Tagged: Sarah Taft-Carter

Providence Mayor Angel Taveras' latest State of the City speech celebrates the value of overcoming complex problems through collaboration -- a not-so-subtle contrast with the state pension overhaul championed in 2011 by the mayor's prospective Democratic gubernatorial rival  in 2014, state Treasurer Gina Raimondo.

In comments Tuesday evening to the City Council, Taveras notes the contrast to February 2012 when "Providence was running out of cash, and running out of time. In the months that followed, there were some who said Providence could not avoid filing for bankruptcy."

A former head of the Federal Mediation & Conciliation Service -- the government arm mediating Rhode Island's pension dispute among eight parties -- calls the case "the mother of all mediations."

Peter J. Hurtgen, who led the FMCS from 2002 through 2004, says a subset of the eight parties in mediation could potentially reach some areas of agreement among themselves. But he says the complexity of the case makes it unusually fraught for mediation:

State Treasurer Gina Raimondo, a leading advocate for litigating the pension case in court, is out with a statement responding to the mediation ordered this morning by Judge Sarah Taft-Carter:

“I have great respect for the judicial system and it is important to let this process unfold in an orderly and transparent way. We owe that to the people of Rhode Island and to our public employees.

Superior Court Judge Sarah Taft-Carter this morning told the two sides in the legal challenge to last year's landmark overhaul of the pension system to try to settle their differences through mediation.

Court spokesman Craig Berke says the talks will be facilitated by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, a branch of the federal government. Taft-Carter is due to be updated on the status of the discussions in early February.

The Rhode Island Judiciary is working to overhaul a media policy last updated in 1981 -- when manual typewriters remained in widespread use.

As it stands, trial justices have some latitude on the technology that reporters can and can't use in their individual courtrooms.