Tagged: General Assmebly

House Speaker Gordon Fox is distancing himself from responsibility for the demise of 38 Studios.

Moody’s Investors Service says the $8.1 billion budget signed into law by Governor Lincoln Chafee on June 15 “is credit positive for Central Falls and schools, but leaves Woonsocket and pensions unaddressed.”

Moody’s points to “a material increase in funding for schools” — $34 million, or almost 4 percent, “marking the third consecutive annual increase in school funding. State funding for education now stands at over $900 million, well above pre-recession peak.”

A series of union lawsuits filed today in Superior Court — aimed at stopping the sweeping state pension overhaul enacted last year — shouldn’t come as a surprise, says Robert Walsh, executive director of the National Education Association Rhode Island. He says opponents made their stance clear before the overhaul was passed by the legislature and signed into law by Governor Lincoln Chafee.

Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist once famously talked about shrinking the federal government “to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” Providence native Joe Nocera uses his New York Times’ op-ed column today to argue that state Representative Jon Brien is wielding a similar cudgel to cut spending in Woonsocket:

The Rhode Island GOP yesterday held its second in a series of recent news conference to introduce a batch of legislative candidates. The latest bunch was enthusiastic and their let’s-rock-the-status-quo messaging is potentially appealing in a state suffering from persistently high unemployment.