Looks like we citizens of Little Rody might be gettin' heard, finally, eh? Methinks the smarter folks in the legislature are feelin' an ill wind blowin' down their collar as we try to retake our state government from the special interests that now dictate what happens. This Providence Journaql column may give you an idea why.

Edward Achorn: Try a little openness . . .

01:00 AM EST on Tuesday, March 28, 2006

THE PUSH IS ON for voter initiative -- for better or worse -- as increasingly desperate citizens fight for some means to make Rhode Island government more responsive to the general interest and less of a tool of special interests. A poll released last week by Alpha Research Associates, of Providence, found a whopping 91 percent of registered voters would like to see the proposal placed on this November's ballot, and 59 percent would vote for the measure.

Even the blinkered politicians of Rhode Island had to be struck by those numbers. People are clearly unhappy about the Ocean State's uncompetitively high taxes, poor job growth, extraordinarily generous public-employee entitlements, struggling schools, and the arrogance of power displayed by some of those in the inner political circles. Citizens are seeking a way to get the state back on track, and they don't see it in legislative elections alone, which are strongly dominated by the money and manpower of special interests, limiting choices.

Unfortunately, voter initiative is an often crude way to govern -- as we have seen in some states, where majorities used it as a bludgeon to beat down the minority, by outlawing gay marriage. The truth is, vocal minorities with good lobbyists tend to be better and more fairly represented in the sausage making of the legislative process.

On the other hand, when some well-financed special interests -- notably those represented in the Ocean State by union bosses Frank Montanaro and George Nee -- call almost all the shots, representative government can be just as oppressive. Note that Messrs. Montanaro and Nee, among others, are aggressively opposing voter initiative.

Obviously, Rhode Island would be best served if its legislators would try to strike a balance, and begin to focus on what would generally benefit everyone in the state. That is the moderate alternative to a citizen uprising and voter initiative.

House leaders have, in fact, taken some steps in that direction. Speaker William Murphy is pushing a measure to bring Rhode Island income taxes more in line with those of Massachusetts (Senate President Joseph Montalbano and his crew, unfortunately, are resisting this crucial reform). And Mr. Murphy has reformed House rules to increase public accountability and essentially eliminate voting fraud by his own members.

But that should be just the beginning. There are good ideas staring members in the face, if legislative leaders would permit a vote on them:

H7123 would require Rhode Island to follow the example of New Hampshire and Vermont, in letting citizens immediately and easily call up, on the Internet, the voting record of any legislator. At present, Rhode Island citizens can only extract a legislator's voting record from the tallies of each bill, a laborious process.

H6814 would require cities and towns to post on the Web their budgets, charters, and collective-bargaining agreements.

H7733 would require that, before ratification of a collective-bargaining agreement, the public would have to be notified of its principal terms and projected cost. That would give citizens a much better sense of how their tax dollars are being spent.

H7580 would remove the pensions from local collective bargaining, as they are from state collective bargaining. That would tend to limit the little-observed deals at the local level that end up driving property taxes into the stratosphere.

H6802 and H6803 would require the Joint Committee on Legislative Services, the administrative arm of the legislature, to be regularly audited, with the results posted on the Web. That would let citizens easily figure out how $37 million of their tax dollars are being spent each year.

The above ideas are sponsored by Rep. Jim Davey (R.-Cranston), who knows something about bad government. He worked for U.S. District Judge John Sirica during the Watergate cover-up trial of Richard Nixon's aides.

The question, of course, is whether those bills can ever see the light of day in the General Assembly. Citizens can call Mr. Murphy at (401) 222-2466 and Majority Leader Gordon Fox at 222-2447 and ask them to make sure the relevant committees allow a vote instead of simply setting the bills aside. Why shouldn't members at least go on record about these ideas?

Obviously, many of the special interests on Smith Hill believe, with good reason, that citizen involvement is unhelpful to them. But legislators should realize that too little public involvement in a representative democracy tends to make for very costly government with second-rate services. Ultimately, that hurts everyone who has a stake in the future of Rhode Island: rich and poor; public and private employees; whites and minorities; heterosexual, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and/or transgender citizens; men, women and (especially) children. And bottling up citizen outrage, year after year, only works until the bottle explodes.

Edward Achorn is The Journal's deputy editorial-pages editor. His e-mail address is eachorn@projo.com.

Are you sure this is RI and not WI?

This is something that could be printed in the Madison Times with only a few changes for names and places.

This is an example of the "good news" that is out there but often doesn't come to the attention of people....Good for you Rhode Islanders!

