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The mass exodus out of Rhode Island seems to have leveled off but the number of taxpayers leaving Warwick continues year after year. It's clear to me that Warwick NEEDS to reclaim some of the 5,800 taxpayers that have left our city in the last ten years (according to the U.S. census). It's not rational to believe Warwick will attract them from out-of-Rhode Island. Therefore we need to concentrate on gaining new taxpayers from within our state. Marketing our beautiful beaches to other cities and towns, marking streets with "Beach" signs, creating a "Welcome to Warwick" magazine paid for by the advertisers inside it, (at NO COST to the taxpayers) and installing "Welcome to Warwick" signs on our borders will be a few of the ideas that should help. We have an excellent tourist department that can come up with other, new ways of attracting tourists, and new tourists become new homeowners and new taxpayers. It's time to market the great values Warwick has to offer to the rest of the state. If we got those 5,800 taxpayers back, they would pay millions in new tax revenue, allowing taxes to go DOWN on the rest of us!

Here's an example:

Say each new taxpayer pays $4,000 a year in all taxes. (real estate, car, tangible, etc.) I believe it's more than that but let's use $4,000 as an example. 5,800 new taxpayers paying $4,000 each is over $23 MILLION DOLLARS! That's $23 million dollars of taxes that Warwick DOESN'T NEED TO COLLECT FROM THE PRESENT TAXPAYERS. It's basic economics. Either collect MORE MONEY from the present taxpayers (as Warwick did for 18 years in a row), or collect MORE TAXPAYERS!

I have always supported the second option. It will help Warwick "Cut Taxes - Cut Spending". A catch phrase that has made good common sense for several years now.

Happy Summer everyone.

Rick Corrente

The Taxpayers Mayor