU, AFSCME and other major unions. And labor officials Tuesday evening were already working to spin the narrow loss of their candidate, Bill Halter, as a moral victory, but the cost in money and in the goodwill of the White House may be a steep price to pay for a near miss…

Read More: Politico

It has been reported that Frank Caprio, candidate for Rhode Island Governor, has proposed a new form of hybrid pension plan for active state employees. While promoting this plan might appear to be a legitimate state function for the General Treasurer, the timing of Caprio’s proposal, coming just days after the Providence Journal published an op-ed piece by RIGOP Chairman Giovanni D. Cicione exposing Caprio’s past opposition to pension reform and in light of Caprio’s history on this issue, demonstrates that the proposal is nothing more than political posturing and the misuse of his staff’s time to promote his gubernatorial campaign.

“For three and one-half years, General Treasurer Frank Caprio embraced the status quo in Rhode Island’s public employee pension plan,” noted Chairman Cicione. “This transparent attempt to score points as a fiscally responsible candidate for governor is an election year ploy and the General Treasurer is using taxpayer supported staff and resources for political activity. Caprio and the employees of the General Treasurer’s office should be apologizing to Rhode Island taxpayers for the billions of dollars in unfunded pension liability that Caprio has been content to oversee instead of working on his campaign for Governor.”

In announcing this plan, Caprio was quoted as saying, “he first recommended a hybrid system in 2008.” This statement, however, is completely refuted by the facts. For example, the Providence Journal reported in January of 2008 that “Caprio has not yet taken a position on what, if anything, the state should do to lower its annual pension costs or $4.9 billion in unfunded liability for the promises the state made in earlier years to current and future retirees. Instead, he has been ordering up studies.” (ProJo 1/25/08). Speaker of the RI House, William Murphy, appointed Caprio to a pension review panel later that year and he continued to “study” the pension issue throughout 2008 as the panel missed deadline after deadline to issue its report. (ProJo 9/22/08).

As late as March of 2009, the Treasurer’s designee to the pension review panel opposed a proposal to limit annual COLA increases to the first $30,000 of pension benefits, which is similar to the proposal now supported by the Democratic leadership of the General Assembly (Pension Commission Final report, pp. 229-230). As recently discussed in Cicione’s op-ed, Caprio has a long history of collaboration in the under funding of the State pension system and the use of unrealistic projections to hide the true scope of vast unfunded liabilities.

“Now that the political winds have shifted, Caprio wants to portray himself as a fiscal conservative,” continued Cicione, “but taxpayers will remember Frank Caprio’s history as a member of Rhode Island’s Democratic leadership that is responsible for this pension mess and that can no longer be trusted to oversee a defined benefit pension system. Thanks to the irresponsible actions of the General Assembly, including those of Former State Representative and State Senator Frank Caprio, the burden on taxpayers to support the state pension system is far beyond anything that Caprio’s hybrid pension plan could address adequately. Instead, we need to move as many public employees over to a 401k style plan as soon as possible and get this pension mess behind us as quickly as possible,” concluded Chairman Cicione.

Press Release: Rhode Island Republican Party

Mr. Nee also wants mandatory binding arbitration this year and expressed that it was his “number one priority.” This would hinder any attempt to reduce the give-away deals that are present in many of these state and municipal collective bargaining agreements. Binding arbitration and perpetual collective bargaining agreements are bad legislation and puts the municipality at a disadvantage at the bargaining table and places an unfair tax burden on the property owners. These union groups have had it their way for decades but now they must be stopped to save the state from a pending receivership. The RI AFL-CIO leadership only cares about the public unions and not the welfare of the taxpayers of this state. Their constant dominance and lobbying at the state house has hurt every taxpayer of this state.

With this state being in the deplorable economic condition, perhaps the taxpayers should start calling for Rhode Island to be a right-to-work state and have “open shops.” The public unions are abusing the “privilege” they were given back in 1966 with the passage of “The Michelson Act.” Perhaps that law needs to be revisited and repealed as well. The taxpayers can and should push for that legislation to counter what big labor is doing to them right now; make it their “number one priority.” If this legislature is unwilling to listen to the taxpayers and allow themselves to be intimidated by these union hacks and their threats of withdrawing support for their re-election, then they will discover the voters will have the final say in the matter come November. Rhode Island is finally waking up to these unions and their underhanded tactics. The corruption is spreading in the municipalities and the unions do nothing to stop it; they pander to this behavior. Enough is enough – a change is needed now!

L.Chappell
Saunderstown, RI

You told the House, Now Tell the Senate: NO BINDING ARB!

Thank you for your recent messages to the RI House of Representatives in objection to the new Binding Arbitration bill. Now, however, it is time to address Bill S2603 in the Senate. This bill is the Senate version of the House Binding Arbitration bill, and it has been introduced by Senator Michael J. McCaffrey.

Like the bill in the House, S2603 provides that if a new collective bargaining agreement cannot be agreed to by the parties, the terms and conditions of the old three-year agreement remain in full force until a new contract agreement is reached. The result: public-sector unions would have no motivation to negotiate new contracts that bring their salaries and benefits into line with those of the average taxpayer.

Furthermore, senators who are themselves state workers or related to state workers will vote on this bill when they should recuse themselves, despite their obvious conflicts of interest.

Please notify your senator that you expect him/her to oppose this Binding Arbitration Bill and that your vote in November will be based upon his/her actions during this legislative session.

News Release: Rhode Island Statewide Coalition