Yeah, but methinks opposition from the most egregious special interests (e.g. teachers, unions, government workers and NGO's professionals) is buildin' steadily. Consequently the people've decided to revolt usin' voter initiative as the catalyst, eh?

We pretty much got a one party system here, with Democrats pretty much controllin' all branches of state government. Strangely the exception is the position of Governor but since the Dems keep puttin' up people so far to the left no one in their right minds'd vote for and the GOP puts up moderates and so dominate Governor's races.

A word of caution from a man in the state where the initiative process has run amok. You have to develop a system that cannot be corrupted by special interests from either the left or the right. If you think that the legislature has been bought and paid for, wait until the entire electorate is seduced by some side or another.

Best thing to do, Doc: public funding of campaigns. CA is starting to make some moves in that direction...

We already got that, to a degree. Unfortunately the Democrat leadership and them same special interests I mentioned in my previous post short circuited any independent or third party candidates bein' eligible.

Methinks they were tryin' to (successfully) kill off the Cool Moose Party (a populist party with some libertarianism tossed in), which had really started gainin' favor here. At the same time it stopped the growth of our Green Party.

Our current voter initiative petition calls for a complete prohibition of out of state funding for any proposals and requires a super majority (60%) of votes cast to pass. Workin' on other safeguards too, eh? We don't wanna make it too easy, lest we run amok ourselves.

Texas deregulated electricity a few years back and the wink and a nod back room dealing is going full force here.

Last sumer the utilities sited the 88% increase in the cost of electricity was because of Natural Gas price increases due to the huricanes. Natural Gas has fallen back to below what it was before the huricanes, guess what the price of electricity is? Still 88% higher than what it used to be.

The old folks on fixed incomes are picketing the headquarters to TXU and Reliant Energy trying to shame them into lowering the cost. My idea would be to seize a couple of the Sons of Bitches running those two companys and see how they like dressed in tar and feathers.

Wish I could laugh but- been there, done that. CA is still recovering from the Enron manipulation of energy prices.

Doc, coming from me I know you'll be shocked, but damn the Democrats. Often as not, when they're in control they are just as pernicious as the Republicans- the agenda of both is to keep it that way.

I know I'm a pretty staunch Democrat, but sometimes I say: a pox on both their houses.

If democracy is to survive here, we need a strong multi-party system. Period.

I want you to know if you don't already- this is not the first time I've expressed this opinion.

Whilst methinks I and others here'd agree with you, but 'twould seem our local GOP's so inept that 'tain't in the cards here. Democrats, who've been holdin' power here ever since Bobby Kennedy busted up the "Families" that'd kept things runnin' smoothly, done everything necessary to keep any third party movements or independents from gainin' any success.

Seems like voter initiative's 'bout our only alternative. Methinks this letter to the editor'll express a bit of what we here be feelin', eh?

Lawmakers vs. Rhode Island voters

01:00 AM EDT on Saturday, April 15, 2006

Rhode Island is well known as the state with an abundance of "freebies," the nation's "candy store." With that in mind, I was extremely disappointed to read that a Senate Committee voted against Voter Initiative.

With the state facing a budget deficit of $350 million, we taxpayers absolutely need new influence in our government. Balancing the budget is of prime concern, and anything would be an improvement over what we presently have.

Voter initiative would give citizens an alternative when their lawmakers fail to listen to the very people who voted them in office.

Opponents asserted that voter initiative would allow majorities to trample minority rights and use the ballot referendum power to ban same-sex marriage and end some forms of affirmative action. But the proposed legislation would aim to protect everyone's civil rights by establishing reviews of ballot questions.

Some senators were concerned that children would be denied health benefits. Hogwash! Children have never been denied health care and will not be in the foreseeable future as long as we put a cap on all the freebies and immigration. The sooner, the better.

It's obvious that some senators refuse to admit what has happened in Massachusetts with Proposition 2 1/2, limiting property-tax increases. I find it hard to believe that Rhode Islanders would not be interested in tax relief.

If not for a few people at our State House, this could happen. Maybe our lawmakers think we are all idiots, and maybe we are. We keep re-electing the same people who are bent on marching to a different beat than the taxpayers.

I hope this may serve as a wake-up call.

DOLORES JORDAN
Greenville

Good luck to Little Rhody !

FloriDUH has passed some voter initiatives but Jeb just ignores them. Sounds familiar ?
(It must be a genetic trait)

(G)WS: I agree totally that we need at least two viable parties for democracy to work.
And even then it is a crap shoot.