Ferri plan would limit influence of lobbyists

My take on the news

Lonnie Barham
Posted 8/20/14

FERRI PRODUCES A GOOD PLAN: State Representative Frank Ferri, the Warwick Democrat who is running for lieutenant governor but has flown mostly under the radar since announcing his intention to run, …

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Ferri plan would limit influence of lobbyists

My take on the news

Posted

FERRI PRODUCES A GOOD PLAN: State Representative Frank Ferri, the Warwick Democrat who is running for lieutenant governor but has flown mostly under the radar since announcing his intention to run, has published his proposal for enforcing ethics among lawmakers and lobbyists in our little state. It would prohibit contributions to elected officials by lobbyists and political action committees while the General Assembly is in session.

Ferri said that lawmakers typically “hold fundraisers every week during the legislative session.”  It provides lobbyists and special interest groups unfair access to legislators – access the average constituent can’t afford. In Ferri’s words, “These fundraisers have replaced the smoke-filled back rooms of years past to become the modern-day place where legislation is really won and lost.”

Ferri’s proposal would also require that legislators wait one year after leaving office before lobbying their former peers.

Ferri has three formidable opponents in the race for lieutenant governor – Republican small-government advocate Catherine Taylor who formerly headed the Department of Elderly Affairs, Cumberland Mayor Dan McKee who seems to be a realist who supports charter schools, municipal consolidation and other attractive ideas; and current Secretary of State Ralph Mollis who has been entrenched in local and state politics for decades.

Although many of us think the lieutenant governor position should be eliminated, if it is going to continue in existence, then Ferri’s proposal puts him clearly in the running to win it. Voters who have longed for clean government in our seemingly corrupt state will welcome Ferri’s proposal.

MY MATH ERROR OVERSTATED WARWICK’S ROAD REPAIR BUDGET: Thanks to Bob Cushman for letting me know that I erred in last week’s column when I calculated the percentage of Warwick’s 2015 municipal budget that is dedicated to road repairs. The budget allocates only $450,000 of the total city budget of $138 million to road repairs. That’s only three-tenths of 1 percent of the budget, not 3 percent as I indicated.

This seems to lend even more importance to Republican mayoral candidate Stacia Petri’s point that annual tax increases in Warwick have gone almost exclusively to boosting employees’ salaries and benefits, and to increased benefits for retirees instead of to city operations like road repairs and other tangible services.

Devoting less than one-third of 1 percent of the budget to road repairs seems ludicrously shortsighted on the part of Mayor Avedisian when many of our streets are in great need of repair.

REED AND ZACCARIA ON CORPORATE INCOME TAX: The race between Democratic Senator Jack Reed and Republican Mark Zaccaria illustrates clearly the stark difference between the two on corporate income tax. Reed is in no hurry to lower it, yet he is pushing hard to mandate that corporations not be allowed to buy or merge with foreign corporations in order to lower their tremendously high U.S. tax burden. Zaccaria wants to eliminate the corporate income tax and eliminate the need for corporations to try to circumvent the U.S. tax rate that is the highest in the developed world, currently at 39.1 percent.

Zaccaria’s argument seems logical. First, it is unfair for the U.S. government to twice tax the same income. Corporate earnings are distributed to shareholders who pay personal income tax on the money. Why should both the corporation and the shareholders have to pay tax on the same earnings? Second, eliminating, or just lowering to a competitive level, the corporate income tax would keep all corporate earnings in the U.S. Indeed, it would create a plethora of new jobs and would attract a tremendous amount of foreign investment that could resurrect our dormant economy.

Zaccaria said, “If Mr. Reed and his colleagues really want to reverse the outward flow of the corporate tax base, their course of action is clear: They should lower all tax rates and vastly simplify the tax code for both corporations and individuals.”

Reed’s response, “Corporate tax reform is overdue that would require closing loopholes and lowering rates.”

OK, Jack! Get to it! Don’t further penalize corporations and their shareholders and inflict more harm on our economy while you and the rest of the Senate dilly-dally on lowering the corporate tax rate and fixing the tax code.

PILING ON IN FERGUSON: Initial information after the police shooting of an 18-year-old black man in Ferguson, Mo., indicated the man had refused a police order and then attacked the police officer, pushed the officer back inside his police car and tried to wrestle the officer’s gun from him. A shot was fired inside the police car during the wrestling and the black man backed off.

What happened next is key to possible culpability by the police officer. At least one witness, a friend of the victim, said the police officer charged the victim and shot him repeatedly as he was “giving up” with his hands raised. Police say the 6’2”, 292-pound man was again charging the police officer. Surely, physical evidence of where the victim fell, the number of shots fired, the angle of the shots, and whether or not any of them went through the victim and struck pavement will point to what happened once the victim pulled away from trying to wrest the gun from the police officer.

It is certainly possible that the police officer, after being assaulted by the NFL-sized man and after having to wrestle to hang onto his firearm and his life, was so frightened and angry that his emotions took over and he overreacted to the point of killing without cause. Or, the victim may have still been pressing his attack on the police officer outside of the police car. Either way, the investigation will determine the facts.

What doesn’t help is that government at all levels, politicians, race instigators, celebrities, and just plain troublemakers are all piling on with their pre-judgment of the situation – all blaming the police, of course. Even President Obama has weighed in making statements that imply police culpability. And he has sent scores of FBI agents and the U.S. Attorney General to the small city to investigate.

The vast majority of police officers diligently perform their duties, protecting the lives, property and rights of the citizens in their communities. Once in a while a police shooting occurs. Usually it is justified. On the rare occasions when a police shooting is not justified, legal action must be taken against the officer involved.

Our society can ill afford, however, to allow every police shooting of a black person to become a national cause célèbre with every politician, celebrity, activist, and journalist jumping in and pre-judging the situation. Such piling on incites violent riots, destruction of property and, in many cases, further loss of life.

BLOCK PROPOSES HELPING VETERANS: Referring to how our military veterans are treated, Republican gubernatorial candidate Ken Block said, “In a time when our front pages cover the story of illegal immigration and how we pay for it, we have a humanitarian crisis right here of U.S. citizens who have served our country - and our country is not well serving them.”

Block has proposed that, like many other states, Rhode Island should create a Department of Veterans Services. Currently, our state has a unit that is designed to provide such services but it is within the Department of Human Services and does not have access to the governor like department heads do. Thus, it cannot advocate for veterans as strongly as it should.

Block also wants to eliminate state income tax on military retirement pay, as about a dozen other states have done. With the average military retirement in the U.S. at only $22,000 per year and so few military retirees living in Rhode Island, the cost to state government would be miniscule.

According to Block, there are 72,000 veterans living in Rhode Island, most of whom did not serve long enough to retire but who still served their country with distinction – many in combat zones and other dangerous assignments. They would all benefit from a stronger voice in state government. And the few who served for a career deserve to enjoy the fruits of their dangerous labor without having to share it with state government.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: Hillary Clinton, former Secretary of State under President Obama and an almost-certain candidate for president in 2016, is clearly trying to distance herself from the unpopular president as the election draws near. In an interview with The Atlantic magazine last week, Clinton blamed Obama for his failure to fully support the rebels in Syria, a failure that fueled the rise of the al-Qaida breakaway group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) that has taken over much of Iraq.

Clinton spoke of President Obama’s foreign policy timidity and his lack of organized foreign policy direction – a policy designed primarily around Obama’s verbal guidance of “don’t do stupid stuff.”

Clinton told the interviewer, “Great nations need organizing principles, and ‘don’t do stupid stuff’ is not an organizing principle.”

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